Large Format Printing: Faux Beer Cans on a Standee

May 15th, 2012

Posted in Box Printing, Large-Format Printing, Paper and finishing, Poster Printing, Printing | Comments »

My fiancee and I installed a standee this week for the movie That’s My Boy. It came with three or four beer cans.

A few years ago, while installing another standee, I thought I had seen everything when I opened the heavy standee box only to see a bag marked “bricks.” (They had been ballast for a Lazy-Susan type of rotating display stand.) But the beer cans really took the cake.

Interestingly enough, assembly instructions for the beer cans appeared in the four-page instruction manual. The text showed exactly how to twist them so they would look like the remains of a fraternity party. To keep them in place, each can had two strips of double-sided tape. The instructional print book showed exactly where to place them on the “lawn” portion of the standee.

How Is This Relevant to Custom Printing?

You might ask how this relates to commercial printing. I see two very direct connections.

First, if you looked closely, you could see that the faux beer cans were not metal. They were cardboard canisters with applique’s of a nondescript beer. Someone had printed and assembled cylinders, each with a top and bottom image and another image wrapped around and glued to the sides. The custom printing vendors had done a lot of work.

Why cardboard and not metal? I haven’t a clue, but here are some thoughts:

1. Liability: If broken or torn apart, an aluminum beer can could have a jagged edge that might cause an accident. The movie studios, standee designers, and movie theaters increasingly attempt to avoid accidents to those who interact with standees, particularly as more physical materials are used in standees and as standees become more interactive.
2. Sensitivity in Marketing: Perhaps the designer of this large format printing piece wanted to avoid promoting a particular beer (again for liability issues regarding product placement). Perhaps the studio wanted to avoid explicitly promoting beer to minors who might see the standee (after all, a cardboard beer can with a nondescript label glued to its surface can give the impression of a beer can without identifying a particular beer or any beer at all).
3. Cost: Creating a fake beer can out of cardboard allowed the designers at the movie studio to avoid the need to have aluminum beer cans mocked up. Perhaps the cost to create simulated aluminum cans exceeded the (considerable, I would assume) cost to mock up a cardboard tube, print the beer can label in four colors on 80# or 100# enamel printing paper, and then, using hot-melt glue, affix the appliques onto the sides, top, and bottom of three cans per standee (multiplied by the majority of movie theaters in the country, presumably).

What About Your Large Format Printing Work?

What can we learn from this? First, consider multiple custom printing options and a variety of materials for your large format printing work. Cost is one factor. The number of copies you will need to produce as well as the accessibility of the particular materials are two more considerations. Talk with your commercial printing suppliers early. In fact, the more outlandish the project, the earlier you should start making physical mock-ups of the large format printing piece, and the sooner you should involve the printing suppliers.

Also Consider Shipping Logistics

When you create something as easily crushed as three beer cans, you need to consider shipping logistics. The standee company inserted all three cans in an additional carton within the main carton that contained the standee. Not to have done so might have compromised a lot of work and wasted a lot of money. So don’t just design a large format printing piece. Also think about how you will get it to it’s destination for assembly.

The Immersive Experience

As an aside, I want you to know how real these looked. The manager of the movie theater came into the room we were using to assemble the standee, and looked disgusted when he pointed at the beer cans and asked, “What are those?” Apparently he had thought we were drinking on the job.

Large format printing, as reflected in movie standees, is moving away from cardboard-only assemblages toward real-world objects. Over the last month I have assembled one standee with a metal street sign pole affixed to a base covered in simulated grass. I have also assembled two photo opportunity standees with fabric-covered chairs.

Anything that looks real captures the interest of the movie-goers and draws them into the fictional world of the movie (and the movie standee). I think it’s powerful marketing. I also think it is fascinating that this is happening at the same time as computer technology is embracing both virtual reality and augmented reality.

There is room for custom printing, it seems. However, to make offset and digital printing viable alternatives to entirely electronic media, it helps to accentuate the tactile qualities of print. After all, you cant touch anything on a computer screen.

Posted in Box Printing, Large-Format Printing, Paper and finishing, Poster Printing, Printing | Comments »

Printing Services: Can a Digital Press Print Quality Wedding Materials?

May 11th, 2012

Posted in Digital Printing, Paper and finishing, Printing | Comments »

A reader recently commented on my blog post about problems with the color register of a client’s wedding materials on an HP Indigo digital press. She made an interesting point. She said she would not have printed a suite of wedding materials (invitation, thank-you notes, RSVP, envelopes, etc., on a digital press).

Is Digital Custom Printing Appropriate for Wedding Materials?

I hadn’t thought about it, because the article was a case study about determining the cause of fuzzy type on a proof. However, I actually do agree with the reader. Although digital printing has come a long way over the years, it is still may not be the best option for an elegant wedding package.

Unfortunately, for my client a press run of 150 copies of five items (three cards and two envelopes) would not have been economical.

1. One of the two envelopes, an envelope for the thank-you notes, had no printing. It was a blank A2 envelope that cost $25.00 for 150 copies.
2. The other envelope (an A7) included variable data printing. Each copy had a different address. Therefore, offset printing would not have been an option.
3. The invitation (a 4/0 digital job) could have been printed on a small duplicator press with two colors, but it still probably would have exceeded the cost of the 4-color digital job.
4. The thank-you note was 4/0 (and could have been printed 2/0 via offset lithography, again probably for more than the cost of the digital run).
5. The RSVP card could have been printed via offset lithography, but it was 4/4 (printed both sides). On a small duplicator press it could have run as a 2-color job printed on both sides. Again, it probably would have cost more than a digital custom printing job.

