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On this page is a brief overview of our services &
rates for artwork and extra work (color separations, color matching, scanning, etc.)
required for imprinting. And information on artwork being submitted. Please enclose your
fax number as we fax finished art that we do back to our customers for their final
approval. Customers who do not have us fax art or email art; waive their right to inspect art.
CSI Chicago cannot be held responsible for incorrect spelling, layout, etc. due to customers
who do not check final artwork and OK it.
When coming in to do artwork bring everything
you have for us to work with, any printed items, logos, photos, digital files, etc.
Send as many different files as you have,
in case one does not work or we are unable to open it, then we don't waste time trying contact you to get a
different file.
For CAD
CUT PRINT PROCESS we need an EPS or AI CS3
or lower file or can use a good black & white art like a PDF, TIF, etc. file; as we can then convert it to an EPS/AI file which is what we need for Cad
Cut. For screen printing we black
& white art as well. If more than 1
color print we need artwork in black & white separated art.
Black &
white art is best for that process,
do not bring in color art for screen printing or Cad Cut Printing. Full color art
only works for digital imprinting.
For our DIGITAL PRINTED TRANSFERS
or Embroidery full color
high quality JPEG files work well (300 DPI) if you
don't have a jpeg file for digital printing transfers then color art will work,
but a scanning charge will apply, plus scanning will sometimes alter the color,
art cannot be bigger than
8.5 x 11 in size for scanning.
If you do not have vectorized art (EPS or AI
file) we can have
that done for you, you can submit a jpeg file or whatever you have, most artwork
conversions cost about $25.00. We have
even done artwork from printed items. If in doubt feel free to contact us. Below
are some examples of artwork done from customers art that they had.
Submitting Artwork
Please read the following below for
what kind of artwork we need, what usually delays orders is not having artwork
that is usable. Artwork that is not usable will delay your order! If in doubt
call us.
-
Originals: Please
when sending artwork, photos or any originals of value, send us
duplicates; as we cannot be responsible for originals should they be
lost or damaged.
- Customers always ask if they can submit artwork on
disk or email art to us, we say Yes but we would prefer all artwork be submitted Black
& White camera ready art (PDF
art is preferred
as we have the least amount of trouble with this file type and can convert
it to an EPS file should we need to; TIF, AI (CS#3 or lower) and EPS and any
vector files will
work well also; but depending on the program and version it was designed on
sometimes causes problems, when sending artwork, send all available file
types you have as it's better to have more than enough) for the screen printing process, if more than 1 color, submit it
color separated in Black &
White, see example below. For example if you have a 3 color design that is red,
black & yellow. Each color should be on a separate piece and in Black print
(not in the color of what it
is going to be printed). The reason we prefer black & white art is that if we have
problems reading the customers disk or since we use only graphic PC compatible and it's
in a MAC format we are liable to have problems using it. Also many times customers disk for some reason
the artwork is not there or is not readable by us. By having camera ready artwork we know we
have what we need to start your job and there will no delay in getting your order done on
time. A black laser print of 300 x 300 or better is usually good enough to reproduce from.
You can enclose the disk with the art (a PC 1.44 or zip disk) should we need to enhance,
change it or reprint it. Or need a type font from it. Always enclose
the type font on the disk or email or convert it to freeform, you can
find the font in your font folder on your PC as we may not have the type font
that is needed for your artwork. On a Mac you can usually find it in your
system/library/font folder. We use a special graphics program that has it's own
special format .GED file, but next to that we prefer a .EPS if in
Illustrator version 8.0 or lower, TIF or PDF file will work as we can usually convert it to
a format we need from that. Artwork
submitted should have a line width of 1.5 or thicker. Anything under 1.5 cannot be
guaranteed to print properly. The only exception to submitting art is when we are doing a four color process imprinting because we then
output the films directly from the disk as it is less expensive and faster to it this way,
in this case we can accept MAC or PC format (Photoshop works well) when doing this. When
doing four color process films from disk we usually output at 55 LPI and prices for films
are about $23.00 ea. for 10" x 12" size. Four color process consist of Cyan
(blue), Magenta (red), Yellow and Black. Please keep in mind when doing four color process
on t-shirts that additional time is needed because of film work, special
plates, proofing and getting colors to print right takes time, sometimes color
printing output is not definite because of what we start with and how well colors print
together after films & plates are made. Those of you who wish to supply us with your
own films have them output to 55 LPI and plates supplied mount them on a 305
mesh.
