Saving and sizing Illustrator & Photoshop files for printing (process, compatible, printer)

[Mama Nance]

I'm designing an invitation for my daughter's upcoming wedding. I'm doing all the graphics and lettering in Illustrator CS3 and placing their picture into it from Photoshop. I have concerns regarding how to save the file in a format compatible with a commercial printing company or a photo printing company. My current plan is to have it printed like a photograph rather than on card stock. If I save the file as an illustrator document or a PDF, I don't think photo printing companies are equipped to handle it. If I reverse my process and place the illustrator graphics into Photoshop and save it as a jpeg, will the text become pixelated and lack it's original crispness? My final concerns are about image size and cropping. Every time I've had pictures printed at places like Wal-Mart, Walgreens, etc., the outside areas have been cropped out of the photos 99% of the time. I can add some extra area for bleed, but I don't want any unpleasant surprises by having more of the image cropped out than I want cropped out. Any advice you can give me would be greatly appreciated. I want the final result to look as professional as possible...which brings up another question for any professional photograhers who may read this. When you have business cards and flyers printed (with text and photos similar to what I'm trying to do with this wedding invitation), how to you save and print these files to keep your photos looking great and your text sharp and un-pixelated? Thank you for your replies.

[ShepsMom]

First of all, don't deal with Wal-Mart, Walgreen's or such labs. They are mass production and don't care for a quality of your work.
Do research of professional photolabs to get your card done and printed. If you do google search, type specific criterias for what you're looking to get.
I suggest to try this lab:
MPix.com
I believe they don't only offer photo paper, but different type of paper specific to cards/invitations. Check them out, i'm not 100% sure.

You can also pick up the phone and call direct with explanation for your request.

I always size all my pictures in Photoshop.
Good luck!

[texanborn]

Originally Posted by Mama Nance

I'm designing an invitation for my daughter's upcoming wedding. I'm doing all the graphics and lettering in Illustrator CS3 and placing their picture into it from Photoshop. I have concerns regarding how to save the file in a format compatible with a commercial printing company or a photo printing company. My current plan is to have it printed like a photograph rather than on card stock. If I save the file as an illustrator document or a PDF, I don't think photo printing companies are equipped to handle it. If I reverse my process and place the illustrator graphics into Photoshop and save it as a jpeg, will the text become pixelated and lack it's original crispness? My final concerns are about image size and cropping. Every time I've had pictures printed at places like Wal-Mart, Walgreens, etc., the outside areas have been cropped out of the photos 99% of the time. I can add some extra area for bleed, but I don't want any unpleasant surprises by having more of the image cropped out than I want cropped out. Any advice you can give me would be greatly appreciated. I want the final result to look as professional as possible...which brings up another question for any professional photograhers who may read this. When you have business cards and flyers printed (with text and photos similar to what I'm trying to do with this wedding invitation), how to you save and print these files to keep your photos looking great and your text sharp and un-pixelated? Thank you for your replies.

Okay....if you are scanning the photo scan it at 300dpi....For a 5 X 7 photo you want to end up with a file size about a 3 to 5 meg file...save it out as a TIFF and then you can place it into a publishing program..If you can go to a commerical printer that does on demand printing.....ask to look at some of their work......most are pretty good.....Hope this helps.....I was in the printing business for 40 years.....wished more people would have asked for help...lol

and try to give 1/8 inch for all edges that bleed....If you place the photo in the document where you want it, they should be able to trim it they way you want it..

If the picture goesto a fold , besure you stop the picture right on the fold and do not wrap it around...


If you can place trim marks and fold marks on your document that is even better, takes the guess work out of it for the printer.

You may want to see a finished proof before printing the card too...that's where you want to catch any mistakes...


JPEGS are for the internet, not printing...

[MRVphotog]

Yup...TIFF is the way to go. As far as the cropping problem just resize the image to the exact size of the card your printing it on. The easiest way is to simply crop the image to the size required by the card stock in photoshop instead of the printer having to crop to fit the image on the card which can end up with a crop that doesn't work for you.

You will find that working with a professional printer is many times better than when using automated printing systems of places like walmart. I'm sure you can email them the image and they will resize it for you within your specifications so it will work perfectly for you and you will receive many compliments on the final product.

[texanborn]

Originally Posted by MRVphotog

Yup...TIFF is the way to go. As far as the cropping problem just resize the image to the exact size of the card your printing it on. The easiest way is to simply crop the image to the size required by the card stock in photoshop instead of the printer having to crop to fit the image on the card which can end up with a crop that doesn't work for you.

You will find that working with a professional printer is many times better than when using automated printing systems of places like walmart. I'm sure you can email them the image and they will resize it for you within your specifications so it will work perfectly for you and you will receive many compliments on the final product.

She needs to place the TIFF in the doucment how she wants it including the bleeds she wants and send the orig scan with the document incase the printer needs to relink it...