To realize the seamless connection of pre-press, printing and post-press, we must pay attention to these four elements

To realize the seamless connection of pre-press, printing and post-press, we must pay attention to these four elements

Often encountered such a situation, pre-press designers feel very perfect work, after the delivery of printing production, there are many actual printing process problems, resulting in the production process can not continue, or increase the unnecessary processing difficulty, which caused Rising costs.

Therefore, starting from the actual production, this article summarizes the basic elements of the printing process that should be considered in the pre-press design, so that the pre-press designers can start from these elements in the design process and pay attention to the process issues of the printed product design to achieve The seamless connection of pre-press and printing, as well as post-press, provides customers with high-quality and inexpensive high-quality services with high quality and efficiency.

　　 An exquisite design work is undoubtedly the crystallization of the designers' wisdom and inspiration, but there is a considerable distance from "design work" to "printed product". Because a single piece of work is easy to realize, if the design is for widespread dissemination and a large number of copies are required, it is of great significance to compare the effect of the work with printed samples. From a printing point of view, the printing process is complicated. Sex makes this practice of printing one piece very extravagant.

　　 At this time, not only the artistic design skills, but also the relevant printing process issues need to be considered and mastered, and reflected in the specific product design, in order to complete the perfect transformation from "work" to "product". In real life, after an accident occurs between the designer and the printing house, the two parties are unhappy because of the confusion of responsibilities. In fact, as long as the designers change the design of the product based on the knowledge of the printing process, they can print better. So, what printing process issues should be paid attention to when designing products?

　　 One, printing type

　　 When designing a product, the first thing that should be considered is which type of printing the product will be designed. The process characteristics of different printing types are completely different. Take the four major printing methods as an example, the offset printing performance is rich and delicate, the embossed products have clear outlines, strong strokes, bright ink colors, the gravure prints have clear lines, fine and beautiful, the silk screen ink layers are thick and embossed, and the flexographic products are concise Color blocks and lines give people a strong visual impact. Different printing types have their own specific design requirements, and corresponding considerations must be made when designing.

For the design of offset printing products, designers have a lot of contact and are relatively experienced. They can mainly pay attention to these points: whether the resolution of the picture is sufficient; whether the trapping value is suitable; for small text, try to avoid four-color superimposition, so as to avoid Increase unnecessary printing difficulty; whether the rule line is complete; try to avoid designing large-format full-page solid color blocks; the direction relationship between graphics and paper fibers, fully taking into account the requirements of post-processing.

　　 Multi-color overprinting should be avoided in the design of gravure products. Because most of the printing materials used in gravure printing have large thermal stretchability, and heat deformation during high-speed printing, it is more difficult to print overprinting. Therefore, when designing patterns, try your best without affecting the design effect. Avoid multi-color overprinting. In addition, some materials not only have high flexibility, but also have poor ink adhesion.

　　 Such as: PE film and black and white film currently used in fresh milk products, so when designing such packaging patterns, not only must avoid multi-color overprinting, but also make the patterns simple and generous, and avoid large areas of color filling. Full consideration should be given to the requirements of the bag-making process. For back-seal bags, the front pattern should be properly internally bleeding according to the size of the finished product to prevent the front pattern from appearing too small after the bag is made. At the same time, consider whether the top, bottom, left, and right need to be seamless. Whether the position of the light spot meets the needs of cutting and making bags. In addition, whether it is necessary to use transparent or the same color for connection between the finished unit patterns is also a point that should be paid attention to in the design of gravure products.

　　 When designing flexo printing products, if the original product was printed with offset or gravure printing, when considering the use of flexo printing, you cannot simply copy the previous design plan and blindly pursue the printing effect of offset printing and gravure printing.

When designing flexo printing products, the following aspects should be avoided: avoid designing too small text and too thin lines; avoid two-color or multi-color lines and text overprinting; avoid designing small reverse white text and lines; avoid image highlights Broken screen or 1% small dots; avoid designing text or lines in bitmap software such as photoshop; avoid designing wide and long solids and gradients along the horizontal direction of the printing cylinder; unless special requirements, avoid combining large areas with dots and small dots The text is on the same page and so on.

