Artwork for Large Format Printing
When setting up your artwork, make sure that the files used can be scaled to the size that they will be printed at for the product ordered.
If vector based artwork (.ai, .png or .pdf) is used, then various issues can be avoided as they can be scaled to any size without comprising the image quality. However, it should be cautioned that certain patterns, fonts and gradients can be lost if they are not turned into outlines or rasterized. Because of these risks, the safest option is to use a more standard image type.
Standard image file types (such as .jpg, .psd, .tiff …etc.) are themselves not without problems. They cannot be scaled up without comprising image quality. Artwork using such file types, because they are flattened and pixel based, must be scaled to size (the size to be used when printed). Simply taking a small flattened file and “scaling it to size” is not a satisfactory solution to the problem presented by artwork that is “too small” or “too low resolution”.
Ideally, the original design file (.ai or .psd) should be scaled to size on the computer it was designed on (to avoid loosing any fonts, gradients or patterns) and saved as a .tiff. While this tends to produce the best and most predictable results, this does produce a very large file. To address this, reduce the resolution down to 150dpi. If the file is too large to send via email, we are also able to accept files using online file transfer and sharing services such as Dropbox, WeTransfer, and Google Drive.
