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Question posted 9/21/07 by Nat Frissken, Swag Design " Is it possible to print the foil blocking on a pack before the colours when it is on press? I thought all the foil blocking was done at the end of the run and therefor it would not be possible? " Reply to posted 9/21/07 by Bob From www.theprintingexperts.com The short answer is no. If you try to run a foil through a press it will be destroyed by the heat. Foiling is only done following printing. Also, if you were asking (blocking not term used here) if it can be run inline on the same press the answer is no. They are two different types of presses, one offset and one letterpress. Question posted 7/16/07 by Donna West, Fox's Biscuits " Can you please provide me with the definition of a cromalin and uses for them?. " Reply to posted 6/11/07 by Pre Press From www.losangelesprintingcompany.com Cromalins were used as a contact proof from the film in order to show color and registration. This is also a product from DuPont, and the generic name is Match Proof or Matchprint. It is actually 3 layers of materials made by outputting from the press ripped file as separations. They are then assempbled as a CMYK composit and a clear overlay is added to the top to hold all in place. It is no longer an accurate guage as film was never quite accurate due to stretching and registration issues due to the material as compared to todays digital offset printing where the file is burned directly to the plate by laser. Question posted 6/6/07 by Jerwin Po, Cityshirt, Manilla, Phillipines "I wonder where I can source metallic gold or silver paperboards, and are these suitable for offset printing?. " Reply to posted 6/11/07 by Sales From www.1printingsource.com In this country all of the paper houses offer "cast coated stock" with many in both text and cover weight. King James is a popular brand but there are many other less expensive ones and they all print well. There are other substrates such as mylar, foil, plastic, etc. but they are not suitable for the average offset press. Question posted 6/6/07 by George Janes, Ontario, Canada "What causes a single fold on, for example a greeting care, to open up? What other considerations other than point thickness should be taken into consideration in selecting a qulity card stock. " Reply to posted 6/11/07 by Sales From www.theprintingexperts.com Not to overly simplify your response, but your fingers cause a greeting card to open as it will not pop open itself.:-) Other than point thickness, you can also take into consideration paper type. Point grade stocks are of less quality than cover grades and will more than likely require die scoring thus raising your cost to produce, thus the price to the customer.Therefore it is generally best to use a good cover grade than a C1S or C2S board. Anything over 100# gloss book (5 pt) should be scored by at least a rotary bindery score. Grain direction will also help in folding. If you fold with the grain, you will be less likely to see cracking on the fold. Question posted 5/11/07 by Karen, Thomas Printing "I am trying to get some feedback on a printing error situation I recently encountered: I was notified of an error where a letter dropped off the page. Where should have been a four letter word, there are now only 3 letters. My production staff provided a file that was correct, and between our hands and the printing vendor we chose, the letter dropped off. A proof was submitted to our staff, that clearly shows that the 4th letter is missing. The proofer missed this completely because he was not looking for anything to change here. What I'm looking for is some feedback on where the fault should lie. Since we gave them the correct files, should they be liable for something that changes even though we approved the incorrect proof? Is the fault 50-50, or does the fault lie with the our proofing process? Any feedback is appreciated!" Reply to posted 5/10/07 by Estimating From www.theprintingexperts.com The liability is never the responsibility of the printer once the customer approves the proof supplied. This is usually found in every printers contract with their customers as well as in general printing practices as posted by the Printing Industries of America (PIA). First of all, who knows the work better then the customer who created, therefore who better to proof it? If the customer misses something it is the customer's liability. Now all that said, if you are a regular customer of the printer, then many printers will work with you to help mitigate the situation with the best costs to fix the problem. It also sounds as if you were the design company or some third party intermediary between the end user and the printer and if that is the case, you should not have been proofing this, but instead having your customer proof it once you gave it a general review. Question posted 10/10/06 by Nolan Scott, Notepad Planet "I am trying to find information on the most economical method to gang print full color notepads that would be 25 pages thick. Does anyone have suggestions on printing this product: either 6 up or 12 up? how to finish the pads when sheets are printed?, how to cut the paper? thanks for your help!" Reply to posted 10/14/06 by Estimating From www.losangelesprintingcompany.com It is not totally clear whether you seek it printed or you will be printing it. You have not advised what press you are using if you would be printing it. Our press gang runs four color process on 70# offset text if you are looking for a venue or if you are printing this, you need to supply your equipment info. If you are ganging this you would want to wait a sufficient period to build the largest gang and run the biggest sheet your press can handle. One cuts paper with a paper cutter if that was your question. Question posted 10/3/06 by Kim Christian Are there any guide lines or rules to follow when typesetting a layout for very thin print paper? Reply to posted 10/7/06 by Matt From www.pbdink.com They would be the same rules for any type of paper. There is not anything special required for thinner paper stock. Just pick readable fonts and be sure to give them to your printer with the layout files. Fonts change from foundry to foundry and if you do not want your work to reflow, always provide your fonts. Question posted 6/27/06 by Nipun from TAFP, Bangalore "Which one
