Commercial Printing Basics

To make this transition as easy as possible, it will help to know some commercial printing basics and lingo. The industry has a language all its own. But with a little lesson in this language, soon you will be talking the talk with the best of them:

Transitioning from do-it-yourself with an ink jet printer to that of Commercial Printing through a print shop can be an intimidating experience. You may have figured out how to get your prints to come out just right using trial and error. You are comfortable with your equipment but it is time to turn over the task to the professionals.

To make this transition as easy as possible, it will help to know some commercial printing basics and lingo. The industry has a language all its own. But with a little lesson in this language, soon you will be talking the talk with the best of them:

RGB and CMYK

RGB stands for red, green, and blue and is a reference to the primary colors of light. When talking about computer monitors or TV screens, RGB is what these digital devices display.

CMYK stands for cyan, magenta, yellow, and black and is a reference to the primary colors of pigment or ink. This is synonymous with "full-color printing" or "four-color process printing."

The important principle here is that the two formats are NOT compatible. There must be a conversion process to take what you see on your computer monitor and put it on paper.

Image Resolution

Another term related to computer screens and printing on paper: image resolution refers to how many dots per inch make up an image. Both computer displays and printing presses produce images by reproducing color one tiny dot at a time. The difference is that computers display images around 72 dots per inch (dpi), while professional prints are produced at 300 dpi or greater.

As can be expected, you would not want to take a standard image off the internet, stretch it out, and attempt to print it. The results would be a "fuzzy" image that lacked clarity. For best results, provide your commercial printing firm with images at 300 dpi. Much higher resolution is not necessary and much lower will produce inferior images.

Bleed

Bleed is the area on the edge of the paper that you can print your images on, but will probably be cut off. Why would you want this? Insurance. If you want your pictures or graphics to go all the way to the edge of the paper, you have to print on the bleed. No commercial printing firm can cut all the paper exactly right every time. You should design your print work to extend approximately 1 cm or .25" beyond the print area. Consult your commercial printing partners as to how much bleed is acceptable to them.

That should get you going and keep you out of trouble. Understanding some printing lingo will also get you some respect at the local print shop. So, tell them you''ve got your CMYK pics at 300 dpi with a quarter inch bleed and they might just crack a smile... maybe.

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Charen Smith writes articles about Internet Marketing. She has an extensive knowledge and experience when it comes to business strategies, techniques and business solutions.