No matter how long you’ve been working with printed material, mistakes and errors happen. It’s part of the process, and knowing how to correct mistakes after they happen is key so a successful final print. Just as important as knowing how to fix these misprints is knowing how to avoid them in the first place. In our research for what kinds of errors are most common this is what we found:
1. Bleed Issues
Setting up proper bleed lines for your prints means making sure your printer can properly set up its designs and print in the right amount of space provided. If you don’t establish a bleed area for your prints, your design might not fully extend to the edges of the final print area. This leads to your mailers, flyers, and other printed material looking cheap. In order to avoid that bit of white around the edges of your designs, always check to make sure you have a proper bleed area designated.
2. Not Checking Fonts
Not all fonts are created equal, and they definitely don’t display equally across all mediums. Some are purely for digital display, which can capture all of the finer details of more intricate fonts. Some of the most common fonts are popular for a reason. Helvetica, Times, Univers, and similar styles are consistently used because they are legible on hard copy printed materials.
3. Not Test Printing
Some issues are only visible once they are printed and looked at off of the computer screen. Colors might not appear as expected, or the design might come out more pixelated than you expected. In some cases, a guiding layer or something that is supposed to be hidden on the image still prints out. Imagine sending out a massive print order for mailers and still having guide lines across your ad!
4. Rushing The Job
This goes along with point #3, but if you’re trying to get your design printed and distributed in a hurry, sometimes things get skipped like spell-checking, properly exporting image files, and not checking that your coloring is CMYK instead of RGB. These errors can result in whole print jobs being wasted. Worse, if the issues aren’t caught before distribution, they can result in damaging customer relationships.
5. Not Having Enough Or The Right Ink
Before you start printing, you need to check in on your printers. Regardless of the style you’re using, you don’t want to get part way through and notice that your blacks aren’t as dark as they should be, or your images are fading as you get further into the process.
6. Not Working With Professionals
If you go with a team you can’t rely on, you’re more apt to run into difficulties. Some services only print, and will print whatever you give them. If there are minor errors, you could end up with thousands of copies of something with an error that could have been corrected after the first page. The best way to judge a print service is to look at the total collection of services they provide. If design assistance is available in addition to printing, you can be sure they will be looking for these kinds of errors. Those printers that have been around for a while are also probably safe bets. Going with the right team can make the difference between a properly printed campaign and a pile of wasted ink and paper. The next time you need a large or small scale print for your business and want to avoid these most common of printer errors, go with the team that knows how to get it right every time. Give RTC Direct a call today!