When screen printing is used for product design, the manuscripts used in principle are not very different from those used in other printing methods. However, in the specific plate making and printing practices, the requirements are different, which is mainly due to the screen printing. Determined by printing characteristics. In particular, due to the thick ink layer and bright color of screen printing, the special effects of screen printing should be fully considered when selecting manuscripts and plate making.

　　 In addition, the graphic lines and dot accuracy requirements of the original manuscripts used in screen printing are also different from those of the original manuscripts used in ordinary printing methods. If the lines and dots of the original manuscript are very fine, it is very difficult to make a plate by screen printing. Therefore, screen printing technology is not suitable for reproducing fine lines and dots of original manuscripts. When making the screen printing plate, attention should be paid to selecting the appropriate screen line, in order to achieve the purpose of fully reproducing the original manuscript. Screen printing is more suitable for single color manuscripts with crisp text and lines, and it is also suitable for color manuscripts with large contrast and clear levels.

　　Through the special effects of screen printing, the reproduction is rich in expressiveness. Through the rich and thick ink layer and the contrast of light and dark tones, it fully expresses the texture and three-dimensional effect of the original content.

　　 2. Material selection

　　 When designing a product, the packaging materials used must be consistent with the market positioning of the product to achieve the goal of achieving the best packaging effect at the lowest cost. When selecting materials, on the one hand, we must consider the variety of materials, on the other hand, we must consider the issue of material specifications. Different types of printing materials have great differences in printing suitability, even completely different, and the actual performance effects of products are also very different.

One of the more successful examples in the use of new materials is the packaging of a bowl of fragrant instant noodles from MINON Company, which boldly breaks through the design materials, draws on the design style of small food packaging, and uses transparent ink to print on the aluminized film. Its bright colors are on the market. It quickly became the "eye-catching" focus of many similar products, providing a new idea for the packaging design of instant noodles, and achieving good promotional effects in the market.

　　For material specifications, it is also an important aspect that affects product costs. For example, since the packaging and trademark printing of different businesses requires paper of different varieties and specifications, it is often necessary to stock dozens of papers of different varieties and thicknesses.

Such as single-sided coated paper, single-sided offset paper, single-sided coated cardboard, coated paper, cast coated glass powder cardboard, white plate paper, gold plate paper, aluminum foil paper, kraft white plate paper, etc. The common thickness is 80g , 90g, 250g, 300g. 350g, 400g, 450g, etc.

　　 When designing a product, the material specifications must be considered to avoid additional costs due to improper selection of material specifications. Take book printing paper as an example. The cover, insert and backing page of book and magazine, generally use 100-150g paper for cover less than 200 pages, 120-180g paper for more than 200 pages; 80-150g paper for inserts; backing pages according to the book The thickness is generally selected between 80～150g.

For the same type of paper, the heavier the gram, the higher the price. The weight of the text paper increases, and the thickness of the spine also thickens. Sometimes it is necessary to adjust the gram weight and opening number of the cover paper, which will produce a series of ties. Often increases the cost of paper.

　　 Three, color and resolution

　　When choosing colors, you need to consider the actual reproduction effect of printing, for example, try not to use purple colors. The reason is that the purple color obtained by superimposing the cyan ink and magenta ink in the printing ink is generally "dirty". It is difficult to achieve the color displayed to the customer on the computer monitor when designing the pattern or the color effect expected by the customer. Quality accidents related to color.

　　 If it is really necessary to print the ideal purple color, it is recommended to use pink ink for superimposition or spot color printing. If the designed product is in the new market experimental stage in the sales process, it is recommended that the customer use spot colors to print the main color of the packaging, which can not only increase the brightness of the packaging pattern and color, but also reduce the color of the main color of the packaging once it is the same as the popular color in the packaging market. Unsalable risks caused by non-conformance (if the main color of the product is printed in spot colors, the main color of the packaging can be changed at any time according to market needs during the sales process).

In printing graphic design, the resolution setting must be determined according to the requirements of the design and printing process, especially the printing materials (mostly paper) used for printing and other factors. It is not necessary to adjust any picture to the highest resolution. rate. For example, the network line of newspaper printing is lower than that of fine picture albums, and they have different requirements for the resolution of image files.

