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File Formats

We accept jpg, tif, eps, pdf, psd - if you have a different file ask us and we will try to accomodate you.

 

Design Your Card with Bleed

When you print a color card on white stock you don't want the card to have a white edge if your business card has an image or background that goes to the edge of your card. In order for us to print you a card that is 2x3.5 or 4x6 etc. You need to design your card larger than it will be when it is cut down. A 2x3.5 card should be set up at 2.125x3.625 with the image or color extending to fill that entire space. Add .062 inches all the way around your card for bleed. If you don't do this and you leave a white border or black border for bleed, when your card is cut down it will have an edge of white or whatever color you put in there. If you have a photograph some of the image HAS to get cut off so you don't get a white edge. Accept that and design accordingly. If you want to leave a border make sure it's a 1/4 inch thick otherwise it will not look even when it is cut down.

 

Keep Your Type Away from the Edges

Your type should be in an 1/8th of an inch from the edge of the finished size. A 2x3.5 card will have a file size of 2.125x3.625 and type shouldn't extend past 1.75 x 3.25. This is very important because it make for a professional card and there is no danger of your type getting cut off. The blade of our cutter is 1/16th of an inch thick so type not an 1/8th of an inch from the edge may get trimmed slightly. Don't try to cram stuff in, a card will look poorly designed if it's too close to the edges. When we write correspondence we leave margins, cards also require breathing space.

 

Design in CMYK Colors

Don't leave your file in RGB or pantone colors convert to CMYK so you can see if there is a color shift. We only print CMYK colors. We suggest you design in CMYK so there will be no color shift.
 

Please Include Fonts or Outline Them

One of the biggest reasons customers cards are delayed is they don't submit their fonts. Please include your fonts with your file. Compress the fonts into a file like a sit file or zip file. If you are working in Illustrator or CorelDraw outline your fonts. In Illustrator on a mac you go Apple+A for select all then Apple+Shift+O to outline the fonts. On a PC its CTRL+A to select all then CTRL+SHIFT+O to outline the fonts. The fonts will look chunkier BUT THEY WILL PRINT SMOOTHLY. It makes it chunkier so you can tell it's been outlined it doesn't change the font. If you outline the fonts you won't have to send the fonts.

 

Please Include the Pictures​
Another reason customer cards are delayed is they don't submit the pictures. Please include all the pictures used in your document. Quark will not automatically embed them. In Illustrator you can choose to embed your pictures instead of link them. You go to View-Show Links then you click on the picture with your mouse on the side of the box is an arrow you click on the arrow and say embed image. That way you won't have to include the pictures separately. Before embedding your pictures Select All and convert the colors to CMYK.
 

Make Sure Your Pictures Are High Resolution

Many customers send us pictures at 72 dpi which is a common resolution for websites. THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE FOR PRINTING. Please scan your images at 300 dpi at the size you will be using the pictures, e.g. business cards 2.125x3.625 if the picture fills the entire background. Don't save it at 300 dpi at 1x1 and then increase the size in Quark. That will reduce the quality of your image making it look blurry, chunky, unclear.

 

Common Color Mistakes

For a rich black for use in backgrounds and big areas only, you can't use 100% Black and expect a rich black, you will get a grey color instead of black. Use 100% Black, 40 Cyan, 40 Magenta. FOR TYPE USE ONLY 100% Black because we cannot register the four colors on small type, it will make it look blurry.

For Blue. Don't use too much magenta or you will get a purple. Even if your card came out blue one time it could come out purple the next time. Use 60% Magenta and 100% Cyan for blue and too darken it add black.

For Purple: don't use too much cyan or you will get a blue. Even if your card came out purple one time it could come out blue the next time.

DON'T PICK COLORS THAT ARE ON THE VERGE OF ANOTHER COLOR because with gang printing colors can fluctuate 5-10%. Use a CMYK color book that shows you color mixes. Then pick a color that there won't be a significant color change to if it goes 5% in any direction. Cards can come out one color one time and a different color another time because we print pleasing color. Pick colors that will compensate for the printing process so that there is not a visible difference if the color shifts slightly.

 

File Size

When submitting files by email make sure they are not bigger than 2 megs or they will often go into cyberspace and we will have no idea you ever sent us a file. Send files over 2 megs through our website link. Before submitting files PLEASE COMPRESS THEM using ZIP or Stuffit or a similar program. This way if there is an error in transmission we will be notified when we uncompress it. Otherwise there may be a line through your card etc. that we won't see but that will have resulted from an error during transmission.

 

Name Your Files Properly

Name your files with the first four letters of the company name that your order form was filled out under e.g. karnfrontbc.eps If you name the files under the customers name we will assume the files came from your customer. If we don't receive an order form telling us different we may contact the customer. The name of the file lets us know what company name we're looking for on the order form.

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