Colonial Printing

Author Archive

Whether your Christmas card list is short and sweet or long and laborious, holiday cards are a labor of love. Most of us want to send friends and family well wishes for the holiday season but may lack the creativity, time or ability to create personalized cards. Luckily, there are plenty of ways to show your love by personalizing your Christmas cards and sharing more than just friendly greetings for the season.

Photos are the best way to create a custom Christmas card. Photos send the message that you’d like to be there to share the holidays with loved ones, even if you can’t. Photo greeting cards can be as simple as inserting a family photograph or as personal as creating a custom photo card. You can capture a family portrait around the tree or use one from vacation. The composition of the photo can be traditional or creative. All you need is a high-quality digital image and a way to design and print the card. Use a professional printer or create one at home using a photo printing website or software.

In addition to adding photos, one of the other benefits of using design software or websites is the ability to personalize text. You can invent your own holiday greeting and incorporate something special about your family or life. Show your creativity by matching text and photos in a witty or whimsical way. If you prefer traditional greetings, simply sign your family name to a stock verse or quote.

Another way to personalize Christmas cards is to include a Christmas letter. You might groan at the thought, either of composing one or because of letters you’ve received but it truly is a great way to personalize cards. Think of all the people in your life that you might not have talked to for months. Sharing news of work, family, travel and other events brings friends and family up to speed. Keep letters to one page and be genuine with the news you share. To avoid seeming boastful, share good news as well as bad and stick to those events that impacted you and your family’s life, rather than small incidentals.

If including family photos or a personal letter with your Christmas cards feels like over-sharing or over the top to you, you can still personalize your cards without compromising your comfort zone. Use photos of your children, pets, garden or some other source of inspiration or simply have cards printed with a design that you create. This is a great way to personalize cards for those who are more private.

Whether you have cards printed or simply use stock cards, you can still personalize them without personal photos or letters. For example, consider inserting a favorite holiday cookie recipe or a recipe for a family favorite dish. Recipes are a great way to add a personal touch to your cards and give the recipient a way to share in your own holiday traditions. Have recipe cards professionally printed or print them directly on the card for a special touch. You might even use a photo of the finished product, dressed with holiday trim, as the cover of the card.

Another option for the truly inspired is to go beyond personalized cards and send your holiday greetings in the form of something more creative. Create a photo gift, such as a magnetic calendar, coffee cup, bookmark or notepad. You can personalize these products in much the same way as cards but they can be used for practical purposes long after the holidays are over.

Personalizing your holiday cards is a simple task and requires only a bit of imagination and attention to your style of communicating. You don’t need to worry if creativity is a struggle; there are literally dozens of ways to achieve any printed idea you might come up with. Dazzle the people on your Christmas card list this year by sharing personal, heartfelt greetings that show you thought of them and want to be part of their holiday season. Whether you share school photos, a personal letter, a witty story or a photo of your new puppy, your friends and family will be thrilled to receive personalized greetings.

Go Green! At ThinkWithInk.com we help the environment by offering options for green printing. For more information about printing brochures, visit online today for more information!

Stationery print shops are some of the best places for people to get the quality prints that they need. Whether it be copies of business cards, invitations or other personal prints, a stationery print shop can deliver the good. The top-notch print shops have been around for decades and specialize in printing hundreds of different things for customers at the highest quality possible. These days, people prefer to use stationery print shops as they offer services that cannot be duplicated on home printers and other consumer devices. Here are the five reasons that using the services of a stationery print shop will offer you the best quality prints.

1. Stationary print shops use high-quality machines that are able to print out hundreds of copies in a matter of a few minutes. These machines are also able to print out selected shapes and sizes that you choose. They can print postcards, invitations and much more. They also stock items such as tape, markers, crayons, pencils, pens, calculators, staplers, stamps and all different types of computer accessories, paper products and ink cartridges. They also stock floppy disks and CDs. They can help you with low-tech paper choices or high-tech design files. And photo prints? Many stationery shops either specialize in these or are affiliated with a quality photo processor who still does things the high-quality old-fashioned way.

2. Choosing paper is one of the most important services that a stationery print shop offers. There are so many different types of papers to choose from that it can be hard for some people to pick the right kind for the right job. There are papers that were originally made from animal skins and vellum papers. There are also the laid types and various versions of cotton, linen, card stock and translucent papers that a top-quality stationery shop can tell you about. They can advise you on the various weights of paper, the colors that are offered and how each type of paper will react to the different kinds of printing technology that are out there these days, including home and office printers.

