Package Design | packagedesignmag.com

(June 2011) posted on Wed Jun 22, 2011

By Brennan Higgins

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We’ve all been through it before: The movie looks great in the trailer, but after you see it, you say, “That was nothing like I thought it would be!”
In the kingdom of package design, though, if you fall in love with a concept and find the printed version isn’t what you were expecting, you lose a lot more than 10 bucks and a couple of hours of your time. Instead, you lose a missed press time, time to market, and, often, a lot of money. You can prevent this nightmare by paying more attention to detail up front. An eye for color early in the design process helps achieve the right colors that will capture consumers’ attention.
Within the process of developing artwork, designers must consider production guidelines carefully. You have to ask yourself some definitive questions before even beginning the conceptual artwork process. If you don’t know the answers to those questions, you roll the dice—and the odds are stacked against you. These questions are necessary because of the technical intricacies in design print specifications. Producing design that’s compelling on screen is one thing, but bringing these designs to life in print requires great attention to detail and the ability to maximize effects and anticipate potential pitfalls.

Q1
Did you adjust the color gradient ranges for the printing method?
Gradients and shadows can be very tricky with different printing methods. To create a smooth vignette in flexo, for instance, the dot density drop-off will often create a line where the gradient passes a point, usually somewhere in the range of 0% to 10%. Cosmetics, beauty, and personal care packages often won’t achieve the effect they were supposed to because a gradient was not planned correctly.

Q2
Are the design and colors achievable within the printer’s spec sheet?
A designer’s first step in the design process should be requesting a printer spec sheet. Key pieces of printer information are the minimum font size, the minimum dot size, the trapping minimums, the number of colors, and the acceptable print file formats. When a printer says it can print eight colors, make sure those don’t include white and varnish, or the number of colors will be only six.