Your designs are worth a lot of time, effort, and money. You want your designs to look clear and coherent when they return from the printers.
The best all-in-one printers, including laser and inkjet for creatives (opens in new window)
If you have spent most of your career in digital-only design, it may be challenging to know what to do when sending a design to print. We have compiled a list of five essential things that you should know and provided links to further reading.
The difference between RGB & CMYK
Computer software may use a different system to generate color on your screen than printers. Computer graphics employ the RGB color system of red, green, and blue. Printers use the cyan-magenta, yellow, and black color set, commonly referred to by CMYK.
The RGB system can produce a broader range of colours than many printers. Your software must be set to RGB if your designs are digital. You must use CMYK if it is for print.
But even when working in CMYK, you might see different things on the printed product. Proofreading your designs is crucial. This article, How color-match your print projects (opens in a new tab), contains more information.
Resolution is crucial
Web-based work is easy. However, printing requires high-resolution files. Otherwise, your prints may need to be more precise, clear, and coherent.
The most critical measurement for print output is DPI, dots per inch. This is the number of drops your printer will produce on a square inch of your printed page.
It is best to limit your software’s DPI to 300. It is not a good idea to increase the DPI, as it will only make your file more complicated and more extensive.
Make sure to distinguish DPI from PPI (pixels/inch), which refers to the density of dots per square inch. This is used for digital design and not print design.
How your design scales
Your design may look great on screen. It may look perfect on the screen, but if your plan is printed at an even larger size (such as a billboard or poster) or a smaller one (such as a business card), you should consider how each element of your design will scale.
Typography is one of the most critical aspects. To ensure that the text on business cards is legible, avoid using light fonts. Make the font manageable so that it is easier to read when printed.
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If you print large images, scaling your designs can be a problem. You need to ensure that they are raster images and not blurred. Vector images are infinitely scaleable and should not cause any issues. You can find more information in our ultimate guide (which opens in a new tab).
Bleeding is essential
It is not a scientific process to cut paper. Designers have left some margins around their designs for error. This is known as bleed. All good design software will have guides that show where the bleed begins and ends.
Different printers require different amounts. You will need to check the settings if you have an in-house printer. You can ask your printer (it opens in a new window).
Proofreading is crucial
Although it may sound obvious, this is a crucial point. One of the biggest pitfalls when printing your designs in printed form is making mistakes. You can’t make it right again, unlike on the internet. You’ve just wasted your money if it needs to be corrected.
Spell-checking is an excellent way to ensure that your work is correct. However, spell check won’t get you 100% of the way. It will not pick up on grammatical errors, such as misspelling proper nouns like company names. And it won’t tell you if you used the wrong homophone, such as ‘you’re’ when you should have used ‘your’ (or they’re/there or it’s/its).
Typos are just some of the things that can ruin your printed design. You must carefully inspect your kerning (opens in new window). Check your punctuation. Is it correct? Do you want it in witty quotes or dumb? In summary, anything can go wrong. Before you send your design off, it is best to have as many eyes on it as possible, preferably with printed proof.
These are only the basics of printing your designs. For more information, visit our glossary. Also, see our advice to get more out of your print projects (opens a new tab) and our guide to printing a poster.