Essentially, for a short-run, five-item wedding materials package including variable data, price trumped quality. My client chose digital printing.

How to Make the Best of Digital Printing

1. Digital custom printing to all but the most discriminating eye really is quite good. That said, it does vary in quality from digital press to digital press, so I chose the best digital press I know: the HP Indigo. It comes closer to offset commercial printing quality than anything else on the market.
2. My client chose a brilliant white uncoated sheet for the wedding materials: 100# Mohawk Via Felt Pure White Cover. I have found over the years that the rough surface of an uncoated sheet affords a more forgiving substrate for digital printing than a high-gloss coated paper. And the brightness of the sheet provides good contrast for the liquid Indigo ink (i.e., toner).
3. With digital printing, it’s important to watch the color register. Use a loupe to check the proof.
4. Here’s one final note to keep in mind. With electronic media taking precedence over offset and even digital printing in some arenas, there has been a tremendous push to improve both the speed and the quality of digital commercial printing to keep it competitive. Since some items will always need to be printed (such as product packaging and marketing collateral), the reduction in cost, increase in quality, and varaible data capabilities of the newest digital printing equipment bode well for wedding materials produced via digital custom printing over the next few years. Stay abreast of the media, and read any discussions of the newest commercial printing technologies and equipment.

What Are Some Other Options?

There are a lot of reasons to just pay more for wedding materials. After all, this may be the most important day of your life. So here are some options for wedding materials if you don’t want to go the route of digital custom printing:

Offset: As noted before, you will get slightly higher quality with offset printing than with digital printing. If you do choose offset lithography, consider including fine color screens, gradations, intricate line art, dull and gloss varnish treatments played off one another, or other items that might not be as high a quality if printed via digital (due to the lower halftone screen rulings of a digital press). In other words, design your work to benefit from the strengths of offset lithography.

Letterpress: If you choose letterpress, you will see flattened indentations on the paper where the custom printing plate has struck the substrate and deposited ink. This is a very tactile medium compared to the smooth surface of either offset lithography or digital printing. Design to its strengths. Consider using blocks of solid color, or maybe screen back a color by using hatch marks rather than halftone dots.

Engraving: The pressure applied to the etched printing plate causes the moist paper to rise where the ink has been deposited (i.e., the wet paper is pulled into the recessed engraving channels in the printing plate).

Thermography: Thermography mimics engraving, for less money, using powders that are added to the wet offset lithography ink. When heated, the powders bubble up and produce raised type. However, true engraving can’t be matched for elegance. You can feel the difference as you run your fingers over the raised letterforms.

The Cost: What to Expect

Expect to pay significantly more for letterpress or engraving than for offset or digital. In addition, remember that varying the text on the envelopes will not be possible with offset, letterpress, or engraving. As a test, you might want to approach a letterpress shop and an engraver when you design your wedding materials, and request estimates. Compare these to the bids for offset and digital printing. The pricing may fit your budget, so it’s worth a try.

That said, the quality will be superb. You will pay for this, but sometimes it’s worth it.

Posted in Digital Printing, Paper and finishing, Printing | Comments »

Printing Services Case Study: Digital Type Out of Register

May 7th, 2012

Posted in Digital Printing | 2 Comments »

A custom printing client of mine is producing a number of elements of a wedding invitation package. She received her hard-copy proofs of the invitation, RSVP card, thank-you note and envelopes and noticed that the type appeared fuzzy on some of the proofs.

She asked for my opinion, and along with her email, she sent a JPEG photo of a particularly egregious example of the fuzzy type.

Here’s How I Approached the Problem

First, I looked at the facts:

1. The job was short run and therefore digital. It would be printed on the HP Indigo press.
2. Because the job was digital, the two ink colors of the wedding package job would be process color builds, not true PMS colors.
3. The two colors, a salmon color and a dark navy blue, were composed of the following percentages of CMYK liquid toners on the Indigo (C0, M70, Y50, K0 for the salmon and C100, M80, Y0, K50 for the blue).
4. The blue type was a simple gothic face with a relatively even thickness of strokes in the letterforms. The salmon colored type was a script face.
5. The script face did not appear to be fuzzy on the proof.
6. The fuzzy type appeared to be more evident on the blue type and on only a few of the wedding package items.

 

I Asked the Commercial Printing Vendor to Explain

I called the printer and spoke with two different prepress operators. I was told the following:

1. The Indigo digital press provides lower resolution output (and coarser halftone line screens) than conventional offset custom printing. Therefore, the fuzzy type will be more evident to the eye than similar type printed via offset lithography.
2. Since the salmon color was composed of screens only (no 100 percent solid colors, but rather C0, M70, Y50, K0), the blue type should be crisper than the salmon (blue was C100, M80, Y0, K50, so it had a 100 percent solid cyan letterform).