is better to print - offset or digital irrespective of costs ? Also how
do we convince a client to indigo print Reply to posted 7/1/06 by Ira From www.1printingsource.com With respect to your first question, regarding which is better, the answer is that they are non comparable. Most modern offset presses today are digital, which means they print direct to plate. All digital is not offset. Indigo is not offset as it is a rotary form of inkjet printing with offset inks. Docucolor, Docutech, similar machines and other forms of inkjet printing are digital but not offset. Therefore, which is better is not comparable. Which is better between the varying technologies, is based on quantity, available turn around time and in some cases effect. Regarding using uncoated paper on an Indigo machine, this is not recommended as Indigo cannot even run on regular coated paper, requiring custom coated papers for the machine manufactured in Chicago and possibly elsewhere. Question posted 6/9/06 by Allen of SAP LLC What are the different types of commercial printers and what can they do exactly? And what is the different text ink available for those printers? Reply to posted 6/10/06 by Patrick From www.pbdink.com Hopefully Allen, you are referring to commercial printing and not a desk top inkjet or laser printer. If the later, we cannot answer your question as you would therefore have posed it to the wrong entity. Now assuming you are referring to commercial printing, the basic types are web rotary, sheet fed and toner printers. Web rotary is for high volume and high page count printing and utilizes roll stock. It is further broken down into two main sub groups: heat set, meaning it has heaters to dry the ink and can therefore run roll stock and non heat set, without heaters and is relegated to uncoated offset stock. There is also the rotary label press, the smallest of the lot as well as their being full web, running 16 pages (in some cases 32 using double 16 configurations), half web, quarter web and Didde web, running 4 page signatures. There is also the Indigo press, which is a small rotary press that is plate-less and film-less and generally good for ultra small quantities that you need quickly that may serve as a prototype for a larger run down the road. We then move to the sheet fed offset presses which in most cases run from the smallest running a four page signature to the 40" running 16 page signatures. There is also what is referred to as the packaging presses, which can easily run up to 90". Toner presses are the Docutech and Docucolor from Xerox with Canon and others also in the marketplace. Question posted 12/21/05 by Dimitri Dominguez of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona Define - Press Check Reply to posted 1/2/06 by Patrick From www.pbdink.com A "press check" is where the client goes to the press to view the materials to be printed for color, registration and the overall print quality. It begins following the pressman completing his/her make-ready of the run, bringing color and registration up to the press standards. The customer then views the materials (one signature or several) and asks for color adjustment based on the available color in the file and registration tightening, if required as well as cleanups for "hickies" and other form of dirt. A press check is not the place to be reviewing typos or any other items that should have been seen in the proofing stage. Similar results can be obtained with a "press proof", where the pressman completes the make-ready and pulls an actual printed sheet to deliver to the customer at the customer's location. The "press proof" is a very expensive process, as the press is kept idle, awaiting approval or requested changes. Question posted 12/6/05 by Cara Parker from Key West Party Company "My retail party
store wants to set up printing service for wedding and other party
invitations. We are looking at the Xerox phaser but need Reply to posted 12/10/05 by Patrick From www.pbdink.com First of all the type of printer who you would need is a "quick printer" and not a "commercial" printer. A "quick printer", runs the most simplistic machines such as the AB Dick duplicators or Hamada presses and specializes in low quantity runs. The key is to find one locally with good quality, remembering that quality is relevant to the equipment used as well as the care of the press and the knowledge of the pressman. You could also Google the larger companies that can supply you with standard items from a catalog and there are those that service the quick print industry. Question posted 8/23/05 by Denise from Hurley "Is there a sight on the web that offers a simple calculator for calculating how many you can run up based on your press sheet size? Reply to posted 8/27/05 by Patrick From www.pbdink.com Not that I am aware of. It depends on the size of the press. A 40" press can run ten 8.5 x 11" sheets up, with two right angled on a 26 x 40" press sheet. A 28" press can run 6 up. It is downhill from there based on the size of press. You could also try the paper company web sites as well as just "Googling" your question.
