Entry level Graphic designer 2

[ayersart]

Hello I have been reading posts on this board for a while and it seems like people here are friendly and helpful! So I thought I'd say hello to everyone and post ..

I have a few questions hopefully someone can help me out. My background I graduated college with a graphic design degree this year and I'm working for a promotional product company doing their artwork. Mostly I do recreating of logos (I'm surprised how many businesses dont have or know how to get ahold of their logo in vector format!). And I also do some design/layout from scratch too. I send the artwork to different suppliers for printing on mugs, tshirts, banners, hats, etc...

Im in this job and nobody here knows half as much as I do about illustrator, so I cant get help from my boss!

One thing i wish i knew more about is the whole aspect of colors and all the differnt methods of printing, and how they coorelate with eachother. When can I use transparency, spot colors at different percentages, gradients, etc.. with the differnt methods of printing?

One supplier said there was a $50 fee for converting a gradient to halftone dots. I know what they look like, but would that be something I can create in illustrator? How do they do that?

Would someone be able to recommend a book/website that explains about colors and printing methods?

 

[Foamcow]

It scares me that you can get a degree in graphic design with no real knowledge of print process.
But that's not your problem, more a shortcoming of the course

The question you ask has many varient answers based on what print process you are using.
From the sounds of it, and the fact you are working on promo stuff, I would guess that you are dealing with screen printers.

They are charging you for producing the screen they will use to do the print. You could create it in Illustrator, but you will probably be better off either finding a different printer with a better deal or coughing up the $50. Creating the screen yourself leaves you wide open for "problems".
From experience, and not wishing to bismirch printers in general, but there are certainly some who will just make your life difficult if you do part of "their" job. Sad, but true.

The percentages of colours that you use is dependant, again, on the print process. There will be a point at the bottom end of the range where the dot drops to nothing. This could be around 10-20%, so subtle tints are just not going to show up.
Likewise, at the other end, you may find that beyond 70-80% your tints just appear solid.
This is all dependant on the quality and skill of the printer, the material being printed on and even the colour being used! So it's not an easy one to answer exactly.

The best advice I can give is to talk to the printer in question. Ask them what you can and can't do on a particular job, ideally before you do it!

The use of transparency... that depends on what you mean. A transparent area in your artwork will just mean that the base material shows through. If that is grey board, then you'll see grey there. If it's white board, you'll see white.

Hope that is some help.
If you have any other specific questions about the artwork for print process in general then ask away!

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[blueark]

My initial impression is that you should look for a new printer. Converting a "gradient to halftone dots" is something that all modern RIPs should do -- there shouldn't be an extra charge for it.

Judging by the kind of work you do, I'd imagine you use spot colors a lot, and probably screen printing. The only issue with tints/gradients with screen printing is that you don't have the fine detail you would have with litho printing. This means that your halftone dots will be more noticable, and that you won't get the range of tones you might get with other methods. For this reason, many people keep them to a minimum, but it's up to you. You may also find that they become darker than you'd imagine, so you may need to over-compensate in your artwork.

Regarding transparency effects, they are often best avoided when using spot colors. You can approximate some effects by overprinting objects instead. Go to View > Overprint Preview. Now draw two objects, give them different colors and overlap them a bit. Select the top item, go to Window > Attributes, and select "Overprint Fill".

An alternative way of overprinting spot colors within one object (effectively mixing two spot colors) involves going to Window > Appearance. When an object is selected, its fill and stroke colors appear in this palette. In the fly-out menu, select "Add New Fill", then double-click it to bring up the Color palette. Change the color, and change the attributes to Overprint Fill as before. This method allows you to manage your objects a little easier.

 

[ayersart]

I went to a 2 year school and I have my associates. We focused more on the art than anything else.

I thought the reason they create the dots was because the method of printing doesn't allow for printing colors at less than 100%.

For screen printing, can you print colors at less than 100%? I dont see how that is possible if they just coat the film with ink... that is what it looks like they are doing here:

http://www.printmojo.com/screenprinting101.php

and if i am understanding it right then the dots just get further apart and smaller (but still at 100%) to appear lighter.

Can you do overprints using screen printing?