 

I Didn’t Immediately Believe What I Was Told

For a few reasons, I didn’t agree with the prepress operators at the commercial printing supplier:

1. The problem was with the dark blue type, not the salmon colored type. Based on the custom printing company’s explanation, since the 100 percent coverage in the dark blue should have created a definitive letterform, the blue type should have been fine, and the salmon colored type should have been problematic (i.e., since all salmon colored letterforms would have been composed entirely of halftone dots). But this was not the case.
2. The salmon colored type had wispy serifs, and the dark blue type was composed of simple block letters. The problem should have been more obvious on the salmon script face, with it’s thin, uneven strokes. But it was not.

Instead, I Believed That the Type Was Out of Register

1. Granted, the salmon colored type was composed of only two colors (magenta and yellow, or C0, M70, Y50, K0). I realized that a mitigating factor would have been the lightness of the color. That is, yellow is very forgiving. If it’s out of register, it’s so light that you usually don’t notice this.
2. The type in the photo my client had sent me was fuzzy on only one side. Upon further magnification, I saw halftone dots on only one side of the letterforms.
3. Most of the proofs were fine. Only one was really bad. It seemed to me that if the comments of the prepress operators at the commercial printing company had been correct, all proofs would have been equally fuzzy, and the type would have been fuzzy on all sides, not just one side.
4. My concern that the type was out of register was based in part on the composition of the dark blue ink (i.e., liquid toner). It was composed of three colors (C100, M80, Y0, K50). The percentage of each color equaled or exceeded 50 percent coverage. And there were no light colors (no yellow at all). Basically, since the color was composed of high percentages of three dark hues (cyan, magenta, and black), I knew any color misregistration would be more visible than usual, in spite of the simplicity of the gothic letterforms.
5. The photo my client sent was a dead giveaway. When magnified, it showed a row of halftone dots hanging out on one side.

I Sent a Photo of the Problem to the Commercial Printing Vendor

I emailed my client’s photo to the printer. The prepress staff forwarded it to the owner of the shop, who was responsible for actually running the Indigo press (a benefit of my contracting with a small print shop). He said he could adjust the HP Indigo to fix the color register for the final press run. Problem solved.

What You Can Learn from This Experience

If your proofs look fuzzy, consider the following:

1. Think about the number of colors used as well as their percentages. If the proof is out of register, multiple colors will magnify the problem, particularly if they are dark colors (not yellow) and if they are high percentage screens of the colors.
2. Consider the typefaces. Type with thin serifs will magnify problems with color register.
3. When you get a proof from the custom printing supplier, use a magnifying glass (or printer’s loupe) to see whether all halftone screens are properly aligned.
4. If there are problems, take digital photos of the problems and email them to the printer.
5. Don’t just take the word of the commercial printer, poster digital printing service, or digital on demand book printing vendor as to why the problem occurred. Do your own research as well. Be an informed consumer.

Posted in Digital Printing | 2 Comments »

Commercial Printing: What You Can Now Do with Digital Inks and Toners

May 5th, 2012

Posted in Digital Printing, Printing | Comments »

Not that long ago, if you wanted special ink treatments for your custom printing work, you had to opt for offset lithography. Digital printing just wasn’t there yet. But this has been changing, affording new options for short-run and variable-data work on digital printing presses.

Here’s a rundown of some of your options and some of the kinds of digital commercial printing equipment you should look for when researching this technology.

Textured Ink: a Tactile Experience

Let’s say you want to print a photo of an iguana in your short-run brochure print job, and you want the reader to get a visceral experience of the reptile’s skin when she or he runs a finger across the printed surface. Now you can achieve this effect with three dimensional inks.

On digital custom printing equipment such as the Kodak NexPress, you can add a clear textured coating over one of the inks (or over a particular area), using the fifth inking unit of the press for a clear ink. Basically, you would use InDesign, Photoshop, or Illustrator to isolate the particular color and then create a separate layer, in much the same way as you would isolate a selection for a varnish. Because the dimensional inks have larger particles than conventional inks, the heat of the fusing unit in the digital press will cause the dimensional ink to expand, providing a raised, textured surface.

Prior to the advent of textured digital inks, you had to use thermography to achieve this effect. First you would offset print the color on a traditional press, and then you would add powder to the still wet ink. The heat of a fusing unit would cause the ink and powder mixture to bubble up, providing a raised ink effect. This was expensive and time consuming.

Textured Ink and Faux Embossing

Using the concept of thick, raised digital inks, it is even possible to do digital embossing without needing to create a metal die for the job. The high-end HP Indigo press will actually allow you to run up to 250 passes of a textured ink to build up a raised surface. This raised surface can then be used as a digital die to emboss the remaining press sheets of your digital print job.

Expanding the Color Gamut

Offset lithography uses four process colors to simulate full-color imagery (cyan, magenta, yellow, and black ink). Since these colors can only create a limited subset of the hues visible to the eye, commercial printing vendors can add additional inks to expand the number of reproducible colors.

Now, digital presses can do this, too. For instance, consider the HP Indigo’s IndiChrome ink system, which can add orange, violet, and green to the CMYK process color inkset, dramatically widening the number of printable hues. In addition, for colors still out of the color gamut, the manufacturer in Israel can create spot color inks for the HP Indigo press.

In addition to process colors, the availability of various black and gray inks and toners has allowed the creation of fine arts photos with incredible depth and nuance. This has opened up the fine arts market to custom printing suppliers with digital equipment.

