Proofing Your Print Project
You have an idea that you have been working on. It is a marketing piece for your business that you want to look a certain way. You go to your printer who has a Full-time Graphic Artist on staff. After discussing the details of what you had in mind, sending a couple of emails with the information you want included along with some images, the artist designs your project. Upon completion of the layout the artist sends you an email to proof before it goes to print. This is where things can go right or wrong depending on the level of attention to detail that is put into the proofing process.
Read Thoroughly
Upon receiving the email the recipient opens it excited to finally get to see how their vision came to life. They look at the artwork before them, see that everything seems to be where they wanted it, and that that the design looks as it should. “Perfect,” they think to themselves. Hurriedly they send a reply email back to the printer stating, “Looks great, print it.” They can’t wait to get the finished product in their hands. After all, they have been working on this idea for a while now. Why shouldn’t they be excited? In reality they have every right to be. What this particular customer doesn’t realize is that they sent the artist the wrong phone number and an old email address. Because they only looked at the overall design layout of their project they didn’t catch this when proofing it. They never really took the time to read the information carefully. Take a guess as to how this project turned out? Exactly, wrong!
How could this have been avoided? Proofing a project is something that should be done in steps. It should not be hurried just because you waited until you absolutely needed the item two days ago and ordered it today. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a long drawn out process either. The following are some basic tips that should help:
- Read the email once on the screen
- Print the Email out
- Read the printed version
- Give the printed version to someone else to read that knows the correct information
- Read the project backwards starting at the bottom right and working up to the top left
- Check for both spelling and grammar errors
A very brief article I wrote that explains this and provides some other tips as well can be found on our website titled “Proper Proofing Techniques.” It’s your project and you deserve to see it come to life the way you envisioned. But your proofing plays an important role in making that happen.
Eric Johnson
Minuteman Press Colorado Springs 