This class had to be one of the most frustrating and beneficial classes I have had this semester. Before this class, I knew a miniscule about file building and how important it was to practice in order for my designs to be outputted. I learned a great amount of information pertaining to RIP’s (Raster Image Processor) and how serious it is to understand the process to “safe” file building in the designing world. The RIP is the bridge from the digital world (or what you create on your screen) to the real world (final printed project that you can physically handle). The whole reason for this class was to show the correct way to prepare your digital file so that the RIP can smoothly translate our design so that it can be reproduced. This includes many rules and guidelines to follow.
One of the first segments we covered was resolution for any Bitmaps, JPEG’s or other raster files. Raster’s hold pixels that are measured by resolution as ppi or pixels per inch. The more pixels you have in a raster image, the more you have to work with when resizing an image. While you may not run into any problems downsizing an image, a raster image becomes blurred and blocky when stretching an image due to the given amount of pixels in that image. So while a photo may look great on the computer screen, it’s better to check the image’s resolution and make sure it is at least 300, otherwise we wouldn’t be too happy with the printed results when its all said and printed.
Another thing that I have learned in this course was about Pantone colors. I had heard them before but never really realized why someone would pay $400 dollars for a bunch of paint swatches you can take free at the Home Depot paint department. Well, I came to find that these $400 dollar books are the only things holding consistency between the colors on your screen to the colors printed out in print services. A great example of this was when I did my final project. On my screen, the accent color I choose in my design looked orange digitally, but when printed it was more of a red orange. My professor even mentioned if I had chosen that color on purpose and my reply was “Yep! I picked pantone color number 1788 because I didn’t want it to be orange, but I didn’t want it to be red, it’s the color right next to warm orange.” And although I was very confident in my answer then, I wouldn’t dare say a word about 3 months ago because I would just choose colors that just looked good on the screen ,come later to find when printed, it look completely different and way darker; it was upsetting at times.
Third thing on the list for how much this class really made me feel like I was on the path to becoming a great designer, was InDesign file packaging. This practice has really saved me a great deal of headaches in the future, and I only regret not learning it sooner. As a designer and a poor college kid, I cannot afford a fancy awesome MAC computer and fancy Adobe Suite software (not yet at least!), so I was constantly working on multiple computers while transferring my work with a tiny flash drive. Well, I can’t tell you how many times I had brought in my file to another classroom and found my Links palette blowing up with red bubbles with a huge question mark in the middle of it, saying I had missing links or fonts; One of the most frustrating things personally. Well after this class, I conveniently learned to practice packaging my designs in a nice folder where I can take all elements of my file with me. It beats having the worry of forgetting to drag over an Illustrator file I just added to my design on the E104 computer and later while working in E211 find that I left the Illustrator file on the computer in E104 and the door is locked. So now anywhere and everywhere I go, I always package and repackage a file so that I can be worry free of missing links or fonts, and even have the luxury of not having to worry if a file I had sent to an output service (printer) had all the elements it needed to reproduce that design.
Last thing that I thought was very insightful for my future career to understand bleeds, crop marks, scores and gutters. All have a HUGE impact on a project, and I already knew what each one was, but never really understood how important they were until I was the one setting them up and having to print the actual design. “Respect your bleeds” is probably one of my favorite lines that Professor Benson had said all year, because on the first project, I did not and there was this ugly white gap all around my business cards when cut out where the crop marks had indicated. I usually acknowledged my margins, all up until my final project, where I think I forgot to check my design in relation to the margin when I resized the entire design from 4.5” to 4.25” but at least I know how to go back and fix it!
Overall, this class did have moments where I wanted to just give up and become an Accounting Major. In the end I learned far more than I ever knew I would, and because of that, I feel like I can have better communication about my designs and be confident that what I put on the screen is going to come out like I expect it to. Thanks Professor Benson for a great semester and all the insight I will definitely use in my years to come as a designer!
