Summer corn is always delicious and we always enjoy the opportunity to not only print but provide the packaging and shipping for our customers.

The Challenge: Print all of the items below and package with other items. Store the different pieces and put together unique kits on demand and ship.

Poster             17 x 11                           100 lb. text House gloss, white

Price Card      10 x 7                            100 lb. text House gloss, white

Brochure         16 x 9 / folds to 4 x 9    80 lb. text House gloss, white

Grilling pad       5 x 3                              80 lb. text House gloss, white

Microwave pad   5 x 3                            80 lb. text House gloss, white

Note: All print 4 color process and the poster was uv coated

The customer provided us with DVD’s and packs of balloons.
 
We had special size boxes made that held one kit.  We printed labels to put on the outside of each kit. 
 
The customer sent us a spread sheet with locations to ship kits to and how many kits each location was to receive.  Plus they also included in the spread sheet which items went in to the kit for each location. Each kit was custom packed according to the needs of each location. 
 
The customer continues to send us additional kit information via email.  They send us the addresses of where to ship the kits to and what goes in each kit.  At the end of each day we send the customer a list of what shipped and the tracking number for each one.

So if you or a friend not only need printing but need help with packaging and shipping just give us a call and let us put the team of Carter Printing experts together and make your job easier.

Peyton Rowe an associate professor in the School of Mass Communications at VCU brought the students out to see first hand how their creative ideas are printed.

They got a first class tour from Christine Gordon who is now a freshly minted VCU graduate and big supporter of the program.  To see a virtual tour of the plant through the students eyes (click below) and enjoy the excitement as students see ink on paper for the first time!

Carter Printing Tour for CreateAthon

Peyton Rowe, an associate professor of Advertising in the School of Mass Communications at VCU, brought CreateAthon to VCU in 2008 and it has been thriving ever since. Each year more students get involved and the creative momentum of this event grows even stronger.

Participants include undergraduate students from VCU’s School of Mass Communications, School of the Arts, School of Business and VSU’s art and design program. Our very own Christine Gordon took the CreateAthon class last year as a team leader and has returned to the event this semester as a Project Manager. This year there were 13 team leaders and each was assigned a non-profit that had been selected through an application process last fall. The team leader writes the creative brief and focuses on familiarizing themselves with the non-profit in order to then communicate their needs to the team at the event. During the 24 hour event, which occurs over spring break, the teams create identities, write marketing plans and develop strategies that help that non-profit serve the community more effectively.

What makes this experience great? It empowers students to recognize their ability to push beyond normal limits and accomplish more than they thought possible. It teaches students communication skills, how to work effectively in teams, and that their work can really make a difference in our community.

Carter Printing decided to get involved in 2011 after seeing the opportunity to help the community and developing students. Carter groups together all the printed materials that were designed during the event and donates the actual printing to each non-profit. Over the next month students will learn about the print process and get to see their work on press. This process demonstrates the efficiency of Carter Printing while allowing the non-profits to realize the potential of the work that has been created through receiving the first round of printed materials. It also gives students the ability to see their creative process through from beginning to end. To find out more go to: http://www.createathononcampus.org

By the Numbers

24 hours

34 mentors- Strategist, Copywriters, Designers

89 students – Mass Com, Marketing, School of the Arts

13 non-profits

TIFF - Tagged Image File Format – In digital photography terminology a TIFF is a type of lossless file format. Because they are lossless files the image data is stored whole (nothing is thrown away). This results in a large file size but also good quality photographs. TIFF files can be compressed to save space, but not as much as JPEG files. When they are un-compressed the software reverses the original compression process; the original large file size is the result. Typically you can open in Photoshop (or other Photo-editing software*) and save as a CMYK file. This is one of the preferred methods of saving a file for print.

LZW - Lempel-Ziv & Welch compression algorithm – This is a lossless file compression that can save you memory and reduce the file size of your photos. You can save your tiff file in Photoshop* and in this process it gives you compression options. LZW can be chosen and not reduce the print quality. Compression leads you to believe that your quality of image suffers but LZW does not for print applications. Sometimes LZW will have problems when ripping the file but is becoming less of an issue. The benefit of using LZW compression on your flattened Tiff file is it will save you hard drive space and time because you are working with smaller files.