 

[MovingPictures]

Hey AA,

My background is very similar to yours. I started out working for a PP/ASI Company and now do freelance web work and professional prepress. I am also ACE in Illustrator, Photshop and Indesign. I would suggest learning photoshop, it is meant to work in tandem with illustrator. If your setting up work for screen printing you dont want to be dependant on your output device for halftones because you will need to sometimes specify angles and or density. Most Adobe software has excellent prepress setup if your using CS, but youll find that most PP vendors are not as up to speed as they should be.

Id love to help you out whenever you need it. You can email me directly with any specific questions.

MP

 

[Foamcow]

The dots, or screen, is used to show different tints of the same colour.
So yes, you are right.. if I understand your question correctly.

Yes it is possible to do overprints with Screen printing. It can be an important part of the process. Ink is not opaque, so if you put one colour over another, you get a third colour.
This is true of most if not all forms of printing.

Even if you concentrate "on the art" you are producing artwork so you should have, at least, an understanding of the reproduction processes. I would recommend you either get on a course that will teach you a little about print process or get a helpful printer to show you. Go visit, show an interest in what they do and how you can make their life easier. Build a good relationship with them and they will help you when you need it.

Produce your artwork the way you are doing it, but have that understanding of what the limits of the print method are. For instance, small text set in a 50% of a colour that then gets a coarse screen applied to it is not going to work well. Know stuff like that and you will be OK.

Let the repro company or printer deal with the screening and angles. There is a whole load of theory involved that I guarantee you don't want to, or need to know about.
A decent RIP will sort out the screening better than photoshop will. Plus if you get it wrong, or something changes - like the job gets run at a different printer or on a different press - then your artwork might be useless.
You aren't a printer. You don't really need to know things like the use of 7.5 degree offset angles for gravure printing ;-)

Don't worry, you aren't alone. I have met many "professional" designers and artworkers who really don't have a clue what they are doing

http://www.foamcow.com

- Web design and ranting

http://www.toccoagames.com

- Day of Defeat gaming community
"I'm making time

 

[blueark]

A decent RIP will sort out the screening better than photoshop will

That hits the nail on the head. Your job is to produce artwork, NOT to worry about what the screen is going to look like. You don't know, and shouldn't have to know, the exact specifications of a particular printing process. Your job is simply to produce artwork that your printer can use. Sure, if you know the general strengths and weaknesses of each printing process, you can create artwork to suit. Screen angles, on the other hand, is generally the printers job these days, unless you are going for a particular effect.

As for ink being printed at 100%, yes that's true, and yes, that's why tints are printed using smaller dots, to give an impression of lighter shades. That is the mechanical reality of printing. For convenience, that level of detail is usually taken as given, and a 50% tint is just referred to as such. Think of it as being like a car: your mechanic (printer) might be interested in knowing that it's a 998cc 1993 Nissan Micra, but in general conversation, it's just a car. Sometimes it's hard to know which information is important, and which you can safely leave to someone else!

 

[ayersart]

Foamcow that is exactly what I am trying to learn - the limits that I have on my design. That way I can use it to my advantage.

An example - a project I had when I was in school, I designed a newsletter, 2 colors, and the main objective was to make it look at first glance to appear to be more than 2 colors. But my limits, do's and don'ts, were explained to me.

It doesn't look like the ink they use is transparent. They are printing on tshirts. And also I was looking at some magnets and they are glossy, and there was green and then gold text was printed on top of the green ink. So when is the ink transparent? And the overprint fill like blueark was talking about - what type of media can that be used on? Something like a 2 color business card?

It seems overwhelming -where I work we deal with many many suppliers, printing on magnets, clothing, mugs, mostly.. ..
I do now understand that I dont need to know the ins and outs of how they print everything but I thought it would be helpful. I'll look for a book or website too.

 

[Foamcow]

It is unlikely that the ink is completely opaque.

If, using your example, you printed the gold on it's own then I bet it would look different to when it's printed over the green.
Either that or the gold area was knocked out of the green. With a slight overlap or "trap" applied to avoid registration problems.

That said, metallic inks are probably more opaque than "standard" colours.

Regarding your newsletter. You can certainly overprint one colour on top of the other to make other colours. Personally I would probably not do this though. The only place I might "mix" the colours would be in duotone images.
You can produce nice work in 2 colours. If you want it to look like more than 2 colours then see if you can stretch to another colour.. or even see if it's possible to go CMYK. The cost difference often isn't as much as you may imagine.

http://www.foamcow.com

- Web design and ranting

http://www.toccoagames.com

- Day of Defeat gaming community
"I'm making time