White Ink as a Color and as a Blocking Device

On the HP Indigo you can also print white ink. You might want to use this ink as an accent in your design, but you might also use it as a blocking device. For instance, if you have a clear plastic substrate (like a static cling) and you want to print a different image on either side, you can print a white ink base between the images. Or, you might choose a metallic substrate and then use white ink to block out the metallic in certain areas of the design.

Special Inks for Security Purposes

From a more functional point of view, here’s a brief selection of security-based effects you can create using a digital press:

1. The Xerox iGen4 can give certain parts of a ticket or other document a gloss coating, creating a security watermark that’s difficult to counterfeit.
2. Xerox digital presses can also add fluorescent ink markings visible under UV light, ink markings only visible under infrared light, or microscopic printing (as small as 1/100 of an inch) that can be verified under a magnifying glass but that appears only as a jagged pattern to the naked eye.
3. The Kodak NexPress can add MICR (magnetic ink character recognition) ink for banking documents and checks.

The security ink functions of digital presses make them ideal for tickets, birth certificates, vouchers, and identification papers. Moreover, the CMYK halftone dots for the individual security features can be printed at different angles to the rest of the text, allowing these security features to be read separately from the main text without needing to add any other inks.

Gloss/Dull Cover Coatings for Aesthetics and Protection

In contrast to security inks, extended color gamuts, and digital embossing, the normal process of coating the cover of a book or poster with a gloss sheen for aesthetics and protection is not dramatic. However, it serves an essential function, and the Kodak NexPress can do this commercial printing job quite well.

Conclusion

All of these effects were once only available in the arena of offset lithography. They were expensive. You needed to to use additional coating units on press, create metal dies, and add additional printing plates. Furthermore, the process only produced multiple copies of one original.

Now, due to the advent of liquid toner-based inks (rather than dry toner) for electrophotography (i.e., laser printing), commercial printing providers can vary the images infinitely, making each page different from the last. Or they can produce an incredibly short press run of 20 copies, or even just one. Or they can build up the thickness of one area of the custom printing job to create embossing dies or textures.

And in most cases the process does not involve an additional click charge for the digital printer, but only a modest additional charge for a variable-data and specialty-imaging software package.

Posted in Digital Printing, Printing | Comments »

Custom Printing: Nanography, a Breakthrough Printing Process

May 2nd, 2012

Posted in Book Printing, Box Printing, Digital Printing, Magazine Printing, Printing | 2 Comments »

I recently have been reading about a breakthrough custom printing process that will be unveiled in a few days at Drupa 2012, known as the “worlds largest trade fair for the printing and media industry.”

The process is called Nanography™, and it has sparked considerable interest and enthusiasm since its creator, Benny Landa, also launched the Indigo digital press back in 1993.

Why It’s So Special

Nanography will target the commercial printing, packaging, and publishing markets with its technology, which combines the varaible data management of digital custom printing with the quality and speed of offset printing, for a significantly lower cost per page than prior options could provide.

Here’s What It Involves

The Landa NanoInk™ used in Nanography contains exceptionally small particles of pigment tens of nanometers in size. (To put this in perspective, a human hair is approximately 100,000 nanometers wide.) Because these NanoInk particles absorb light so well, they provide image quality not seen before in digital or offset custom printing. The Nanographic process provides crisp, exceptionally uniform halftone dots, a high-gloss sheen, and an unmatched CMYK color gamut.

But There’s More

Durability: The process yields an extremely durable and abrasion resistant ink surface.

Varied Printing Substrates: Unlike many other digital commercial printing processes, Nanography allows for printing on coated and uncoated press sheets, recycled carton stock, newsprint, and plastic packaging film. Pretreating the substrate with a special coating is unnecessary, and no post-printing drying process is needed.

Cost-Savings: The thickness of the ink film (approximately 500 nanometers) is about half the thickness of a comparable film of offset ink. This significantly reduces the cost of ink for a job. Combined with the elimination of paper pre-treating costs and post-drying costs, the ink savings will add up to a dramatically reduced cost per page.

Eco-Friendly Process: Less ink benefits the environment. Moreover, the water-based process is also more eco-friendly and energy efficient than prior technologies, due to the combined benefit of reduced consumables and increased printing speed. Also, the Nanographic press is much smaller than other digital presses and tiny compared to offset presses.

Nanographic Presses

Landa Nanographic Printing presses are not just small and fast. They also are varied in their configuration. These commercial printing presses can be used with up to eight ink colors and can produce either 600 dpi or 1200 dpi print output.

The presses also come in both web and perfecting sheetfed versions, so in either case the presses can print both sides of the printing sheet simultaneously. And they’re fast: The sheetfed presses run at 11,000 sheets per hour, while the web presses run at up to 200 meters per minute (over 650 feet per minute).

What Kind of Custom Printing Work Will Reap the Benefits?

Due to the variety of press configurations (i.e., both sheetfed and web), Nanography should make inroads into all areas of custom printing, particularly general commercial work, books and magazines, direct mail work, carton printing, flexible packaging, and labels.

Due to the color fidelity, Nanography should even be appropriate for such aesthetically demanding work as food and cosmetics marketing.