3. Stationery print shops can guide you in the many different ways of printing that can have a very dramatic difference in how your printing job turns out. They are aware of the several types of printing styles such as letterpress, the most popular for old-style prints which is often done for important items such as wedding invitations certificates, diplomas and business cards.

4. They have the right equipment for the job. A stationery print shop is used to doing jobs of various scales and they typically have the right equipment for your printing needs. For example, if you are doing photo-realistic color printing then you may want to use a shop with one of the new digital printers. It is best to take your glossy projects and layouts to the professionals for printing to assure that you will not run in to any snags along the way.

5. Stationery print shops can offer a touch of class and sophistication that you cannot produce in a home or office setting. They have the expertise to produce quality color, design and typography with special papers and inks. They are experts at using a combination of technology, from the large-scale printing machines that have been used by stationery shops for years to the latest desktop technology.

Stationery print shops are good at producing the best prints because they are professionals in the field of printing, color, paper, ink and much more. This is a huge reason that they have been around for so many years and have continued to provide the very best in customer service for printing needs. You could find almost anything you need at one of these shops.

If your hometown does not have a stationery print shop that can offer these types of services, you always have the option of mailing them to a shop that can complete your job and send the results back to you in a timely fashion. You also have the option to create a template on your home or office computer and email it to the stationery shop of your choice for the prints to be completed. This is another reason that stationery shops are a great choice for all of your high-end printing needs. They can offer you the satisfaction that you require and many even guarantee that your final prints will be the best in terms of quality, class and style.

StationeryPrintShop.com is here to provide you with the finest selection of personalized stationary sets, both high-end and affordable invitations, birth announcements and moving announcements. Tired of hand writing out your address on envelopes? Try custom stampers, embossers or address labels with a design to make it extra special. Visit us online today!

categories: printing,stationery,cards,invitations,events,hobbies,society

With every technical process comes a specific vocabulary, the familiarity with which is an essential component to your success within the specific technical realm. Knowing at least the basic terminology used in printing will allow you to communicate with print companies with ease and make your use of computerized design programs easier as well.

This primer on print terminology will arm you with a basic knowledge of critical printing terms. While professional designers and printing technicians will have a vastly wider vocabulary they use in their communications with one another, the average individual can get by with an understanding of a simple handful of words and phrases.

You will need to know terms that pertain to graphic design, different paper sizes and types used in commercial printing, and some common technical terms used by professional printers in order to make your projects run as smoothly as possible. Your ability to effectively communicate with your printer as well as to adequately prepare files and provide the printer with all of the necessary data will significantly affect any project you undertake.

Image-Related Terms

Resolution – Sharpness or clarity of an image when it appears on paper, film, disc or a computer screen.

It is important to realize that the resolution of an image on your computer screen while you are designing a document will differ from that of a printed image. Contacting your printer for resolution recommendations is advisable. They will be able to tell you the best measurements and file format in which to achieve good quality resolution in printing.

Pixels – an abbreviation for “picture element,” a pixel is the computerized dot which makes up an image.

DPI – representing “dots per square inch,” this term is used as a measurement of image quality in relation to various computer monitors and printing equipment. The DPI is a measure of the pixels present in an image and will determine the resolution of an image on a computer screen or a finished printed product. Your print company will be able to guide you in the appropriate dpi specifications needed for each print job.

Crop Marks – these are lines which are often placed around the edges of images that indicate to the printer the actual proportions of an image that is to be reproduced. Crop marks are usually found in attached image files or embedded files.

File Types

PDF – this file format, created through the use of Adobe software, is a standard open file format used for transferring or exchanging documents. Various graphics and word processing files can be converted to PDF for easy file transfer. Most printers request that full document files be sent via PDF and may request separate image and font files also be included.

TIFF – one of the printer preferred image file types, this abbreviation stands for “tagged image file format.”

EPS – another common printer preferred or acceptable file type, EPS or “encapsulated post script” files can be used for sending images, font styles, and other document-specific information.

Paper Types and Sizes

There are different styles and sizes of paper which are commonly used in printing different kinds of marketing and general interest publications. Likewise, paper can have a glossy or matte finish. Determining the best paper type and size for a specific project is often easy to do at home, especially if you’re working with a graphic design program on your own computer. However, if you need assistance in making paper type or style decisions, any good printing company’s customer service staff should be able to assist you.

Color Terminology

RGB – stands for “red, green, blue,” and refers to the most basic graphics programs’ usual method of creating shades from the three primary colors. While often appropriate for on-screen image clarity, this is not the color method which results in high-resolution printed images.

CMYK – stands for “cyan, magenta, yellow, black,” and refers to the four-color process used by most printers which achieves more precise shades and better printed image resolution.

