I’ve worked as a graphic designer since 2008. I do a little bit of everything but we do a lot of printing for government/government subsidized programs that use design houses that they are contractually obligated to use.
The last year or so these designers provide files for full color gang run printing that have linked files, fonts intact, RGB color. One in particular has this in their email, “If the Printer needs to set up or export the files according to their own production specifications, you can share the working files with them. Here’s the direct link again to the Working Files folder” and they link to a hundreds of files that I have to sort through that are working files.
Am I missing something? Has something changed? I am not as passionate as I once was for graphic design, maybe I’ve missed the new trends or changes. If I was providing a file for print, I would provide it in a pdf, 300dpi @ size w/ bleed, flattened, images embedded and in CMYK. I’m not sure who to ask. If it’s a me problem, I want to learn. Help?
I would prepare a gang-run file the same way you would, because that’s how gang-run printers usually want it. First, though, I’d find out their preferred specs, but they’re usually small variations of what you mentioned. Even for more traditional custom offset runs, I’ve almost always done it that way for at least the past 15 years unless the printer specifically asked for the working, packaged files.
I would never send a mess to a printer and expect them to sort it out. That’s plain sloppiness, and I’d expect to be charged for the time it took to sort out the mess. I have too much pride in my work to do it any other way, even for government work.
This has me doubting myself, especially the RGB thing. This is not something I’d expect from a design house. (especially a large one). I expressed concern with my employer and was basically told to just make it work.
I’m tempted to open their working files and export as a 300dpi CMYK tiff and be done with it.
I gave up using .tiff years ago in favor of .psd. In addition, modern RIPs can usually handle RGB-to-CMYK conversion on the fly. In many cases, it’s even preferable, but I still prefer doing my own conversion from one to the other unless it’s for digital printing. There, I’d be needlessly restricting the larger color gamut of most digital printing to the more limited CMYK space.
Printer #1 - Desperate for work. They’ll take anything you give them and they’ll either run it as is, or they’ll fix it and not tell you and not charge for the labor. They’re not doing you any favors. Not telling you deprives you of the opportunity to learn from your errors and do things the proper way. This is one way designers pick up and perpetuate bad habits.
Printer #2 - If it’s not set up properly they’ll tell you it’s not acceptable, then give you the option to fix it, or they’ll offer to fix it for you, for a fee. I sent a client’s publication to print this week and got a note back from the printer that I didn’t set the bleed on the back cover. I sent them a corrected page and they told the client there would be a prepress charge of $60 to replace it. I told my client that was my mistake and I’d pay it. Ouch. But that’s how you learn.
As far as RGB… The problem with leaving images at RGB is that the client may have the expectation that’s what they’ll see on the printer’s proof or the final printed pieces. And it won’t look the same and you might have to explain something most people have a hard time comprehending. I avoid that by converting everything to CMYK.