Question posted 7/13/05 by April Pasquariello from Oh What A Bagel "I currently own a bagel store and want to open another business, more towards home accessories. I have a wholesale company I go thru to purchase my items. I want the items to be in my own catalog under retail prices. How can I go about getting this done?"
Reply to posted 7/14/05 by Scott From www.losangelesprintingcompany.com If money is short, many of these catalog type wholesalers offer a catalog with an imprint and hopefully without prices. You then would just have to insert a price sheet. Should that not suffice, then to plan your catalog you first should decide how many items you want to include, how many require images and do a simple mockup in Word, or pencil as to how you would place them on a page, how much copy, how big the items and lastly how many pages that would entail. Your choices for catalogs would be, 4, 8, 12, 16 and so on in increments of four on a sheet fed press or 8 pages for a web press should you require a high run. Assume that every four pages is an additional cost and only you know your budget. I suggest that you start small and reprint, adding pages as required, with a new venture. You probably could secure the images from the wholesaler, thus bypassing the need to hire a photographer and doing scans, should it not be digital photography. The images should be 300 dpi tiff files, not jpg files and not lower than 300 for color. Write your copy and try to make it compelling, offering benefits and not statistics or "we offer, etc." Folks want to know the benefits of buying your product and buying it from you vs. your competitor. If the budget permits, hire a professional copywriter who understands the USP (Unique Selling Proposition) style of copy. If you are going to design it yourself, just know that Word, Publisher, or any cheap home desktop software is not usable in the world of printing. If you are not designing, hire a designer who has previously designed for print. Knowing how to make something pretty is not enough. A designer must know how to make it applicable and usable in the printing and binding processes.
Question posted 6/23/05 by John Brodt from Behan Communications, Inc. "Hi. I'm hoping someone can give me some guidance. I'm fairly new to the design field and am trying to learn about uncoated printing papers. Someone has told me that Mohawk, Monadnock, Finch and Neenah are the best in the uncoated field. I've looked at printed samples and can't really distinguish between them in image quality. How do all you veterans feel? Are these the top four uncoated choices? Is there really any distinguishable difference in quality? How would you rank them on quality? Any that I should stay away from? Are they all pretty much the same price? Anything you can offer would be appreciated." Reply to posted 6/28/05 by Ira From www.1printingsource.com Paper is like any other commodity: Branding. You pay for a brand, you do not necessarily pay for better quality. For imaging, just make sure you are buying a quality opaque sheet. After that you are paying for finishes that might be unique to a specific brand. Many designers like to use paper rather than excessive ink to make a creative point, using such paper as Classic Columns, laid finishes, or those with visible fiber content. However, since you used the word imaging, nothing will be as crisp as an image on a coated stock. When that becomes important then you are best advised, should you not want gloss, to go to a dull book or cover.
Question posted 6/17/05 by Tony From Digital Tech "I was wondering if I could get more information. I have a graphics and web design company and I wish to expand and make a printing department. Printing business cards, brochures, etc, but I have very little knowledge on the machines and the process. Where can I get more information? Or can someone provide and help me with that information? I've been looking all over the internet and have come up short. Thank You!" Reply to posted 6/18/05 by Ira From www.1printingsource.com Become a member of the PIA, the main printing organization and you can network through there. Also contact the equipment manufactures, I who believe would be very helpful in the hope of selling you a machine or two. Make up your mind if you want to go quick print (AB Dick), small press, high end quick print (Ryobi 2-4 full color printing) or high end small press (Heidelberg GTO). Contact the manufactures of whichever direction you want to go.
Question posted 6/14/05 by Vishnu From Smruti Design "Is there any standard size to make folder for an American company and if so please specify the size of folder and also inserts" Reply to posted 6/15/05 by Ira From www.1printingsource.com The standard size for a four page presentation folder is 9 x 12" folded and can have one or two 4 inch pockets and usually a business card set of slits on the right pocket. The flat trimmed open size is 18 x 16" with the four inch pockets adding to the 12" height. There are also, if two pockets, two 5/8" glue flaps extending from the side of the 4" segment that is to become a pocket. Inserts would be the standard 8.5 x 11" U.S. letter size page.