Color Conversion – the process by which colors in computerized images are optimized for printing, it usually involves the adjustment of RGB colors to CMYK.

Color Matching – frequently achieved through digital imaging software programs at a professional print shop, this process is used to complete color conversions in the best and most efficient way possible to optimize print quality and color appearance in finished print jobs.

Printing Process Terms

Bleed – used in printing in reference to the area of ink coverage on a finished print, the bleed can be viewed as a margin in terms of your design files. Placing a margin or bleed in your files is encouraged by printers and the absence of it can often result in additional charges as more work needs to be completed by the printer.

Proof – a test print made to predict the appearance of the finished print, a proof is often shown to the customer prior to proceeding with the full print job.

Template – the document submitted by you which contains all the important details of the print job, including layout, dimensions, placement of images and the like.

Go Green! At ThinkWithInk.com we help the environment by offering options for green printing. For all your brochure printing needs, visit online today for more information.

Whether you’re considering an online or local print shop for printing your personal designs, correct file preparation is essential to the successful completion of the process. You may be designing brochures, business cards or other documents for clients as part of a small home-based business or you may be working with personal documents, like family newsletters, custom-made holiday cards, or marketing materials for your sole proprietorship. No matter what the print job is for, providing files in the correct format to a professional printer is a critical part of getting the job done right.

With any project, the design itself and the manner in which you prepare files for printing will both be of equal importance. A fantastic design that isn’t printed on time as a result of file format issues or file preparation problems will leave you hanging. Failing to meet a deadline for a client can result in loss of profit as well as reputation. Being as savvy as possible about the file preparation process will allow you greater success in your business ventures.

Here are some helpful tips to make your printing activities as successful as possible and your printing schedule timely.

Print Specifications

Once you’ve determined which professional printer you will use for a project, contact them for assistance in establishing the right layout for a particular design. Most professional printers require specific file formats. While you can work with a variety of programs to achieve good quality prints, you will need to know in which format the file must be saved in order for the printer to access it. Your version of a design program may not be compatible with the software utilized by the printer.

Additionally, you must understand the basic print specifications for achieving top-quality prints. Your print company will be able to advise you on those specifications. Printer provided specs like safety zones and bleeds will allow you to send the file off in the best possible condition for completing your print job on time and with good quality.

Color Conversion Processes

Most professional printers use a four-color process for achieving the best, most accurate and vivid color prints. If you are working in a design program that utilizes only a three-color process or RGB, then you will need to convert your colors prior to sending the document off to the printer. There are color conversion tools which allow you to assign RGB color values with their CMYK (four-color process) equivalent shades.

Converting colors can be accomplished in two ways. You may manually adjust colors in your documents using a fully functional color conversion program, or you can use a color conversion program to identify equivalent colors and send those specifications off to the printer along with your files.

Font Choices and Font File Types

One of the most common issues encountered by professional printers is inadequate information on font styles contained in documents or incorrect fonts being used by novice designers. With each document you send to the printer, you may want to consider sending a partner .eps image file which contains embedded fonts. You can also forward the actual font files including the print and screen versions of fonts so the printer is able to compare the two to find any font errors prior to printing.

Many novice designers are accustomed to manual font adjustments in word processing; however, using fonts that actually have a bold or italicized version available will lessen the chances of font problems with printing. Many of the manual font adjustments you make in standard word processing are lost during file transfers and conversions, making them poor choices for professional design jobs.

Troubleshooting Trapping and Misalignment Issues

Dealing with designs which include overlapping colors can be difficult, at least when you are less experienced in preparing files for sending to a printer. If your design has overlapping objects of different colors included in it, consider asking your printer if they can trap for you.

Trapping prevents white lines from appearing between objects of different colors in an overlapping design. It additionally keeps colors from merging in any part of the design in which different objects are supposed to be unique shades. Many printers will perform trapping processes for you but you may be responsible for completing the prep work yourself, in which case you will need to become more familiar with trapping techniques to avoid misalignment issues with your designs.

Image Preparation

Whether your print job includes photos or graphic images, you will need to send all image files to your printer separately. Edit the images prior to placing them in your design file and ensure that each is saved in at least a 300 dpi format. You may also want to consult your printer on certain images in order to know what format might provide the best resolution in your finished document. Your printer will also be able to provide you with the graphics format in which image files should be submitted. Usually a .tif or .eps format is best but printers vary on their preferences and capabilities.

Go Green! At ThinkWithInk.com we help the environment by offering options for green printing. For all your brochure printing needs, visit online today for more information.