Why Nanography Is Important

1. One of the reasons electronic and social media have taken a foothold is price. It costs almost nothing to reproduce and distribute an electronic book relative to the cost of a print book. A new process, such as Nanography, that increases printing efficiency and quality while reducing costs holds great promise.
2. A second reason e-books have taken a foothold is their speed to market. Nanographic presses can compete better with digital media because these custom printing presses are fast.
3. Since Nanography is a digital, inkjet process, Nanographic presses can produce infinitely variable print pages, allowing for mass customization of printed products.

Why I Believe What I’ve Been Reading About Nanography

The short answer is the Indigo. I have found no better digital press. As a printing broker, I send more and more of my clients’ jobs to commercial printing vendors with Indigo equipment. Without question, Indigo rivals the color fidelity of offset. And if Benny Landa created the Indigo, I can’t wait to see how Nanography will change the custom printing industry.

Posted in Book Printing, Box Printing, Digital Printing, Magazine Printing, Printing | 2 Comments »

Book Printing: Consider Both Design Goals and Custom Printing Costs

April 29th, 2012

Posted in Book Binding Options, Book Printing, Hardcover Book Printing, Soft Cover Book Printing | Comments »

A client of mine is producing a family history print book. We’re not absolutely sure yet whether it will be long enough to warrant perfect binding—or even case binding—or whether the press run will require digital or offset printing.

That said, my client wants the book to be first class in design and primarily for family and friends. So at this point I’m guessing that it will be an 8.5” x 11” format, 100 to 200 pages (based on the number of photos and the amount of text), and case-bound in a limited edition on table-top case-binding equipment. I would assume at this point that the interior of the book would be digitally printed on an HP Indigo (or similar press) due to the short run (presumably less than 500 copies if the book is for friends and family), and the 4-color imagery in the text of the book.

Regardless of the method of producing the book, it will need to include one or more images reflecting two branches of a large family tree.

I was just called upon to offer advice regarding both custom printing and design issues, and I wanted to share them with readers who might face similar challenges.

The Goals for the Family Tree

A family tree includes a lot of information, and to be useful this information must be readable. Moreover, in this particular case the family tree will include two smaller trees: one for the mother’s side of the family and one for the father’s.

I spoke with a book printer to discuss options. He suggested the following:

From a Book Printer’s Perspective

1. My client could print the two segments of the family tree on two consecutive pages within the book. If artwork on the two pages needs to cross over and align perfectly, these could be the two center-spread pages of a signature in a perfect-bound or case-bound book, or the center spread of the book if the text winds up being short enough for saddle stitching.

   Or, my client could print the mother’s family tree on a page preceding her chapter of the book, and the father’s family tree on the page preceding his. (Either way, there would be no additional custom printing charge. The pages for the family tree would just be part of the text.)

2. My client could print the two segments of the family tree on the inside front and inside back covers of the print book. If the book were saddle stitched or perfect bound, this would be no problem, and if my client choses to produce a case-bound book, the segments of the family tree could be printed on the endsheets of the book.

   For either a saddle-stitched or perfect-bound book, there might be no extra charge, or only a minimal charge, depending on how the covers are printed. More specifically, some larger presses can print both sides of the press sheet simultaneously. In this case, depending on how many inking units the press has and how the covers are imposed (set up on the press sheet), the additional cost might be only for ink, wash-ups, and plates.

   On the other hand, if the covers must be printed once for the exterior front and back covers, and an additional time for the interior front and back covers, this option might add hundreds of dollars to the cost of the job. The same would be true if the job is case bound, since an additional press run would be needed for the endsheets, which might otherwise be blank.

3. As a third alternative, my client could add an over-sized sheet (11″ x 17″ folded to 8.5″ x 11″) between signatures within the book (called a “tip-on”). This would work whether the book is saddle stitched, perfect bound, or case bound.

   If the print book is saddle stitched, the fold-out would need to be placed in the “high-folio” side (the back of the book) and open out to the right (placing it in the low-folio side is an option, but since it is more difficult, it would cost more). Basically, an 8.5” x 11” book page would be on one side of the staples (the front half of the book), and the larger, two-page fold-out would be on the other side of the staples (the back half of the book). The fold-out would be folded in just shy of the trim so the cutting knives won’t chop through the fold when they trim the book.

   Depending on the page count and press run, this can add $600, $700, or more, for make-ready and the book press run.

From a Designer’s Perspective

I thought about these options as a designer as well as a print broker to see whether the respective goals might be in conflict. These were my observations and my suggestions to the client:

1. Seeing both the mother’s and father’s side of the family tree side by side would show a connection between the two sides of the family.
2. But this would require a larger than normal page size to allow for readable text.
3. Therefore, the ideal option would unfortunately also be the most expensive (the fold-out).
4. Placing the two halves of the family tree side by side on facing pages would work, too. However, a fold-out treatment will be more dramatic, giving prominence to the design and type on the fold-out page.

At this point it is early in the process. We’ll see what my client will choose. I’m sure it will depend on the size and format of the print book, its budget, and my client’s design and editorial goals for the family history. These may all affect both the printing technology (digital or offset) and the binding options (traditional long-run binding or short-run table-top binding).

