Preflight your files!

Purchase any preflight software. This software will scan your files for problems and also collect all the related images and fonts when it comes time to sending your files off somewhere. (We use FlightCheck by Markzware)

Here's what we look for in your files....

1. All linked images supplied - Whether or not they are embedded in any file used.

2. All fonts supplied - This includes all the fonts that are used in any linked files.

3. All raster based images should have 225dpi to 300dpi - These include Photoshop files.

4. Bleed - Any color that will run off the edge of the final trimmed printed product must extend a minimum of 1/16th of an inch, but ideally will extend 1/8th past the final tirm.

5. Crossovers line up - We carefully check all crossovers & common elements (i.e. page numbers) to insure that they all fall in the same place on each page.

6. Provide final print outs of your project. If the project is uploaded the provide a final PDF of the job. This gives us something to compare to.

Design with the end in mind.

We recommend that you use software that is appropriate for the task at hand. There are three main components of all digital artwork and each has software that is designed specifically for it.

A. Vector images - (i.e. logo's and illustrations) Software - Adobe Illustrator & Macromedia Freehand

B. Raster images - (photos, air brushing, vignettes) Software - Adobe Photoshop

C. Page Layout - Software - Quark Xpress, Adobe InDesign, and Adobe Pagemaker

Using these software packages appropriately you can build any project that can be handled by anyone in the world with minimal difficulty. A typical project would include some pictures done in Photoshop, a logo created in Illustrator or Freehand, and the layout done in Quark or Pagemaker or InDesign with the images imported into them placed and sized properly with the type set.

The benefit to creating your project this way is that each program has been utilized by its strong points. Obviously anything can be created complete in Illustrator or Freehand (Do not use photoshop if there is any type invovled), but the page layout programs are designed specifically for doing that and thus do it a little better.

Book work in particular should be done in layout software. (It is our belief that there should never be an exception to this. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it will take a printer much longer to layout your job and most likely they will want to charge you for the extra time.)