Disc Pro Graphics Pre Press
Professional Printing with PDF’s
Not from other File Formats
PDF files are the best way to send print ready files. There are many reasons why this is the case, but we will focus on the three most important ones here. As a customer of Disc Pro Graphics, the files you send us are of the utmost importance. We want to make sure that your files are printed exactly as you intend.
PDF’s are better than other formats for printing
But Why?
PDF files are the best way to print documents. This is because they have a lot of advantages that other formats don’t have. For example, they are very accurate and look exactly how you want them to look when they come out of the printer. We recommend using pdf files when sending print ready documents to us, so that we can make sure they look great when we print them.
7 Reasons you should use pdf, when sending artwork to be printed at a commercial printer
Fonts
Words are commonly the most important information in the majority of printed documents. Words designed for marketing purposes depend on presentation heavily for their impact to the reader. At Disc Pro Graphics we understand that no two fonts are exactly alike. When sending artwork to be printed by utilizing a pdf, your fonts will be what you intended unlike other modes of sending files for printing.
Image quality
Images are another very important thing for your printing projects. When placing your images within other files than a pdf., You are drastically limited to the quality of images that will be stored within documents other than a pdf. The amount of control you can have of images is also diminished by using something other than a pdf file format. PDF’s allow you to place high quality images with high PPI (Pixels per Inch). Along with assigned color profiles for you images to create a dependable representation on your screen.
Design Layout
Pdf’s are very respectful of placement because of the way they are designed. When using other file formats they are mostly designed for words and not for design layout. The pdf format is made with design in mind and allows you to keep your layouts when printing. Word processors and other related software do not treat design with the same intent as pdf’s do and have the ability to shift and resize certain textual aspects of your documents when being converted.
Bleed
Printing bleed is extremely important when printing any document. This is because bleed ensures that your document will print correctly and without any white borders. When you design your document, make sure to include bleed in your design. This way, when you send us your file, we can be sure that it will print correctly. But commonly misused software does not allow for bleed to be placed in a document. That is another great advantage of pdf’s, they allow for bleed to be placed within the design. Pdf’s have settings just for bleed and trim sizes to be natively built into your pages.
Page sizes
Programs not intended for creating printing documents do not allow for detailed page sizes. There might be a few options within various word processor and presentation programs like Microsoft Word, and Powerpoint, but the pdf and other Adobe Creative Software is extremely versatile with all kind of page sizes. If you need a certain size for your project pdf will give you the ability to have any kind of page size with no limitations. A jpeg picture although high resolution, does not contain size instruction as a pdf naturally does.
Color accuracy
When it comes to color accuracy, pdf’s are the best way to go. This is because pdf’s allow you to include color profiles in your document. Color profiles ensure that your colors will print correctly and accurately. If you don’t include a color profile in your document, we cannot guarantee that your colors will print correctly. So, by designing within Word and other presentation software you are circumventing that part of the critical process for design all together. There are no guarantees that your prints will look anything like what you see on your screen. Initiating print design directly from pdf software will ensure consistent color throughout your printing project.
Converting your document to a pdf
Converting your document to pdf can be a difficult process because of all the potential problems that could arise. When converting other documents to PDF, all of the possible issues that have been previously named rear their ugly heads. Some of these issues include fonts not displaying correctly, images not printing correctly, and margins being off. These problems can be fixed by starting your design with pdf designing software. Adobe Illustrator is specifically created for vector images. Photoshop is designed for editing photo files. and Adobe InDesign is perfect for assembling all these together for your final pdf when it comes time to export your layout as a print ready document.
By attempting to send Disc Pro Graphics a non-PDF document. There is no guarantee that we will be able to convert without any issue your intended document. Everyone of the issues could be present and Disc Pro Graphics wouldn’t even know it. You would then receive a PDF that is incorrect. And it wouldn’t waste your valuable proofing stage on a cheap mistake. Being able to see a pdf formatted document ensures you can see your complete package immediately.
Cost Savings of Making your own PDF
If you have a document that you would like to have printed it is always best that you convert it to a PDF before sending it to us. We want to assist you in converting your document to a PDF so that you can have the best possible experience when using us as your commercial Houston printer.
By taking it upon yourself to convert your files to a PDF you can circumvent the issue of wasting a proof where you could fix one of these issues. This results in saving money and time for your printing project. Disc Pro Graphics wants to help you by walking you through all the ways of converting a word document to a PDF. Also we will go step-by-step converting a PowerPoint presentation to a PDF. And lastly, we will walk you through how to convert a publisher document to a PDF.
Following the steps you will be able to confidently know what you are sending to Disc Pro Graphics to be printed, more secure in knowing that your documents will be produced as you intended from beginning to end. The support that we give to our customers in getting the best possible printing experience is why we continue to lead Houston’s printing industry.