File Preperations and Requirements

Make sure your files and images are in CMYK and not RGB. Any files created in RGB will be converted and may not look the way you expected them to.

Images should be 300 DPI or higher at 100% for best results on the printed product. Images taken from the internet are not suitable for commercial printing; they are at a low resolution (72 dpi) that will display beautifully on screen, but reproduce very poorly in print.

If you want your finished product to go all the way to the edge of the page, make sure you account for a 1/8” (.125”) bleed on all four sides in your document. If your document does not have a bleed, a 5/16” (.313”) margin on all sides will be sufficient. If you have questions, please contact Lake Region Printing before submitting your files.

	Does your 4-color document have a large area of black coverage? If so, consider creating a new swatch with a “true” black - 60% Cyan, 40% Yellow, 40% Magenta and 100% black. On the 4-color press this results in a heavier, deeper black than just 100% black, which can actually appear dark gray over a large area.

If your document is something that can be printed “n-up” on a page - such as a bookmark, rack card or postcard - only send us the file 1-up. Imposition can be done quickly and easily by our prepress software to account for things like bleeds, colorbars, sheetmarks and press guides, and we will always maximize paper space for you. The same applies for booklet-style documents - create your document the same way that you would read it, with the pages in numerical order.

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When your files are ready, you can submit them to Lake Region Printing in a number of ways.

PDF Format: the advantage of PDF is that your layout and all fonts and images will be preserved as you had them in your original file (especially if you outline the fonts before you export it), and the Lake Region Printing workflow is optimized for PDF format. Many programs let you export your file as a PDF even if you don’t have Adobe Acrobat; please contact us if you have questions about how to do this.

Raw Files: if you cannot export your file as a PDF, we can accept the raw files under almost all industry-standard design programs. However, please be sure to include all fonts and images used in your file. This can usually be accomplished with the “package” option. Please contact us if you have questions about how to do this.

Media: PDFs and smaller files can be sent to us through email (sales@lakeregionprinting.com). Large files or files with multiple parts can be uploaded to our FTP* or submitted on 3.5” Floppy, CD-ROM, 100MB Zip disks, or flash drives.

*Please contact LRP for login information