Question posted 5/10/05 by Andrew From Infinity 2000 "How do printers keep up with all the fonts every publication uses? Can I embed fonts into my pictures that are going into the magazine to save on having to make sure the print house has all the different fonts I have used in the magazine? " Reply to posted 5/11/05 by Sales Mgr. From www.pbdink.com The first thing companies usually do is buy font collections. Adobe sells them as well as other companies selling True Type font collections. There are also many fonts that can be downloaded free from the Internet in addition to buying them from "font Foundries" like Adobe. In any case when you submit your publication for print you will be asked to supply the fonts as well as the images in a separate folder. You can embed the fonts but some software does not embed them well, so even if you do embed you would best be served by supplying the fonts as well.
Question posted 5/5/05 by Michael Fisher from Alterian "Looking to find digital printing services. Is There a guide that can help me identify printers offering digital/printer personalization services?" Reply to posted 5/5/05 by Ira from www.1printingsource.com Not that I am aware of. Essentially you have two basic choices for personalization: 1-Docutech digital, which prints black toner and many of the machines are set up to personalize. The second choice is a direct mail facility where the ability to laser and personalize is part of the day to day operation.
Question posted 4/22/05 by Andrew From Infinity 2000 "I need to print a 16 page magazine, approx 10,000 - 15,000 copies. The inside pages can be newsprint paper to save money and the outside cover will be 4 color on a heavier glossy paper. Is it cheaper to get a printing company who can use a Web Press for this magazine or is a sheet feeder printer cheaper? If 16 pages is to little for a web press would increasing the number of pages in the magazine then be cheaper on the web press?" Reply to posted 4/22/05 by Sales Mgr. From www.pbdink.com The minute you require newsprint you automatically opt for two things: 1-using a company with a web cold-set press 2-requiring sufficient quantity, as yours, to warrant being on a web press. Therefore your best bet is a "cold-set" web press for the guts and most web presses will either have a sheet fed press for the covers or a sheet fed vender who they use for their covers. "Cold-set" refers to web presses without heaters which precludes them from running coated stocks.
Question posted 3/31/05 by Bobbi From ATKearney "Can you tell me anything about the use of (a) PDF file as a format for a proof type?" Reply to posted 3/31/05 by Damon From www.losangelesprintingcompany.com PDF proofing for our color is what we do on all of the smaller jobs as most people look for reasonable quality color and a cost effective job. If you are not using messengers or FedEx, etc. to overnight the printing hard copy proof you are saving costs and time in getting the job on and off the printing press. However, there are two ways to send a customer a PDF file. One way is to simply "distill the PDF on your computer and send it. That will show most things. However, if there are subtle font or image issues where a text or image box is overlaying on some other text or image you will not necessarily see this unless you first send the PDF through the printing press RIP as if you were to plate for printing next and then you will see the flaws. Therefore when using PDF proofing always request one that has gone through the RIP first.
Question posted 3/30/05 by Bobbi From ATKearney "Can you please give me a list of the current types of proofs that are industry standard? Reply to posted 3/30/05 by Ira from www.1printingsource.com The press in the industry of today has moved to digital pre-press in all of the modern commercial printing shops. The standard for color proofing is the high resolution inkjet proof, generally by Epson, and calibrated to the printing press that the job is to run on. This has taken the place of the old Cromalins or Match-prints. The old blue line used for the folded sample, due to it's thinner make up and therefore ease of fold is the low resolution inkjet with a paper print out and usually by Epson ink jet machines.
Question posted 1/12/05 by Sarah from Our World "I was wondering if you could help me? I'm trying to get my first catalog job together and I have purchased adobe PageMaker 7.0. In the templates there is no option for "catalog printing". which should I use? also in the document set up it says page size: letter, legal, tabloid, A4, A3 and so on. I need your help. To give you an idea I need a 72 page catalog about the size of an Avon catalog? Reply to posted 1/12/05 by Ira from www.1printingsource.com Assuming that the catalog printed for Avon is a digest size, set up your page as 5 3/8 wide (width always comes first ) by 8 3/8" high if you want digest size (TV guide, Readers digest, etc.) or if full standard page at 8 3/8 x 10 7/8". The reason for the marginally smaller than normal letter size or half letter sized page is that you did not mention the quantity of your catalog printing and at a quantity point you will need to be on a web press for the larger quantities. In the meantime if you are starting with a smaller run then your interests are best served on a sheet fed press and you will not need to resize your catalog later on. Also make sure your images are CMYK Tiff format and at 300 dpi. Size them in Photoshop rather squeeze them down in your document program. You will wind up with a smaller file with potentially less problems. |