Seeing Your True Colors

by lweber | Aug 12, 2015 | Print Buying Tips

When it comes to colors and images, what we see on our computer screens and what gets printed can vary drastically.  Here at Minuteman Press, we take important steps to provide the highest level of accuracy when printing your job on our digital printing presses.

Every morning, we calibrate our presses to ensure an exact recreation of our customers’ files. “Color calibrating” means putting the press through a series of tests and test prints.  Yawn…we know that this doesn’t seem like an exciting way to start the day, but this step is important!  These tests ensure that the color profile used for printing is the highest quality, and they prevent any color variations during a job.

During the calibration, a tool called a spectrophotometer is used to precisely match a standard set of pre-printed colors to the colors that the press produces.  We place the spectrophotometer over a color sample.  It uses a light and a diffraction gradient to separate a color into narrow wavelengths which then get measured and recorded by the press.  It’s the same tool a home store uses to match paint. The press analyzes these recordings and then adjusts its settings to match.  When you think about it, this is really advanced technology!

Regular color calibration is an important step in the professional printing process.  Using advanced equipment and the right tools, like our spectrophotometer, means that Minuteman Press will give you high-quality printing and accurate colors.  We are committed to helping your company look good.

If you have questions about printing, color, or image quality, please contact us any time.  We love to educate our customers, and we know that teaching you and working together will result in the best quality printing for your business!

Saddle Stitch Binding and Avoiding “Creeps”

by lweber | Jul 14, 2015 | Print Buying Tips

Take a look at any booklet, magazine, or catalog and you may notice what appear to be a few staples holding it together. These are not staples, however, but a saddle-stitched binding. Because most print jobs are large quantity, using regular staples to bind a booklet would take too much time. Therefore, a stitching machine is used. Instead of single staples, a stitching machine uses a long spool of metal wire which gets pushed through an awaiting booklet and then cut and folded to resemble a staple.  Imagine a sewing machine with super strength.  Here at Minuteman Press, we have multiple stitching machines including standalone units and all-in-one booklet makers that stitch, fold, and cut within seconds.

When folding the booklet in half, the pages on the inside will “creep”, or be pushed farther outward than the pages on the outside of the booklet. To account for this, the booklet is given a face trim to even out the edge. This will give the book a clean appearance.  However, we need to be careful with this step.  If the booklet is thick, the face trim can significantly reduce the margins of the inside pages. This dilemma can be avoided in the design process.  The graphic designer should give the pages a “creep allowance”.  This term sounds funny, but it means adjusting the inner and outer margins to allow a face trim with no consequences.  The diagram below shows the way a booklet is folded, stitched, and cut properly.

At Minuteman Press, we print booklets in the form of school handbooks, playbills, directories, and owner manuals. We can help you create a new design, or we can work with your digital files.  If you have a question about creating a booklet, please contact us any time.