[Emmanuel]

Hi, there,

I need a bit of help here, cause that is a field I really have not that much experience with, yet.
I am currently working as a lowpoly modeler and texture artist in a small german game company.
But really I want to spice up my life by working more towards animation/illustration.
For that, I need some advice on how to set up my photoshop/painter etc to produce images that can be printed for book covers etc.
What do You guys have to say about that issue ?
I encountered some problems when dealing with RGB--->CMYK conversion, but in Painter (5.01) there are a lot of professional print standards and previews included, so I might do the adaption in that software rather than in photoshop.
Damn, I think it is a complicated matter, any comments appreciated.


Eternally Yours,
Emmanuel

[Sc00p]

Yes, doing work to get ready for print is a complicated matter...and it does require a lot of working, reading and experience, and because your topic is so general, I can only just help you a bit.

Basically, the process is this, say we will be doing a 2-page book cover:

1. Do thumbnails, printed work has to be planned out, and your work in a page layout program will go much smoother if you already have an idea of how you want to lay your type out.

2. Do the illustration. Either in Photoshop, or Illustrator, using CMYK or pantone� (standardized) spot colors. This illustration should then be saved in .EPS (if its vector) or .TIF (if its a bitmapped graphic)

3. Use QuarkXpress...the industry standard page layout program to do your type for the book cover (don't do your type in photoshop)..import your illustrations in and lay everything out. Now, I won't say quark is easy to "wing"...you have to practice a LOT and read a lot of manuals if you want to master it without taking a class.
After you have your document saved, you bring it on a zip disk or CD (MAKE SURE YOU INCLUDE ON THE DISK ALL FONTS AND IMAGES USED IN YOUR DOCUMENT), print companies most likely do not have the font you want, and might even charge you extra to search around for it.

**: Note that there is SO much more to it than this, but in short, this is the process. There are a lot of things that you need to check for before you print, like, knowing if you want a bleed or not, or what kind of paper you want, what quality print...the list goes on endlessly.

Then just have them print it...quite simple after that really.


A note about CMYK: With CMYK, you will only be paying for 4 colors...any pantone color you add to this will raise the cost of your printing. Why do we use pantone colors?
a) because it is a printing standard...if you refer to a pantone swatch booklet, the color number you punch in to the computer will print out EXACTLY the same shade as on the swatch booklet.
b) They print without a halftone pattern, giving you a solid, instead of mixing CMYK flat dots to give the illusion of another color. (You can use a magnifying glass to see halftone patters in any print media...if you see the pattern of dots, instead of a flat color, you know it was printed in CMYK instead of pantone)

But perhaps I've gone too deeply into the subject, but for your question, you don't really have to "prepare" photoshop for printing, just make sure you're working in CMYK instead of RGB, and at at least a resolution of 300dpi for a nice quality print. DO NOT get confused by quark if you don't have to, but for book covers and such, this is how it's done. Layout is NOT done in photoshop.


PS: If you have any specific questions on the subject of getting ready for print, just ask.

------------------
Rene Antunes
www.nytro.org
[email protected]



[This message has been edited by Sc00p (edited June 18, 2000).]

[Emmanuel]

Hi again,


thank You so much for the reply.
Indeed, it went a bit deeper than what I exspected.

The essential thing seems to be that my artwork should be as "streamlined" as possible, regarding colours, lettering etc.
I probably will not be the one who does the lettering and layout, but rather only delivering the image in the needed dimensions (for back/front cover if required).

Probably, I will check the image with one of the employees in the local print shop to see what it looks like.
They have the experience, they will know, and with time I will get an eye for the colours I need to use.

But maybe future clients just make me paint the picture and they will take care of it beeing printed ?
I am thinking of publishing houses.
I guess they must have their traditional print shops where they have all their stuff printed ?

Thanks again for Your kind answer, I will see how it all works out.

Bye,
Emmanuel

[Sc00p]

Oh I almost forgot. If you save your quark documents to PDF files before printing, sometimes it will save you some money (although sometimes they screw up during printing, but its a chance to take :)

When you save to PDF(adobe acrobat document) you don't require any support files on your disk when you bring it to print. (meaning you don't need to include your images or fonts on disk..they're embedded into the PDF already).

------------------
Rene Antunes
www.nytro.org
[email protected]

[Sc00p]

Also, to answer your question. It's best if a designer does NOT foot the bill for printing...that is extra cost that the client should have to pay,just make sure they tell you EXACTLY how many colors you are allowed to use before you work, if they say, for example, 2 colors only, use 2...not 3, or they will get angry :)

It's okay if they make you pay for a few little cheap 3 dollar color Xerox comps to show clients for design work, or to print stuff for your own portfolio. No need getting a 40 dollar printing just to try and win a job.

**: You can of course cheat your 2 color limitation by using screens. Say I use pantone #1565C ...I can screen that color (meaning lower the opacity) to use it as another shade of the color, instead of paying for another color, got it? :) Just remember screens don't print as clean as a flat(aka=solid, no gradient) 100% color.

------------------
Rene Antunes
www.nytro.org
[email protected]

[The Dude]

I kind of have a related question. I recall
from a computer graphics class I took
something about working resolution and print
resolution. Is there some kind of ratio to
go by. Like to print to a 1200x1200 DPI
printer you want the image or project
resolution to be at least 1/3 the print
resolution? I dunno. Is this making sense?

[The Dude]

Does anyone have any input on this issue?

[Sc00p]

Hm...as much as I hate adding another line to bring a topic back to the top of the forum, I'll answer this anyway

Basically I don't concern myself with home printing, I just know that for laser printers, I keep my linework to 600DPI, and for any other home color or any jet printers, I work towards 300DPI. Anything above that is pretty wasteful. As for your working resolution, if you don't plan to print, then anything over 72DPI is wasteful, because thats the DPI of your monitor.

As for your math equation there, the only one I'm familiar with is printing linescreen, which is, you do 2XLPI when you're printing, meaning if you want a 133LPI output, your image should be 266 LPI (Lines Per Inch). Magazines use this form of printing.

Sorry, I hope this helps. Home printing isn't very much my thing

------------------
Rene Antunes
www.nytro.org
[email protected]