But this does illustrate the need to coordinate the physical requirements of the custom printing process with both the desired look and functionality of a job and the amount of money available for its design and production. And, as always, it’s wise to involve the book printer early in the design process.

Posted in Book Binding Options, Book Printing, Hardcover Book Printing, Soft Cover Book Printing | Comments »

Commercial Printing: Letterpress Is Thriving

April 24th, 2012

Posted in Paper and finishing, Printing | Comments »

I read an article about letterpress recently, sent to me via Google Alerts. The article was entitled “The Letterpress Thrives in an iPad Age.” It was written by Peter S. Green and published by Business Week early this month.

Multiple Copies of This Article

What I found intriguing was the number of times this article about custom printing has appeared, in blogs, online newsletters, etc., under slightly reworded titles, but always with the same lead paragraph appearing in the search engine results: five pages of Google search listings.

To me, this speaks volumes. People want the tangible qualities of custom printing work. In fact, people need the tangible qualities of print even more now because of the ephemeral (i.e., virtual) nature of the Internet.

The Gist of the Article

“The Letterpress Thrives in an iPad Age” describes the experience of several artists who come home from their day jobs (in some cases designing advertisements on their Macintosh computers) and either use their own letterpresses or rent them with other artisans within a group setting.

Why? They want to get away from the computer for a while, stop being wired-in, and create a marriage of physical art and physical communications.

According to the article, the market is there, too, noting that “Etsy, the website that hosts online stores for handmade goods, listed over 22,000 letterpress items in early April, more than triple the number a year earlier.” In addition, one artist described in the magazine article sells her work both online and in Anthropologie, an upscale women’s clothing establishment. Her custom printing products include greeting cards, wedding invitations, and thank-you notes.

Why I Think Letterpress Is Thriving

To add depth to the argument for the physical attributes of commercial printing work, another article I read noted that being 13 percent of the way through a book on an e-reader didn’t hold the same satisfaction for the reader as having read 40 pages of a 300-page book. There’s a sense of accomplishment that comes from knowing—in an analog way—that you have read a certain number of pages of a print book and have so many more to go.

My personal view is that letterpress is thriving for the following reasons:

1. Our world has become increasingly impersonal and virtual.
2. Letterpress has a more tactile quality than even offset custom printing, since the type and plates actually strike the paper and leave indentations (called “the punch” of the plate on the paper). The multi-level nature of the letterpress printed product combined with the all-cotton card-stock makes holding and reading such a printed piece a sensual pleasure.
3. The artisans in the magazine article are approaching both the illustrations and type of the letterpress-printed items as artwork: more than just communication.
4. Handcrafted notecards are very personal. They are far more intimate than a hastily written email note. (My guess would be that handcrafted writing implements—beautifully wrought ballpoint pens and fountain pens—might also be making a comeback.)
5. The natural quality of the components of letterpress (the cotton of the paper and the metal of the presses) balance the artificial nature of computer images.
6. The antiquarian nature of letterpress as well as its slowness balance the speed and perfection of cyber-life.

Samples From a Local Letterpress

I brought out my letterpress samples today to look for any qualities I had missed.

1. I found a letterpress pizza in a miniature, printed pizza box. The pizza is a diecut puzzle printed in two colors on thick chipboard. Each of the six slices of pizza fits into its neighbor, and running my finger across the printed surface, I can feel the mushrooms and green peppers because the inking plates have created multiple levels on the surface of the chipboard. This is not just a sample of custom printing. It is a sculpture. And the strengths of letterpress reinforce its sculptural nature.
2. I found a square letterpress invitation with a green heart hanging in a brown tree. The custom printing paper stock must be at least 16 points in thickness, with hills and valleys in the paper’s surface, much like stucco. The artwork and type are recessed into the thick paper as well as printed in a simple color scheme.
3. I found a two-color Z-fold invitation. The all-caps headlines are actually blind embossed into the paper, as are the yellow water drops that form a background pattern. The complexity of the surface (its multi-level nature) combined with the simplicity of the black and yellow color scheme, plus the fact that screens are created with cross-hatching rather than halftones, makes for a powerful custom printing piece.

I think I understand the current appeal of letterpress.

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Commercial Printing: Sappi Paper Fosters Sustainable Forestry

April 19th, 2012

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I recently received a print book written by Sappi paper company (formerly Warren Sappi) entitled Taking the Guilt Out of Paper. Sappi manufactures and supplies paper to commercial printing establishments and other vendors. The print book is promotional in nature, but it makes several cogent points about paper-making and the harvesting of trees in general.

The Charge: “Go Paperless. Save a Tree.”

Sappi notes that it’s not as simple as this. Promoting sustainable forestry actually improves the health of forests and wildlife. (And, as we know, plant life absorbs carbon dioxide and gives off oxygen, so we all need the forests.) Using custom printing paper that has been certified, ensuring that responsible methods have been used in its planting and harvesting, actually helps ensure the continued existence of vibrant forests, healthy wildlife, and clean air, soil, and water.

Harvesting trees while planting far more than have been cut does result in variation in the age of growth in the forest. This is true. However, what Sappi refers to as “variation in age class within a forest” actually promotes biodiversity of both plant and animal life.

It is more a question of stewardship, of being careful about using only those commercial printing paper products that reflect such certifications as SFI (Sustainable Forestry Initiative) and FSC (Forest Stewardship Council), and using paper products responsibly and with purpose (without waste) to help keep the eco-system thriving.

