Education – Paper, Print & Design

Offset Lithographic Printing Following on from the prepress stage, where the operator has transferred the artwork onto metal plates, comes the process of Offset printing.  This is where the image transfers (offset) from metal plates to rubber blankets or rollers and then onto paper. This is how the actual ‘printing’ part of the project takes placce: The Process The press operator sets up the press by loading and fixing the printing plates onto the plate cylinder, and a new rubber blanket onto the blanket cylinder. The press operator fills the ink trays (note that larger presses may run off a...

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Prepress Prepress is the first step when artwork arrives at the printery from the designer and involves the following processes:  Reviewing & Preflighting Artwork In this process a specialist Prepress operator will check the supplied artwork to ensure it has been set up correctly. It is important to note that this is a technical check—and not a content check—a printery will not spell check or proof read your artwork. The Prepress operator will be specifically looking at the following: The supplied format is correct (high resolution PDF) The artwork document trim-size is correct The artwork document includes crop marks The...

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The term ‘commercial printing’ refers to any print service offered by a print supplier (a printery) to another party, such as a designer or business. There are many forms of commercial printing—Here, we take a look at Offset Lithographic Printing: Long-run versus Short-run Printing Commercial print methods can be split loosely into two categories: as being more (or less) suitable for large (Long-run) versus small (Short-run) quantities. Long-Run Print Methods Long-run commercial printing methods create large volumes of identical reproductions as cost-effectively as possible. As a general guide, long-run methods tend to offer the best economy when printing in volumes...

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  Colour is one of the most critical assets within a designers toolkit. Colour allows us to create epic visual communication full of expression and emotion. However, when it comes to print, colour is also an area that requires some technical understanding to ensure that results match expectation. GSM takes a look at Colour - CMYK, RGB and PMS... CMYK Colour Most commercial print processes are based Cyan (C), Magenta (M), Yellow (Y), Black (K) colour model—otherwise known as CMYK or ‘Process’ Colour. Here’s how it works: If you did art at school, you likely did an exercise where you...

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In this Education article, we take a look at some basic considerations for setting up print artwork... Some Artwork Basics A common cause of hold-ups in print work is artwork files set up incorrectly. This article covers some basics around setting up artwork to avoid the most common mistakes. For this article, we will assume Adobe Illustrator, InDesign (or QuarkXPress), and Photoshop are used to construct the artwork. And that the dispatch file to the printer is a high-resolution PDF (the industry norm for print artwork). We strongly advise against using office-level apps (such as Microsoft Word or Apple Pages)...

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Supporting the Pantone Matching System is a range of swatchbooks. Understanding the different versions and their intended uses ensure you will use the right tool for the job. GSM takes a look: Formula Guide: Two x books (C & U): Formula Guide swatchbooks show the base range of 2,400 PMS colours, along with the corresponding ink formula. Printers use these formulas to mix Pantone colours. Bridge Guide: Two x books (C & U): The Bridge Guide swatchbooks show the same base range of colours as the Formula Guide—but instead of showing the ink formula, the Bridge Guides show each Pantone...

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For this installment of Education, we return to Pantone colour and how this can expand the printable colour range. We all know that colour is a powerful tool for a designer. But how can you get more from colour when designing towards a print outcome? The answer may be through the use of Pantone colour. But first, let’s take a quick look at the theory of printed colour, and why CMYK and Pantone colour differs.  CMYK Colour 99% of all printed material uses a CMYK-based colour model. CMYK is based on the principle that printing varying amounts of Cyan, Magenta...

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The most commonly used substrates for commercial print methods - both digital & offset- are wood-based papers and boards. But what if you have a print project that needs a more robust  solution? Something that won't tear and is moisture resistant? This is where synthetic papers come in. GSM investigates... Synthetic Papers The term ‘synthetic papers’ (sometimes shortened to ‘synthetics’) is a broad category of printable substrates made from materials other than wood pulp (the base material used to make most papers & boards). Synthetic papers are extruded from polypropylene or Polyester pellets to form smooth white sheets ready for...

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