When crossing Grandstand Square nears the famous London Bridge, you might have noticed a signboard depicting the photo of Sophie Dahl, a famous supermodel from London. This wonderful poster of her is not photographed but a fine work of what is called large scale printing. Designing for large format printing comprises signs board, banners, or posters. When placing such a poster, it is important to ensure that it stands out from the crowd and should not give a negative message to its audience. To make people notice your large scale printing you’ll need to choose the right images, colors, and fonts. You’ll also need to use an equilibrium designing pattern to make everything fit and noticeable.
A large format printing guideline helps to understand the difference between vector images and bitmaps, Cyan Magenta Yellow Black (CMYK) model versus Red Green Blue (RGB) model, and more.
Here are five tips that will help you avoid the most common challenges to large scale printing.
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Vectors Images versus Bitmaps
There are several differences between a Vector Image and that of other Bitmap images. Vectors work a little differently from JPEGS and other bitmap formats. Bitmapped images are composed of individual pixels assigned with a fixed location and colour values, but in Vectors shapes, lines, and colours are defined by mathematical equations. It is therefore possible that a vector image stays sharp no matter how large-scale printing you have designed. On the other hand, its counterpart that Bitmapped images will have a shaggy, stumpy look if you scale them too far. Therefore, for large scale printing, use vector images wherever possible. It is also noted that the vector images are advantageous due to their file sizes. It tends to have smaller file sizes in comparison to the same bitmap file size.
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Choose Fonts Correctly
Most of the Foamex Board Printing works are viewed from a distance, which means that the fonts you choose depict not only style but also readability. Some fonts are there which give your large scale printing a good stylish look but are difficult to read from far places. To check this, one should use simple fonts with higher readability with Bold and clear styling. Now you can use a simple technique to test whether the font you have used is correct or not. Just go back away from your computer’s monitor and read the text from a distance. If you have a problem with reading the text exactly, you must consider the change in font selection.
The other concern is the platform you are working with. In general, we require designing a large-scale printing in a responsive manner. It means our design should look the same throughout different platforms whether it is Mac OS, Windows or DOS so that you can guarantee your fonts will display properly if you need to transport your file to a client, print shop, or someone else who runs a different operating system from your own. This is also known as outlining, ensuring the text remains the same if your client or print shop does not have the selected font installed on their machines.
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Choose Colours Wisely
Same as with fonts, viewing from a far distance is a key concern when selecting your colours. We must pick a background colour that is in contrast with the text and graphic elements to make sure that viewers can read the message on your banner or Foamex board easily. Another technique is to keep the colour combination steady, not messy. In most cases, two or three colours will be sufficient to make designing for large format printing look mesmerized. However, you can use a multi-colour schema if you are designing for large format printing so everyone can stop by and have a keen look.
The second thing that should be kept in mind is the use of a set of colour combinations. Some people use RGB combination while some use CMYK combination. It must be known for large scale printers that RGB has a greater colour combination. They are used for printing posters, wallpapers, constructional plans and banners. Hence it makes the printing heavy and messy. While CMYK has less combination but is supported by the printer software, hence its prints are blooming and shining.
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Balance is Key
While designing for large format printing one must understand that banners, signs, and posters all are meant to be read and absorbed quickly by people who pass by them. This means that you shouldn’t over complicate your print with tons of graphics and text like in jumble words. Also, if you want to grab the audience’s attention, your design shouldn’t be too scattered.
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Factoring for Page Bleed
Page bleed is another element of designing for large format printing that is easy to overlook, but luckily, it can be fixed easily. When the image or colour of the document goes to the right of the paper and becomes messy, then it is called a Bleed. Just like when your knee is scratched and blood clots at a point. Always set the proper margins on the printer to print otherwise you have to trim your print. Make sure that nothing is lost to the bleed by factors between 3 and 5 millimetres of space on each edge. Use background colour to fill the area of margins and save from bleed.
For best results, it must be ensured that text and graphics do not drift into this area. Else, you may lose them entirely during the process of printing. Contact Foamex Printing Company for your large scale printing requirements.