When taking a file to be printed (at either type of printer), you might find yourself trying to understand a different language when asked about what kind of options or “specs” that you’d like. To make the process easier for you and the printer and to help reduce costly mistakes, I’ve listed a few things below that you need to know before taking a job to a printer.

Image resolution: This is something that I cannot stress enough. If your document has a photo or graphic in it, you need to make sure that it is at a high enough resolution to yield a quality print. 99% of the photos taken off of the web are NOT high enough resolution to be printed. If they are used, they might turn out blurry or pixelated. This is because your computer screen operates at 72 DPI (dots per inch) and printed materials need at least 200 DPI to look crisp. Most digital photos from a digital camera (not cameraphone pics!) are fine to use as are any graphics created directly in Word or Powerpoint.

File Type: The printer will need to know what kind of file you’re giving them to print from. Some options might be a Word or Powerpoint file, and Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator file, or a PDF file. I highly, highly recommend the use of PDF files which are quickly becoming the industry standard for print-ready files. They are easy to make using Word and Powerpoint, the fonts are embedded in the file so you don’t have to worry about them, and overall, it leaves the guesswork out of what you’ll end up on the printed page. I can’t stress this enough…USE PDF FILES!

Size: The printer will need to know what size paper you need to print on. Common sizes are 4.25″x5.5″ (1/4 page), 8.5″x11″ (letter), 8.5″x14″ (legal), and 11″x17″ (tabloid). You can also have them trim your page to a custom size, but you’ll need to make sure and let them know this ahead of time to avoid confusion!

Color (ink): If you head to a store like Kinkos, your options are basically color or black and white. I’m going to talk a lot about color in a later post, but just keep the cost factor in mind when you’re setting up a document. Black and white is significantly cheaper to print, but may not have the impact that you might get from color. An offset printer can also print in single colors (1, 2, 3 or 4-color). 4 color printing is also called full color printing because they use 4 colors (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black - CMYK) to create all of the possible colors you could want.

Bleed: Nope, not an Edgar Allen Poe reference . . . bleed in printing is when the image, color, or text runs right off of the edge of the page. If you pick up any major magazine, the cover is almost always with a “full bleed” or bleed on all 4 sides of the page. If you print a normal Word document with a margin on all sides, you could say that it’s “no bleed” or bleed on no sides. There is a lot to consider when printing with bleed (size, cost, etc.), so be sure and mention this to your printer up front if you’re wanting to do that.

Proof: A proof is just a sample print to give you a solid idea of what your document will look like when everything is done. They do this so that if you catch a mistake or a wrong color, they have only printed one copy and you can fix it easily. Otherwise, they’ll have 1,000 copies of an unusable document which is wasteful and expensive! It is a great idea to check a proof for anything that you have printed and don’t be scared to ask to see a proof. The printer will gladly do this to save them trouble later on!

These are just a few terms to help you maneuver through your next trip to the printer. Please feel free to leave comments here and ask questions. Printers are also always happy to answer any questions that you have so feel free to give them a call. It’ll make everyone happy in the end!

Tags: color, design, paper, printing, tips