We Actually Have More Trees Now

Responsible, sustainable forest management approaches trees as a crop. The goal is to plant more while harvesting less. This has led to an abundance of trees in the United States, more now than there were 100 years ago. Since it is in the best interest of the paper products industry to ensure the longevity of the forests, the industry participates actively in protecting both the trees and the forest animals.

Sappi Commercial Printing Paper Preserves Wildlife, Too

Animals and fish depend on the trees for their food, water, and habitat. However, the animals, fish, and even the insects scatter the seeds, fertilize the soil, and disperse the pollen. So there is a mutual dependency between the animals and the trees, and for this reason the Sappi paper company promotes the health, longevity, and increase of wildlife as well as plant life.

In addition to working with wildlife groups to educate companies and individuals about conservation, Sappi considers the effects of various tree cutting techniques within a particular wildlife area. In some areas Sappi may harvest more actively, in some less.

In fact, not cutting trees in a responsible way would cause a forest to become old and one-dimensional, with all growth of the same age. This would in fact decrease the amount of land suitable for particular animals, birds, fish, and insects.

Biodiversity Is Essential

The ideal situation, according to the Sappi paper company, is biodiversity, which implies that multiple species of plant and animal life, of various ages, can coexist harmoniously. While Mother Nature often acts aggressively to manage forestland—through fires, insect infestations, plant and animal diseases, and wind damage—commercial printing paper companies that adhere to SFI and SFC guidelines simulate the gentler aspects of nature to manage the forests responsibly while providing paper fiber (and hence a product, service, and employment) to individuals and organizations.

National Geographic Speaks Out

Taking the Guilt Out of Paper Usage by the Sappi paper company includes remarks by Hans Wenger of the National Geographic Society. He notes that:

1. Forests are “100 percent renewable.”
2. In terms of carbon emissions, an entire year’s subscription to the National Geographic magazine is comparable to using one gallon of gas in the family car.
3. The electronic revolution has its costs, too, particularly in terms of the energy needed to run the computers and servers (to create the documents and store them over time) and the extraction of resources to make the electronic devices (many of which, such as mercury and cadmium, cannot be recycled easily if at all).

Balance Is Key

If I had to distill the entire print book into one short message, I’d say that Sappi focuses on responsible use of resources. Both commercial printing paper and electronic media will be with us for a long time. Each has its place and cannot be totally eclipsed by the other. But in order to ensure future resources, it is important to use the resources we have purposefully, without waste, and with consideration towards sustainablity.

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Large Format Printing: Multiple Standees and Marketing Theory

April 18th, 2012

Posted in Large-Format Printing, Poster Printing | Comments »

Installing a large standee for The Dictator today, I had some thoughts about the importance of placement of standees and other point of purchase displays. I thought these might be of use to you in your large format printing work.

Placement of Standee (Immediacy)

The goal of large format signage is for it to be immediately seen. As the long escalator disembarks on the main floor of this particular movie theater, you are immediately greeted by a moving Madagascar standee. The canon barrel goes up and down, raising and lowering the animal characters stuffed in the barrel. Motion, wild color, and the faces of the creatures grab your interest.

Placement is key. You see this moving, large format printing structure before anything else, as the escalator reaches the main floor.

Placement of Standee (Competing Images)

When we completed The Dictator structure, we were asked by theater management to place the standee in an open spot next to the Dark Shadows standee. By itself, Dark Shadows is huge. It is also exciting, since it combines printed graphic panels with a velvet chair in which the movie patron can sit for a photo opportunity, surrounded by the ghastly inhabitants of Dark Shadows.

That said, The Dictator standee is larger, simpler, lighter in color, and first in a series of standees going down the hall in the movie theater. It includes a large, overstuffed chair in front of a large circular poster of the main character. It is flanked by two flags hanging on wooden poles. Under the chair is a circular, inkjet printed floor covering—a simulation of a round rug.

The Dictator standee dwarfs the Dark Shadows standee. I think this is true for two reasons:

1. In general, what you see first makes the strongest impression. The Dictator is first in line and larger than the other standees.
2. Whatever is harder to see makes a lesser impression. Movie theaters are dark, and the fact that The Dictator is positioned under better light, and is itself lighter and simpler in general, makes it more of an eye catcher than Dark Shadows, even though I personally think the Dark Shadows standee is far more intriguing up close.

Unique Materials Engage the Viewer

In a prior blog positing, I had mentioned that I liked the way Dark Shadows involved the viewer. The Dictator does the same thing. Both are photo opportunities. I think the unique construction materials accentuate the immersive quality of the standees. Both Dark Shadows and The Dictator include printed materials (flexographic panels of solid color as well as offset printed images), but they also include physical objects (chairs, flagpoles, and, in the case of The Dictator, a custom printed floor covering resembling a large, round rug.

Both standees create an environment for the viewer to step into. You can participate with the standee. In the case of The Dictator, you can run your hand across the embroidered chair or reach up to touch the inkjet custom printing work of the soft fabric flags on wooden poles. Images of flags, offset printed and diecut, just don’t compare to the emotional engagement of real flags, a real chair, and a real rug.

