ARTWORK DECORATING INFORMATION & TIPS
Putting more life in your logo
In terms of promotional impact, there’s a world of difference between merely putting your logo on a garment and showcasing it in a way that turns heads, holds attention and makes a lasting impression. Putting more life in your logo means increasing awareness of your company, and building brand equity. It means accurately representing your company’s character and value. And, it all starts with the quality of the artwork you supply for decorating.
With a little background knowledge and a few easy-to follow steps, you can put more life in your logo with every screenprinting and embroidery application. Here is a quick guide to bringing your logo to life… on the right garments, delivering the results you envision, maximizing your exposure and minimizing your expense.
Tip #1: The more ready your art, the more cost-and time-efficient the process
The degree of “readiness” of the artwork you provide will affect the time it takes to complete your order, the accuracy of the results, and the costs incurred. Artwork is considered ready for screenprinting or embroidery when it is provided in a digital format that can be used for pre-press and printing without the need to make modifications. Because of the technical specifications required for quality screenprinting and embroidery, some modifications to your art will most likely be needed.
Tip #2: Make your art as ready as possible before submitting it for decorating
There are three basic ways to supply artwork: hand-drawn, mechanical and digital. While we can work with all three for decorating, digital is ideal. Below is brief information about each format; what you can expect in terms of necessary modifications, preparation time, and accuracy of results; and guidelines for making your art as ready as possible.
Hand-drawn artwork (Bad)
A hand-drawn logo provides a good starting point for the artistic elements of your screenprint/embroidery, however, it will require extensive digitization and modification for effective results. We will be happy to discuss the specifics and fees involved in making hand-drawn art ready for use.
Mechanical Artwork (Better)
The most acceptable mechanical artwork is camera-ready, black-and-white. It can be provided on a sheet of white paper or bromide, and should be no larger than 8.5” x 11”. Working with mechanical artwork may require a substantial amount of modifications and preparation.
Artwork that is faxed, scanned, on a business card, cocktail napkin, etc; is not considered acceptable mechanical artwork. Attempting to translate these types of artwork into a design for screenprinting or embroidery will severely compromise the integrity of your distinct design. However, they offer a good starting point and we will be happy to discuss the specifics and fees involved in making such art ready for use.
Digital artwork (Best)
Digital artwork includes images created in Adobe illustrator or PhotoShop, CorelDraw, and Microsoft Word, Excel or Powerpoint. While this is the most ideal format, digital artwork may still require some modification and preparation before we can put it on your garment.
Because digital artwork is the most technical format- and therefore offers the most accurate results- there are several guidelines you need to be aware of when preparing and supplying digital art for decorating.
A. Submitting and acceptable file format
If your digital artwork file ends with any of these suffixes, we’ll be able to work from it to properly prepare your art:
Embroidery file types -- .cdr .eps .ai .tiff .jpg .bmp .gif
Screen printing file types -- .cdr .eps .ai work the best, but with some art and computer work we can make .tiff .jpg .bmp .gif work.
B. Be sure to include a printed proof
This will allow us to see what your art is intended to look like, and help us match your expectations a s closely as possible.
C. Be sure to include all the basic file elements
These include fonts, layers, and paths. Sending these elements will assure greater integrity in the end result, and save you time and money.
D. Delivering artwork via disk
In general, CD-ROM or floppy disks will work fine. Before sending artwork on disk, it is best to contact us to make sure we have the hardware to accept it.
E. Delivering artwork via e-mail
Artwork should be e-mailed from the computer of origin, that is, from the computer on which it was created. E-mail artwork forwarded to us from other e-mail files has a greater risk of arriving corrupted.
Tip #3: Talk to us
Just like your company, the life your logo takes on is one of a kind, and requires special care to present its character in the best light. While these general guidelines are an ample start, we’ll be happy to take your decorating a step further by assessing your current art and letting you know the results you can expect from it, and advising you on artwork preparation and color selection… from initial concepts to final details we can take care of all your needs.
Understanding Embroidery
Estimating your logo’s stitch count:
1 solid square inch of embroidery equals approximately 2,000 stitches.
1 solid square ¼” of embroidery equals about 500 stitches
No letter should be smaller than 3/16”. Each letter ¼” in height equals about 100
stitches.
Drop shadows in your logo will translate to 200 extra stitches per inch.
Straight lines under logos typically require 200 extra stitches per inch.
Fabrics, colors, and artwork detail will affect the amount of stitches.
Understanding Screenprinting
Most of the Airborne’s garments featured in our catalog are best decorated with embroidery. However, if you do opt for screenprinting, it’s important to remember that every color you want requires another screen to be created, set-up, and printed through. The costs connected with these screens depend on the techniques we use.
It’s always beneficial to print more than less.
Because of the set-up charges involved, you’re better off ordering more than you think
You need. No one wants to be in the situation where five screenprinted shirts
Cost $100.
Every color has an associated cost.
Different colors have different chemical make-ups, which make them more expensive
than others.
If you need your screenprinting to match an exact color, we’ll have to custom-mix
Inks to achieve that PMS color at an additional cost for every run.
The process that allows colors to show correctly on dark goods often involves
additional charges.
Number of locations is also a price factor because everywhere you want to put a print
means extra screen charges.
Special locations, such as on a pocket, collar or sleeve, often have additional costs.
Drop shadows, shading and anything that blends from light to dark will probably end
Up looking like a series of dots. This does not apply to single-color halftone gradients,
which usually screenprint fine.
Please consult us to help you select the right decorating method to best achieve the image you want to convey.