　　 If the resolution of pictures on newspapers printed on newsprint is adjusted to the same resolution as that of picture albums printed on coated paper, it will not only make no sense, but will cause the printing to stale. The resolution settings for different objects in the graphic design of printing computers are as follows: general newsprint, offset paper printing color or black and white newspaper printing network line is 60-100 lines, the design resolution is 120-200dpi; generally use offset paper, painted newspapers Color pictures printed on, coated paper, cardboard, and whiteboard, such as book covers, pictorials, product advertisements, etc., with a printing screen of 150 lines, and a design resolution of 300dpi; high-end books, exquisite picture albums, and high-end advertising prints are printed on high-end coated paper , The printing network line can reach more than 175 lines, the design resolution is 350dpi; the design resolution can be 400dpi for fine treasure books, special securities, special banknotes, etc.

　　 4. Typesetting plan

　　The designer must provide customers with a reasonable layout plan according to their needs. For example, the market prospects of the products designed in flexo printing are promising, and the product packaging has a large print volume at a time. Customers can be advised to arrange multiple unit patterns vertically and increase the printing efficiency by increasing the circumference of the plate cylinder.

Pay attention to the direction of the paper when typesetting, such as bottled wine trademarks. Because it is a mechanized labeling, the speed is fast. After the back of the paper is automatically glued and wet, it will deform and bend instantly. The bending direction of the paper must match the automatic labeling machine, otherwise Production cannot be carried out on an automatic assembly line. Therefore, in order to meet the needs of different customers, the horizontal and vertical lines of paper must be considered first when assembling and typesetting, so as to prevent the entire batch of products from being scrapped due to the production of trademarks that do not meet the requirements of the horizontal and vertical lines of the customer.

The distinctive feature of 　　 packaging trademark printing and book printing is that one page, one picture, and multiple pieces are combined. As few as two pictures, as many as dozens of pictures. It is more appropriate to combine several pictures for printing. This is the problem to be considered in design and craftsmanship. Mainly consider from the following aspects.

　　① The degree of difficulty of finishing. If there are many post-processing procedures for a manuscript, it is necessary to carefully consider not making the printing layout large. Otherwise, the temperature and humidity of the printing workshop are not well controlled, which will easily cause the paper to stretch and shrink, so that the hot aluminum and embossing in the next process will be very difficult. It is difficult to register accurately, so that the aluminum should be hot stamped and embossed at one time, and it is necessary to hot stamp several times. In addition, if there are too many pieces and the paper is deformed, it will seriously affect the registration and it is difficult to remedy.

　　② Special-shaped trademarks. Trademark labels are generally not very large. For thin paper special-shaped trademarks that need to be die-cut, do not join too much, otherwise it will affect the quality of die-cutting due to the accuracy of die-cut plate production.

　　③ Number of prints. If the number of prints is not large, don't overdo it. Because the layout is too large and the number of printing is small, the cost of die-cutting is high, which will inevitably increase the cost of the single standard.

　　④ The number of paper openings. The size of the packaging paper coincides with the paper size, so the printing paper is very standard and there is no waste problem. This is not the case for packaging trademarks. Due to the impact of the size of the single label, it is impossible to accurately assemble into eight, four, or folio printing. Therefore, whether to adopt interlocking methods, such as interlocking, horizontal and vertical interlocking, collating, one-shot punching, and drawing cutters, is based on the principle of saving printing paper as much as possible. Choosing a good process assembly method can directly create profits for the enterprise.

　　 For example, in book design, if the format selection is unreasonable, the margins will increase and the effective use area of paper will decrease. Books with more short lines, such as a collection of poems in horizontal rows, use a 32-format book, with a lot of blanks in the cut and order, and use more paper. If you use a long and narrow 36 format, you can save paper. If the format is too small, the number of folds and the loss of smooth edge materials will also be greater. In order to facilitate printing, try to avoid or use less irregular format, which can reduce printing costs.

In summary, in order to achieve a successful leap from "work" to "product", pre-press designers must learn about the printing process in depth, and make a good selection and setting of parameters on the process issues discussed above. Only by proficiently applying it to specific product design can we successfully realize the requirements of mass industrial production of printing, and continuously guide and reduce production costs to create more value for customers.