Study task 13: Print finishes

The type of print finish you choose, can have a major impact on the effectiveness of the final printed material. Along with the standard digital printing method, other examples of some printing finishes include spot varnish, embossing, thermography, foil blocking, die cuts and lamination. The type of paper and finish can have a dramatic effect on your printed material. 

Blind emboss:
This is the process of raising letters or designs on card or tough paper where no printed image has been added. Blind embossing is a raised surface, whilst blind debossing gives a depressed surface in the paper. 

Emboss:
The technique of raising up some of the printed page to create a shadow and adding dimension to a design. This requires a special dye and accurate registration. Putting a texture on the paper is also a form of embossing. Referring to heavily textured paper as “embossed” paper is simply a way to explain that the paper isn’t smooth and has a noticeable texture. 

Die cut:
This used to create packaging from a regular sheet but can also be used in brochure design. An irregular shaped cut-out can be used in a leaflet or brochure to create an unusual cover, or to knockout a hole for an image to show through. The cutter can be combined with scoring to create folds in the paper. These can have a significant cost and are usually only used when a budget permits or for short, high-quality runs. 

Foil blocking:
Metallic foil is applied to a page using heat and pressure to create a reflective area. The effect is more eye catching than a metallic ink given the foil’s greater reflective properties as it sits on top of the paper, whereas ink is partially absorbed. There are also matt foils that can be applied to gloss or reflective materials. White foil is ideal for use on dark coloured materials. 

Blocking:
To impress or stamp a design on a cover. The design can be blocked in colour inks, gold leaf or metal foil. This is most commonly used on case bound book covers. 

Coating:
A special water based coating – usually sealer, gloss, matt or silk is applied to protect printed items from ink smudges, finger marks or to enhance the appearance. Coatings are most commonly used on coated matt or silk paper, which are more prone to smudging than gloss paper. Coatings dry faster than varnishes, resulting in a quicker turn around of jobs, tend to be more scuff resistant than varnishes and there is less risk of yellowing paper. 

Thermography (heat embossing):
Thermographic printing is a powder and heat process. The powder becomes liquid when heated and quickly dries hard when it cools. The end result is a raised surface on the paper. This is often used on business cards but can create interesting textures for invites and postcards.

UV:
UV is a special varnish which has undergone an accelerated drying process using ultra violet. A gloss UV varnish gives a very shiny effect, especially when used on printed matter with a matt laminate. With both gloss and matt finishes available, UV varnish gives a similar effect to lamination (although the process is more akin to printing a spot colour). The advantage is that it can be printed onto specific sections of a page to enhance a logo or image. 

Varnishes:
Varnishes are applied to protect printed literature from ink smudging, finger marks or to enhance the appearance. There are five main types – machine, gloss, matt, silk and UV. Varnishes are commonly used on matt or silk coated paper as these are more prone to smudging than gloss coated paper. Applying varnish to the whole document as a seal is an ‘overall varnish’ whilst applying it to specific areas for effect is a ‘spot varnish’. However, this is more costly as the job is taken off the press and allowed to dry, before the varnish is applied on the press at a later date. The gloss varnish is a more subtle version of the gloss UV varnish.

Metallic inks:
These are spot printed onto a page and can add another dimension to literature as they have a reflective quality due to their metallic components. Available in a variety of Pantone colours, they are best used simply and sparingly, due to the viscosity of the ink. They can be prone to rubbing off if not coated or sealed. 

Offset Lithography:
A printing process by which the inked image to be printed is transferred (offset) first to a rubber layer before contact with the paper, which takes up the inked areas. Higher quality than digital and can be used to print CMYK, specials or a mix of the two. 

Scoring:
Scoring creates a line or depression in the paper to help the paper fold easily. Folding paper without scoring it first can look unprofessional and the paper may crack. A reverse score – where the outside of a printed item is scored and then folded back on itself – is sometimes used on glossy or plastic coated papers. Duplex and any paper that cracks when folded can be reverse scored. 

