To Graphic Designers: I’m teaching a course in prepress. What subjects do you think I should cover?

Posted by admin on March 8, 2010 Leave a comment (5) Go to comments

3348011117 8cd14f1dfe m To Graphic Designers: Im teaching a course in prepress. What subjects do you think I should cover?

Assuming I already taught the obvious: CMYK vs. RGB, DPI/LPI, PDFs, Color, Color profiles, Color space, Fonts (and thier problems), Bleed, trim…. anything else you can think of?

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5 Comments.

danuitti March 8, 2010 at 6:57 pm

Here are some thoughts.

1. Don’t use Microsoft WORD to make a high quality printed document…. EVER

2. Use STYLES in those programs where it applies. This helps with consistent text.

3. CMYK for all full color printed graphics

4. Embed all fonts. But make a folder that accompanies the job with ALL FONTS.

Visit http://www.BooksJustBooks.com and look at their book printing tips. They are AWESOME
celiakhan March 8, 2010 at 7:02 pm

I was a former graphic designer now working for a printing company so I have a little of both sides.

1. Please encourage them to outline or curve their fonts. Prepress operators don’t need to change them and it avoids that missing Bold Condensed Oblique font.

2. Put contact info in the electronic file.

3. Link your files AND check them. Actually this should be #1.

4. Link your fonts

5. Create a PDF of your separations to ensure this will run smoothly. Especially if your job is not 4/4 or 4/0.

6. Finally when submitting your file, assume that the prepress operator is an absolute idiot and spell everything out. Trust me, if everything is clear, your job will be the job they take on a Friday afternoon instead of any other.

3.
swt313grl March 8, 2010 at 7:33 pm

Im a production artist: the person between the designer and printer and do this for a living.

Most importantly:
1. CMYK vs RGB
2. Acceptable Programs: Don’t use PageMaker, Publisher, Corel Draw, Word, etc
3. Support (Illustrator eps or tiffs, no jpgs, fonts)
4. Print Quality Specifications (300+DPI, bleed, etc.)

I could go on and on but I find these the most important. For more specific things I would go to a print house website and see what they would require of files being sent to them.
seahawk March 8, 2010 at 8:11 pm

1. Color Management – ensure that the printed output more or less matches what you see on screen. also known as printer-monitor calibration

2. Cross Platform compatibility of files – how to work mac files in pc or vice versa

3. masking difficult objects with the use of channels – for hair, fur, etc.

4. setting black and white points

5. Resolution – computation of scanning resolution or required resolution for a project

6. the most important – put pride in your work!
PentiumBoy March 8, 2010 at 8:18 pm

u must use photo shop as tool

and many things depend on image processing and design

like images filters – segmentation of images – classification of image – the extensions of images and why it differ from each other

how image stored in computer
how u compress the images without distortion

colors mode its the basic u can give very good hint about it in 10 min .. not to be the basic idea of the course

i wish that i helped u