Magazine production question

1

Hey all.

I’m working at a new magazine as a designer. The first issue comes out in Oct. and I’m meeting with the printer this week for the first time. I’ve never sent anything of this magnitude to print before and I’m a little nervous about the production side of things.

I was hoping some of you might have some past experience regarding this matter and would post some questions that I could ask in the meeting?

Thanks for all your comments.
Sean

2

most important of all what resolution and what file types does he need also its a real important fact that you must raster all photoshop images since not everyone has the same fonts you do, either that or you include the fonts on the cd with the original art so make sure you ask him that. Another important fact is colors cmyk is used for press so make sure your monitor is calibrated correctly or you have a up to date color code chart so you know what values of cmyk you are using. thats all i can think of right now good luck

3

Thanks GD-very helpful comments.

In terms of trapping, chokes, spreads and bleeds-is the designer generally responsible for this?

-sm

4

grimdeath makes some good points - I’d add the following:

  1. Not just CMYK (four-or full-colour printing) - there’s when pantones are used (sungle, duo and triple) which are single inks that can really bring production costs down.

  2. bleeds and spreads should be set by you with guidance from the printer (eg 3mm bleeds are the norm)

  3. Trapping and chokes are set by the printed using your proofs as guidance

  4. Remember that Photoshop defauls to RGB. If full colour being used, you must convert these images to CMYK

  5. Ask about proofs - you should - or moe likely the editor should - proof what the printer produces (ie not what you sent to the printer)

  6. Which binding being used - stitch or hot glue? Maybe a bit late for this, but from a design point of view could affect your gutter widths

  7. If using Quark, use the ‘Usage’ utility to check that you’ve got all the images and fonts updated and present

  8. What paper (substrate) is going to be used? Is there going to be show-through problems?

  9. Some printers may ask you to set the print profiles for each image, (this could take a while if you’ve lots of images) in which case the printer needs to specify his settings.

  10. Good luck with your first mag - remember to have some fun!

Hope this helps… :slight_smile:

5

Thank you kindly for your list of questions.

I feel well equiped going into the meeting. I’ve also referred to my pocket pal for the first time ever and found a few issues to address there like, creeping, signatures and impositioning.

+sean-