Plan your work

• Know ahead of time what you are trying to accomplish and know how you wish to accomplish it.

• Use scans where scans are needed (usually only in photos or continuous tone art) and line art as logos and flat art.

• Consulting a printer at the early part of a job will usually save you time, money & frustration.

• Most printers have a set of "standard" inks that they order premixed to PMS standard colors. Using one of these standards can save the cost of the printer having to mix inks to a precise formula to achieve an exact specified PMS color.

• Be aware of folding panels. Do your work at 100% the size of the printed piece and allow for proper margins where you want it to fold!

• Plan what program is best to accomplish your goal.

• Single page layouts should be built at trim size with bleeds.

• Resize ALL halftone and four color scans in PhotoShop or any other paint program. Resizing in the page programs or draw programs can lead to long imaging (RIP) time (and therefore cost more money).

• When using colors, plan on what the colors will be and how they will print -spot or process. If you use spot colors, specify colors in PMS (Pantone Matching System). If the colors are built out of process, please specify them as CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow & black) or Separations within the color pallet.