JPEG - Joint Photographic Experts Group – In digital photography terminology, JPEG is a type of lossy file format. It is the most common file format used in digital photography. When the image is saved, the camera strips out data (parts of the photo) that the human eye probably won’t notice.  If you are printing on a digital press the rip can convert to print. However, changing your files from JPG and RGB to Tiff and CMYK are still preferred for both digital and especially offset printing methods.

OTHER FILE FORMATS

RAW – RAW files are the actual data taken directly from a digital camera’s image sensor. They have not been processed by the camera at all. This means they are the purest image files possible in digital photography. Often, quite correctly, the terminology “digital negative” is used to describe them. Different camera manufacturers have different names for their own RAW files. For example, Canon uses the digital photography terminology “RAW” while Nikon uses a different digital photography terminology – “NEF”. They are incompatible with each other. Whereas every computer can show JPEG images, RAW files need specific software. This is always supplied by the manufacturer when you purchase a digital camera. It is also easy to obtain on the internet. These files can be opened in Photoshop or most other photo-editing software and then saved in CMYK format.

.psd (Photoshop document), the default file extension of the proprietary file format of Adobe’s Photoshop program.

The BMP file format, also known as bitmap image file or Device Independent Bitmap (DIB) file or simply a bitmap, is a raster graphics image file format used to store bitmap digital images, independently of the display device such as a graphics adapter.

GIF- Graphics Interchange Format – Is a bitmap image format that has widespread usage on the World Wide Web due to its wide support and portability. Not good for print applications.

PNG – Portable Network Graphics – Is a bitmapped image format that employs lossless data compression. PNG was created to improve upon and replace GIF as an image-file format not requiring a patent license. PNG was designed for transferring images on the Internet, not for professional-quality print graphics, and therefore does not support non-RGB color spaces such as CMYK.

This space determines the color range you can work in. This defined space allows you to edit images in a consistent manner. A device color space is specific …a camera, scanner, monitor, and printer will each have its own color space. The editing space is gray balanced in equal amounts of Red, Green, and Blue. Editing spaces are uniform so when you change lightness, hue or saturation they are applied equally.

In Photoshop under Edit and the Color Settings

There is no ONE default color workflow setting that works for all images. Images come from too many different sources with varying color spaces and image content.

North American Prepress 2 is what Carter chooses to start with because of the Color Management policies. If an image has a camera profile then we try to honor it. Then we convert to the necessary (destination/press) profile. Carter Printing uses GRACol. Carter will use either Adobe 1998 or sRGB as a source space to start with, if an image has no embedded source profile. If an image is made up of lots of vibrant colors and no embedded source profile,  we are likely to choose Adobe 1998 or colormatch. If the image content was majority flesh tones, we’d probably choose sRGB so that the skin tone didn’t get too RED. sRGB tends to add more cyan than Adobe 1998 to the color areas containing reds.

As an example 4″ x 6″ is a common size photo. Reproduction for print is usually ideal at 300 Pixels Per Inch (PPI). This is a universal standard. Some will work with anywhere from 240 to 360 but 300 is a solid consistent number that yields good photo quality. So an easy way to determine the Pixel Resolution is to multiply each dimension by 300.

300 PPI x 4″ and 300 PPI x 6″ = 1,200 x 1,800 pixels

So a photo that is 2″ by 3″ will be

300 PPI x 2″ and 300 PPI x 3″ = 600 x 900 pixels

So next time you are reviewing photos for a print job, check the size of the original photo and the size you would like to reproduce it as in your print job. If the resolution is below 300 you know it will not be as sharp as it could be.  As always if you have any questions do not hesitate to give us a call.

Check out this video that shows how VCU students and Carter Printing will help 12 non-profits in Richmond!  Click below for video.

http://www.wric.com/global/Category.asp?c=190525&autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=6570517&flvUri&partnerclipid