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HiDefColor is an all-in-one creative marketing agency.

How Crossovers/Gutter Jumps are Printed and Bound

Posted by Rick Rys on 7:47 pm in Printing | 0 comments

I was asked the other day about producing a calendar for 2012. The unique challenge with this project was that it wasn’t a typical template calendar and that its design involves fashion photography that crosses over the spine onto the page beneath. Large images that cross over the spine/gutter in the binding process are known as a ‘gutter jump’ or ‘crossover’. This design is used frequently in the magazine and book publishing business, but it may be relatively unknown to most graphic designers or photographers as...

What are Those Square Barcodes in Print?

Posted by Rick Rys on 3:04 pm in Blog, QR Code | Comments Off

You’ve seen them everywhere: electronics stores, newspapers, Facebook pages, music promotions, real estate signs, billboards and many other locations. Those funny looking black and white squares that look like something from the future. Well, the latter is now reality. Those funny looking square barcodes are called QR codes. QR stands for ‘quick response’ and they will revolutionize how marketers convert prospects into customers. QR codes are scanned by smart phones. Visit: http://get.beetagg.com in your mobile browser and...

Staccato/FM Screens Produce Larger CMYK Color Gamut

Posted by Rick Rys on 7:03 pm in Printing | 6 comments

Staccato/FM screens ability to produce a larger CMYK color gamut is one of the best secrets to producing quality color on press. Conventional halftones, often referred to as AM screens (amplitude modulated), distribute ink over a grid of dots that increase in size for darker tones. Throughout the tone scale, the frequency of dots remains the same, but the size or amplitude increases. The ink and water requirements vary greatly throughout the tonal range, causing a basic lithographic instability for which there are no on press controls. An...

Uses for QR Codes in Graphic Design

Posted by Rick Rys on 4:02 pm in Blog, QR Code | 2 comments

So now that you know how to make money with QR Codes, what’s next? QR codes are scanned by smart phones. Visit: http://get.beetagg.com in your mobile browser and automatically download QR Code reader software. There are many options to integrate QR Codes into your next design of print collateral. When QR Codes are scanned with QR reader software (through smart phones/mobile devices) recipients are taken to custom landing pages or other call-to-action options. Let’s begin with the six basic types of QR Codes: URL – encode URL...

Mobile Marketing with QR Codes in Print Collateral

Posted by Rick Rys on 2:52 pm in Blog, Media, QR Code | 0 comments

We’ve all been talking about cross-media publishing for the last fifteen years or so. I know it’s been on my radar for a long time. Finally, there really is a great form of cross-media publishing that really is quite simple and very effective to your marketing strategies. The answer: QR Codes. QR codes are scanned by smart phones. Visit: http://get.beetagg.com in your mobile browser and automatically download QR Code reader software. QR stands for ‘quick response’ and is a clever way of engaging your prospects through...

VIDEO: The End of Print?

Posted by Rick Rys on 5:22 pm in Blog, Printing, Video | 1 comment

Is this the trend of where printing is going or gone? BTW, the iPad comes with the car. What do you think? Please leave your comments below… ...

Expand your Creative Options with Digital Dimensional Printing

Posted by Rick Rys on 5:28 pm in Blog, Printing | 0 comments

How many times have you sat in those marketing meetings trying to think of a clever, unique way of creating marketing pieces? A new innovative and inexpensive printing method is digital dimensional printing. Digital dimensional printing is a raised, high gloss, spot coating that creates an additional sensory feel to your marketing pieces. This raised or 3-D effect helps your communications stand out in a crowded marketplace. Images and photographs that look like they have a textural feel are perfect images to start with since the reader will...

UV Soft Touch Coating – Alternative to Touché Paper

Posted by Rick Rys on 12:02 pm in Blog, Coating | 7 comments

There’s no question soft touch ‘fiber’ paper stocks are very unique and create the sensation of feel to your design. However, they have production drawbacks with buying even cartons from paper mill and the effect of paper color when printing CMYK inks. A less expensive alternative is coating your next print project with UV Soft Touch coating. UV Soft Touch coating is applied inline in the coating unit and is not a varnish. Varnish is a form of coating but it is applied in a printing unit, not a coating unit. Varnish will use...

What is a RIP – Raster Image Processor?

Posted by Rick Rys on 1:58 pm in Blog, Design | 0 comments

What is a RIP? A simple analogy is Photoshop. Have you ever opened a PDF with Photoshop? The ‘Import PDF’ dialogue window prompts you with two important fields: resolution and mode. After inputting resolution, mode and clicking OK, Photoshop starts the raster image process – converting the PDF into a bitmap. Raster is another term for bitmap. This is essentially what happens in prepress, however with much more sophisticated software and hardware. The main difference between the two is bit depth. Photoshop will...

VIDEO: Advanced Sharpening and Noise Reduction in Photoshop

Posted by Rick Rys on 5:51 pm in Blog, Design, Featured Article, Media, Photoshop | 134 comments

This VIDEO will show you how to get the most dynamic and sharpest images in your printed marketing material. This is a two-step Photoshop sharpening technique that will show you how to create the sharpest images without creating noise in smooth midtone areas of your photographs. This is one of my favorite Photoshop sharpening tips in reproducing beautiful photography on press. All images are not as sharp as they can be when converted from raw files. These days there is a lot of post image processing that needs to be done with digital images....