Quality British Company

10th March, 2010  

Tel: 0800 689 9117

 

Supplying Your Own PDF Artwork (use our artwork service instead if in doubt!)

 

The price you have been quoted is for providing professional quality finished PDF artwork. In order for your job to print correctly your artwork must be correct. The first set of files you supply under your printing contract with us will be checked for print suitability at no charge e.g. free. If your files are unsuitable for printing then we will immediately advise you. Subsequent resubmissions of your files are subject to a recheck and our minimum charge of £80. We can, of course, make the file corrections for you at reasonable cost. There is no resubmission charge where we undertake the work on your behalf.

 

These are the FIVE key issues where clients need to pay particular attention: If you do not understand any of these concepts we strongly suggest you use our PDF Artwork Service. There is a small cost for this but it is a guaranteed way of progressing your job without delay and ensuring a quality result.

 

  • CMYK versus RGB.
    • All images/fonts/pictures/graphics etc created within your document must be in four colour process (CMYK is our printing method). If your images are not colour then they must be grayscale. This means they must be converted to CMYK and not left as RGB.
  • Bleed and Registration Marks
    • Bleed of 3mm should be added wherever an image or area of colour reaches the edge of the page.
    • Any important information on the page should be 3mm inside the page.
  • Resolution
    • Each PDF and all images within it are recommended to be at least 300dpi. Quality will be diluted by lower resolutions but can still be acceptable. It is subjective.
  • Fonts
    • All fonts should be included/embedded and remain as text. Do not convert to an image.
  • Images
    • All images should be included/embedded.
    • Transparencies should be flattened.
    • Images must be compressed using ZIP compression and not JPEG, which will reduce the quality.
    • Any picture files that are used in place of vectors e.g. signature scans, need to be at least 1200dpi.

 

Here is a quick checklist:

 

PDF Files need to be:

 

Version 1.3
CMYK if colour or greyscale if not
Transparencies should be flattened
Fonts should be embedded and remain as text, never converted into an image
Images need to be compressed using ZIP compression not JPEG which will reduce the picture quality
Images should be 300dpi
Any picture files that are used in place of vectors e.g. signature scans, need to be at least 1200dpi
Bleed of 3mm should be added wherever an image or area of colour reaches the edge of the page
Any important information on the page should be 3mm inside the page

 

NB: Failure to address these issues may result in the quality of your job being less than perfect or our refusal to print from the artwork.

 

Please note: this is your artwork and your responsibility. We print the PDF artwork that you create and the end job is the result of your origination.

 

DO NOT be misled by what you see on your computer screen. Full colour printing is an entirely different process!

 

UNABLE TO CREATE PDF's ?

 

PDF Artwork Service - how to get peace of mind!

 

THE PRESS QUALITY PDF (we need your original files for this - not your PDF's!)

 

Many of our clients choose to try and create their own professional print quality PDF's. Many of them end up out of their depth and seriously affect the progress schedule and quality of their job. Be warned, PDF creation for print is a highly skilled area where one slip up can cost you not only your deadline, but also the cost of a very expensive reprint.

 

Our print prices are the most competitive in the United Kingdom so if you have ANY doubts about being able to create the required standard of PDF may we politely suggest that you use a small percentage of the print cost savings on our professional PDF artwork service!

 

Remember that if the document needs amendment, for example bleed to be added, then a studio time charge will be incurred.

 

STUDIO TIME

 

If you have supplied files that are unsuitable for printing we will advise you as soon as we have determined this fact. We will then suggest that you either correct the artwork yourself or contract the use of our studio facilities to make your job print ready.

 

Should we find that your source files are unsuitable for printing then we will issue you with a variance to contract detailing the estimate for studio corrections and the resubmission cost of resupplying your corrected artwork should you choose to do the changes yourself.

 

Please note that amendments to the source document or the PDF by our studio are charged at £80 per hour. Our minimum charge in the studio is £80 which covers administration, file access etc.

 

This may involve making text alterations, changing page sizes, adding bleed, replacing logos, converting RGB images to CMYK etc.

 

Please note that should you choose to make the amendments / corrections yourself then we will have to reinvestigate the document when it is resubmitted. This is necessary to check it's suitability for final printing. Files that are resupplied are subject to our minimum charge of £80 which will cover the cost of resubmission, rechecking etc

 

You will be amazed at what we can do in an hour! We will give you an estimate in advance for the work required to make your job print ready. All artwork costs are payable in advance.

 

Telephone: 0800 689 9117