Design development

This is the scanned in drawing without any rendering, however the live trace tool on illustrator has been used to achieve a more prominent stroke. This does not have the desired effect that intended, it needs to be developed much further to give me the final angular shape that is needed. 

In order to do this I will use the pen tool on illustrator to draw the shape over my original hand rendered version. To keep the design symmetrical the best option would be to complete half of the design, then flip it to keep each shape in line with the opposing side. The screen shot below shows en example of this, however where the anchor points join in certain places, it does not give me a clean line as the anchor points extend too far to create these sharp points shown on the image. If the size of the stroke is changed, this may prevent this happening when joining the anchor points. 

This design shows a much cleaner and refined version as the anchor points meet perfectly and there are no sharp edges extending further than they should. The stroke size used is 1pt. however, depending on how the shapes will be filled either with colour or left alone, a thinner stroke may also work. 

Half of the design completed, then duplicated and mirrored on the other side. The stroke size is still slightly too big, and the centre line needs to be removed. 

This version is fully refined and the centre line has been removed, I am pleased with the final vector and can now being creating the wallpaper design. 

I started playing around with some repeat ideas that I could possibly use, neither of these two work, as it was just to get an idea of placement with the cat.

Undecided on colour or how I would fill the individual shapes, I just played around with using the fill tool so that each shape was a separate block colour, this could work nicely when used as a repeat design. 
Two examples I created using block colours for the shapes, I don't think they create much impact and they appear to be rather childish. However I do like the monochromatic tones of the bottom one shown, but I don't think the block colours inside each individual shape work. 

The monochromatic tones work nicely, but to make it slightly more interesting to be used as a wallpaper 

Testing the repeat

 Final design

Writing a project rationale:

Task:

A project rationale should outline the problem and justify why a project should take place. As you are producing a campaign for your own website it is vital that you outline the requirements of the project just as a client would. 
Write a project rationale for your campaign outlining all the necessary requirements of the project just as a client would.

Purpose/reason for campaign:

• identify that there are a wide range of bespoke label and packaging designs
• should advertise the website as a respected source of information and help
• advertises where to find the specific information

Audience:

• young designers interested in the more illustrative area of design work
• people looking for an informative website that showcases other examples of work

Idea development

Initial ideas:
From my research, I know I want to create a geometric image to be used for my repeat. With some of the artists I have looked at, animals influence their work and I want to take this idea on board, I started sketching out some shapes on my gridded paper, which started to resemble something that looked like a cats head, and I quite liked this idea, of creating a repeat for wallpaper that is slightly different with a quirky element which will appeal to the specific target audience. 

From this, I want to create a drawing using the centre line so that my drawing will be symmetrical. I think that geometric shapes could create something nice to be repeated as a wallpaper.

This is the first outline of my geometric cat head, I studied an image of a cat and tried to represent the features onto the squared paper, which gave me a cat made up of angular shapes. It was much easier drawing something like this out on squared paper as I know that I can create a perfect line of symmetry. 
From this sketch, once I was happy with the lines and balance, I then traced over it more accurately on some tracing paper so I could create a finalised drawing to scan in and use on illustrator. 

This shows the more refined line drawing that I will use to scan in and manipulate. I have altered the shape of the face slightly, which is the only change I have made to the line drawing. I will draw over this using the pen tool on illustrator to create a clean digital version of the drawing. 

Development:

This shows my original drawing then using the live trace roll on illustrator. I am pleased how the shape will look, however certain points where the lines join are not clean enough, I feel it would work better if I was to create a vector of this using the pen tool. This would give me a much cleaner finish, as the design must be symmetrical also, this would be the best way to create the shape as I can do half of the cat then duplicate and repeat it. 

 Using a ruler in the centre its easier to mark off where I need to work from. For this I used the original drawing as a guide.