From Quark

  • Make sure all colors in Quark are set to “Process”. If you are unaware where these settings are, go to Edit > Edit Colors. All colors that are set to “Spot”, click on the particular color to edit and check the process box. Click “OK”.
  • Make sure all Illustrator .eps and Photoshop .tif files are set to CMYK color mode.
  • Set all illustrator fonts to outlines. To ensure that you have all fonts within your document converted to outlines, select all, then hit “Convert to Outlines”. If this box is grayed out, all fonts in the document have been set to outlines.
  • All photoshop files need to be 300 dpi. If the image is less than 300 dpi, a loss of quality may occur. If the image is more than 300 dpi, please resample the image to 300 dpi.
  • Make sure that all fonts in the document are packaged together. There should be a screen font and a printer font for each font used.

Spot Color in Quark:

  • Make sure all of your colors are set to spot.
  • Make sure all embedded images are .tif or .eps formats.
  • Make sure that you package both the printer AND the screen fonts. If you are including a True Type font out of Quark Express, please follow steps 3a to 3c.

    3a. Convert your composite image by exporting it as an .eps.

    3b. Import the .eps file into Adobe Illustrator and convert the text to outlines.

    3c. Save the .eps as an .eps out of illustrator.

  • Package the composite materials, fonts and images into a folder.
  • Compress the file using WinZip or Stuffit.

From InDesign

We currently have InDesign CS and CS2 capabilities. Stay tuned for our process and color guidelines.

From Illustrator

Spot Color in Illustrator:

  • Make sure all spot colors are designated swatches and in the “Swatch Options” menu, set to “Spot” color.
  • Make sure you “Select All” and convert all text to outlines by using the “Convert text to outlines” command.
  • Save the file as an .eps file format.
  • Compress the file using WinZip or Stuffit

Illustrator:

  • Make sure all swatches are set to process. If you are using spot color swatches, you can identify them in the SWATCHES palette by a black dot in the lower right hand corner of the swatch. Make sure you don’t have anything in your document selected and then highlight that swatch. In the SWATCHES palette, click on SWATCH OPTIONS. You will see the SPOT COLOR drop down menu; switch it to PROCESS COLOR.Convert all text to outlines.
  • Save the image as an EPS or PDF. EPS images are preferred. In all cases, you may email your artwork to art@bci-inc.com, FTP your art to us or send it on a CD. If you email or FTP your artwork, please fax us a copy of your output with your purchase order to ensure that our output matches your expectations.

From Adobe PDF

We are currently using Quark Express 6.5 to lay our prepress work into our work flow. Quark 5, 6, and 6.5 does not accept PDFs in the Acrobat 5 or 6 formats. When creating your PDF, please make sure that it is saved in Adobe Acrobat 4.0 format.

Before you create your PDF file:

  • Make sure all process artwork is indeed in CMYK
  • Make sure that no artwork is in spot color (Acrobat 4.0 files do NOT allow spot color and will automatically convert it into either RGB or CMYK.) Otherwise color shifts to your work will occur OR you will no longer have a spot color job.
  • Please send spot color artwork as an .EPS from Illustrator.

 

Please check and recheck your Acrobat 4.0 file if you were designing in InDesign, Pagemaker, or Illustrator. The transparency and special effects features in these programs cause inadvertent distortions in the PDF and will print as such. BCI claims no responsibility for these distortions and will charge you for another run if a reprint is necessary.

 

Coming Soon: Distiller settings and InDesign Export settings avalailable for download. Be sure to check back soon!

Other Supported Types

For Corel, Freehand, and other vector art-only based programs:

If your software allows you to convert your text to outlines, please do so to eliminate font issues. Make sure that all of your swatches are designated. Save all of your artwork as an .eps.

The newest versions of Corel and Freehand allow you to Export the file formats as EPS or earlier versions of Illustrator. BCI prefers that you submit duplicate files; One EPS and one converted to Illustrator. Sometimes it is better to open a converted Illustrator file in Illustrator than a converted EPS in Illustrator. (This is due to complex file conversions.)

Using Adobe PageMaker* (.pmd), Microsoft Word (.doc), Microsoft Publisher (.pub), or Adobe Acrobat** (.pdf)

  • None of these applications support spot color and your artwork may be subject to a prepress fee for correct assembly.
  • * Adobe PageMaker is no longer being developed or supported, but BCI can import any PageMaker document into our software suites. Prepress work is required to make necessary adjustments.
  • ** Adobe Portable Document Formats PDFs only support spot colors in .pdf/x formats. Otherwise, they only support one color or proces color artwork. If you are using spot colors in a PDF file, open the file in Illustrator and please save it as an EPS.

Using Adobe Photoshop

Process Color: Make sure you save your file in CMYK color mode at 300 dots per inch with the document size being the actual print size. Do not your file in RGB color mode. Lastly, save your file in the .TIF format.

Spot Color: Adobe Photoshop only supports spot color as 1 color, monochromatic bitmap images. Save your files as Bitmap, 1200 DPI.