This section is dedicated to telling you what other print shops won’t about your print job. We quality manage every job that goes through our system to avoid costly mistakes and to guarantee you the best results.
Our production and design staff are extremely experienced and will advise on the best stocks and finishing’s for your print project. You can rest assured that we will let you know if your file is not quite up to scratch, and will suggest alternative methods to get the best result.
We want you to be aware of the limitations of print and to make sure you are not disappointed with your experience. Please note the list of potential risks and errors below, and techniques we have to go about reducing them or avoiding them all together.
Please understand that these potential errors are common for all print brokers. We just like to make sure our customers are 100% aware and comfortable with the whole printing process.
Double sided printing with a border
We highly recommend avoiding a border around the edge of double sided prints smaller then A5. This is due to the possibility of the printer shifting, causing the front and back not to line up exactly. Once trimmed the boarder can make the whole print look un-even. When shifting does occur, often it moves less then 1mm out, but on small products like business cards and invitations this can look very obvious and can be disappointing. To avoid this error, we suggest leaving a minimum of 5mm of space from the edge of the paper to the boarder line, or removing the boarder altogether.
Cracking of ink
When there is heavy ink coverage on a fold line, the ink on that line can ‘crack’ causing white flecks to appear along the spine. This tends to occur more prominently on heavier paper stocks, as the fold is deeper and the grain stretches more. To avoid this we suggest either, avoiding ink on spines and folds, switch to a lighter stock or apply a laminate. We add a crease to all stocks before we fold them to reduce the amount of cracking, but sometimes this is not enough to erase the error completely.
Low-resolution images and logos
Jpeg files are usually not high enough resolution for print, therefore pixilation can occur making your artwork appear fuzzy. If you have a graphic designer creating your artwork, you are entitled to request a high resolution PDF or ESP file that works perfectly for all print jobs as it can be blown up to extremely large sizes and still be crisp and clear. If you cannot get hold of your graphic designer, we offer recreation of artwork at an hourly rate. As for photographs and other images, we like to have them supplied at 300dpi to avoid any pixilation.
Colour Matching
It is almost impossible to get the exact same shade of colour printed every single time. There are so many variables preventing this from happening. From the type of paper stock you use, to the temperature of the room, the different types of printers, right down to amount of moisture in the air, all of this and more can play a part in manipulating the colour produced. It really is a science. Knowing the CMYK breakdown of your brands colours helps us get as close as we can to the true colour, and if you have a physical print out of the colour you are trying to achieve, feel free to leave it with us to colour match correctly.
Mother Earth and Monsters commitment to Eco Solutions.
We strive to not only produce the best results for each job but keep our footprint as small as we can. We have already put in place an environmental plan to reduce waste by recycling when ever possible and then reduce land fill volume when no recycling option is available. We transfer to water based inks, use non PVC based substrates when ever possible & increase our knowledge as company a by obtaining certification relevant to the printing and signage industry.