Safety of Standee

You wouldn’t initially think about it, but standees that invite participation put both the participant and the theater at risk. You can hurt yourself if you’re not careful. So in both the design and production of these photo booth standees, as well as their placement, safety has to be a consideration.

For instance, the Dark Shadows standee includes a chair made of layers of corrugated board covered with padded velvet cushions and graphic panels. It is quite sturdy. It is also bolted to a floor panel so it can’t move (making it safe for enthusiastic teenagers).

Overall Thoughts for Your Own Large Format Printing Work

Here are some concepts you might take away from this experience:

1. Think big. All large format printing displays fit within an environment and compete with other point of purchase signage. Larger, brighter, simpler, more colorful—all of these qualities will get your image noticed. And for marketing, it’s all about getting noticed.
2. Think physical reality. If your point of purchase signage has protruding elements, or is positioned in the way of foot traffic, or is dangerous in any other way, a marketing moment can turn into a legal one or even a tragedy. Someone can get hurt.
3. Think surroundings. Your image will compete with other images. Determine the location early in the process, and even if there are no competing marketing images to consider, do consider the lighting, the surrounding wall color—everything else in the environment.
4. Think interactive. Your large format printing display will grab the viewer if it invites him or her into its own fanciful world. Using real objects (like the chairs or the fabric flags on wooden poles) makes the installation more real and hence more immersive.

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Magazine Printing: Redesigning a Periodical

April 13th, 2012

Posted in Magazine Printing, Offset Printing | Comments »

A colleague of mine recently received the task of redesigning a magazine for a defense firm. She asked how I would approach this custom printing job.

General Approach to a Visual Make-over

I listed three starting points that I would use if I had just received such an assignment:

1. I’d consider the goals, mission statement, and overall character of the organization. The redesigned publication should visually reflect all of these, consistently expressing them through all design elements, from typefaces to color usage to design grid to placement of white space.
2. I’d compare the publication to a selection of current printed and online marketing materials from the organization (brochure printing samples, print posters, print catalogs, etc.). The redesigned publication should either complement these materials, or the other publications should also be redesigned to reflect the new visual identity.
3. Finally, I’d compare the redesigned magazine to other marketing collateral from competing organizations. The redesigned periodical should conform to the general “look” of the custom printing work from other industry leaders, but it should also stand out in some distinctive way.

Specific Design Elements to Consider

Design comprises a set of tools, or building blocks, including type faces (serif or sans serif, old style or modern), type sizes (contrasts between body type and headline type), the design grid (the number of columns, and their relative size and placement), images, color choice and placement, use of white space, and so forth.

These tools work together to give a tone or mood to the design and to move the reader’s eye around the page spread, from the more important elements to the less important ones.

A Critique of the Initial Publication

When my colleague showed me a sample from the magazine printing run that immediately preceded the redesign, this is what I saw:

1. The cover included a relatively small headline, the company logo, and a collage of photos. All of the photos held equal weight visually. It was impossible to identify the most or least important photo in the collage. There was no focal point on the cover.
2. Inside the magazine, there were justified columns of type separated by vertical rules, with multiple screens, color bars, and photos scattered everywhere: a huge number of design elements. There was almost no unused space, and the overall experience was claustrophobic. Many of the design elements seemed to have no purpose other than a decorative one.

What I Told My Colleague

I made these suggestions to help my colleague approach the redesign of the publication.

1. Choose a visual focus, particularly for the cover. Decide how the reader should navigate through the page. What should he or she look at first, second, third?
2. Choose one page spread, and simplify the design elements within that one page spread. Take out anything that does not directly support the visual (and editorial) goals.
3. Choose one typeface for the headlines (perhaps a sans serif, given the crisp, technical air of the defense industry content), and then choose a complementary typeface for the text copy (perhaps a serif face for legibility). Take out the vertical rule lines between columns of type, and make the text ragged right. This is easier to read, and it will provide more white space, giving a looser and less claustrophobic look to the magazine.
4. Include more white space in general. It gives the reader’s eye a resting point, and it helps lead him or her through the content, from more important elements to less important ones.
5. Choose photos that also direct the reader’s eye through the page spread. For instance, if the subject of a photo is looking off to the right, the reader will do the same. If there is a headline to the right of the photo, the gaze of the person in the photo will encourage the reader to look at the photo first and then the headline.

My Colleague’s First Mock-ups for the Redesign

My colleague showed me mock-ups for a dramatically improved magazine printing design. Here are some elements she included:

1. The single cover photo was a composite shot of a group of people sitting in a semicircle, all looking at a globe. The title, the futuristic typefaces, the monochromatic color scheme, and the simplicity of the image all reinforced the expansive atmosphere and technological focus my colleague wanted to convey.
2. Inside the magazine, the consistent typefaces and type sizes immediately reflected the relative importance of all editorial elements. Photos on the table of contents page were grouped (creating a simple, square shape that contained the four images). My client had positioned page numbers for the articles in the bottom right of the four photos, creating visual rhythm through this consistent treatment.
3. There was significantly more white space than in the initial design of the magazine, which helped group similar elements and set them apart from type and images used in other magazine stories.
4. Initial caps introduced the articles, immediately attracting the reader’s eye.

Overall, I’d say the redesign was excellent.

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Posted in Magazine Printing, Offset Printing | Comments »