Welcome back to our educational series on commercial printing! Last month, we introduced this article collection with an informative post on image resolution. If you’ve ever wondered why a photo came out blurry in print, you’ll probably find your answer there.
Today we’re going to cover another common round of associated questions we get from clients about colors. We love colors as much as you do, and we get why you want everything in your printed piece to be pixel perfect. But before you start screaming about something that’s slightly off, there are a few things you should know about our professional printing methods.
Why Can’t You Guarantee Color Matching?
Short Answer: Because we’re not liars.
Long Answer: The first answer is meant to be funny, but there’s a lot of truth behind the joke. We could pretend to have complete control over our press machine, but that would be dishonest. Here at PrintFirm we consider quality and value as equally important. Our goal is to give you the best possible quality for the lowest price. To keep our prices competitive and your wallet happy, we use a process known as gang printing. We’ll explain more about this later. For now, just know that we can’t guarantee colors without raising our prices substantially. Besides the overhead costs involved in perfecting intricate color details, there are lots of external factors that influence the results of your print project. For example, the weather and the amount of moisture in the air have an effect on our digital press. We haven’t figured out how to control the weather yet, so we don’t plan on changing our color policy any time soon.
What is Gang Printing?
Short Answer: It’s the reason why your business cards were so cheap.
Long Answer: Gang printing or gang runs allows us to print your orders quickly and efficiently for the lowest price. The word “gang” in this sense means group. We could print every single order individually, but that would make tons of extra work for us, and it would majorly increase our turnaround times. By grouping multiple orders together on the same sheet of paper and printing them simultaneously, we’re able to maintain a high level of productivity while wasting less paper. Still, gang printing does have some drawbacks, such as less control over colors. Since there may be several projects on a single sheet placed side by side, it’s impossible to get precise ink distribution.
Can I Get a Reprint or Refund Because of Color Variations?
Short Answer: Yes. Have you heard about our going out of business sale?
Long Answer: Sorry, we don’t offer reprints or refunds for minor color variations. If we ever make a serious mistake, our claims department will take care of your case. Please note that by serious, we do mean major, as in “OMG WHY!” NOT “I’m an extremely picky person who considers everything serious” serious. Otherwise, please refer to our terms and conditions page before you place your order. Pretty much all the parts about color appear in red lettering, so you won’t have a hard time finding what you’re looking for. The cliff notes version says that you’re prepared to handle slight inconsistences in your artwork. If you’re not, well, perhaps another company will be able to meet your needs.
What is Pantone Color Matching?
Short Answer: Something only design geeks obsess over.
Long Answer: Ah, Pantone Color Matching (PMS)…the stuff designers’ dream about in their tasteful typographic PJs. Pantone colors are usually left to graphics and printing industry professionals. Pantone or spot colors each have a name or number to ensure uniform appearance for printing. When you indicate a Pantone number, you know you’ll get the right color regardless of how the file looks on your computer screen.
We do not offer PMS matching for our full color products. We do give you this option for our business stationary products, including 1 or 2 color envelopes, 1 or 2 color letterhead, and 1 or 2 color custom notepads. You are free to order any of these items and pick the exact color(s) from the choices provided.
Can I Pay For Custom Colors?
Short Answer: We’ll do anything if the price is right.
Long Answer: There are other common PMS colors available for the products mentioned above. We will probably be able to accommodate your custom color requests for a small fee. Feel free to discuss your project specs with our customer service staff.
How Do I Know What My Printed Piece Will Look Like?
Short Answer: Invent a time machine.
Long Answer: By now you’re probably questioning the viability of your print projects. Don’t lose sight of the fact that the vast majority of the jobs we print come out looking every bit as awesome as they’re intended to be. That said, there are a few things you can do to avoid confusion and increase the chances of successful completion.
#1) Calibrate Your Monitor Have you ever noticed that websites look a little different on your phone than they do on your desktop? Or that when you look at your design on your boss’ computer the colors don’t seem quite right? That’s because computer screens aren’t always accurate as far as colors are concerned. The best way to get around this hurdle is through calibration, which means making adjustments to your screen’s color balance. For instructions, please see the tutorials below:
Calibrate Your Display (Windows)
Monitor Calibration for Mac
#2) Review Your Digital Proof Carefully You may or may not receive a digital proof with your order. We highly recommend electronic proofs because they give you a chance to review your artwork before it goes to print. This might not sound like a big advantage, but you’d be amazed at how many errors you can overlook by ignoring your proof. Be sure to check your proof for everything from spelling mistakes to color issues. If you see something that looks off or not the way you expected, speak up! Ask our staff for assistance via email or phone. We’d much rather answer your questions than have you unhappy with your order.
#3) Request a hard proof Let me be very clear: WE DON’T CURRENTLY OFFER THIS SERVICE. I brought up hard proofs anyway because this article isn’t really about our company specifically; it’s about helping you get a better understanding of commercial printing in general. We know of other companies who still send hard proofs for a price. These are very time consuming, and they still don’t mean that your marketing materials will come out exactly the same as the sample. Why not? Because small print jobs, such as a single poster print, are created through digital imaging. Digital colors have a reputation for being less accurate than offset for the most part. Nevertheless, a hard proof will let you see potential problems with your file, especially if you’ve never done a print design before. CMYK colors are definitely not the same as the RGB graphics you’re used to seeing on the web, and nothing makes this clearer than holding a physical example in your hands.
The CMYK Round Up
I hope this clears up any misconceptions about printing and color matching. Do you have additional questions about colors or our policies? Do you have another topic you’d like us to discuss? Let us know in the comments below!