- Example of a 2 color separation is shown below. Each piece of artwork color
should be in black & white regardless of what the printed color is. As
you can see the blue design on the left and the red color separation next to it fits
perfectly with each color. On the right is what the two colors look like when put
together, there is a very slight overlay when the 2 colors butt up to each other. When in
doubt and you want us to do the color separations you can submit your 1 color design and
include a colored-in art piece to show where the colors go. We then can do the color
separations here, there is a charge for us to do the color separations. We do not
recommend printing ink on top of ink as you get ink build up and tend to lose detail when
doing this.
Re-Doing Customers artwork
If you do not have good artwork you can submit
what you have and we will have our art staff clean up and re-do your artwork.
Below are some examples of how your artwork will look before and after it has
been re-done. From photographs to color vector art (trucks), xerox type copies
(Dragons) to good black & white art, from rough sketch (bird) to good full
color art and from full color drawings (Madonna) to good black & white art
for silk screen printing.
 
(Photo)
After (artwork) Before
After
Before
After
Before
After
Submit what you have and we will be glad to give you
a quote on re-doing your photo, sketch, bad xerox copies, etc. into good clean
useable EPS vector art. Once converted to a vector file EPS (Encaspulated
Postscript) which is the best art file format; we can then export it into other
file formats such as Jpeg/JPG a common file to compress and store images for
transfer over the Internet often used to compress photographic images for web
pages, TIF
(Tagged Image File Format), BMP (Windows Bitmap), WMF (Windows Meta File),
GIF (Graphic Image Format) or CGM (Computer Graphics Metafile).
Services/Information
- Artwork use fee is $40.00 per
hour, Minimum art charge is $20.00
(1/2 hour). Average artwork takes about 1-2 hours for logos from your
idea or sketch. For simple designs or incorporating our clip art for use on t-shirts &
product imprinting usually takes about 1/2 hour. Customers supplying camera ready art,
there is no art charge.
- Plates for most wearable orders is $25.00 each, Large plates
(a heart size & full size design) or halftone plates (photographs being reproduced
in one color are $40.00
each Each color in a design requires a plate, example a
3 color design requires 3 plates. Four color process plates
are about $60.00 ea.
- Halftone Scans are
$15.00
(photographs to be imprinted on wearables and products) require a halftone scan to be
done
before a plate can be made from it. Please keep in mind when submitting photographs to be
halftoned that photographs should have good contrast, color and clarity.
Some photographs will not reproduce properly depending on contrast we will
try to inform you of that, customer assumes all
responsibility for photos given to us for halftone reproductions.
- Please keep in mind that in the custom imprint product
business, that it is standard to have a 10% over or underun due to different printing processes. All over/underuns are billable to
the customer plus any shipping cost to get products to our warehouse or to
the customer.
- Please note all artwork and typesetting by us for
customers, requires the customer to proof all finished work for accuracy, spelling, color, etc. Customers who do
not proof work waive all rights to work done and is done strictly at customers risk. You
can come in to our showroom or we can fax artwork for you to proof. Rush jobs where there
is not enough time for the customer to proof art will be done strictly at customers risk.
- Art fees charged by
CSI Chicago is an art/use fee and we retain all rights to art designed by us for use by our
customers. As long as we produce the items for our customers there is no additional art
use fees, use of artwork for other purposes is restricted and needs a written waiver by us
for other use, as in ads or other advertising use not reproduced by us. Customers who wish
to own artwork outright can discuss buying all exclusive art rights from us.
- Color Matching imprint colors
is a $14.00 per color match charge for wearables. PMS color matching for
other products will vary. You can submit a PMS color number or submit a
color chip if not sure of the PMS number. Please keep in mind that when we will do our
best to match the imprint color you have in mind but cannot guarantee exact color matches.
First off PMS color are a offset printing ink match and not a silk screen ink match but we
do have a computer program that helps us convert PMS colors to mixing silk screen colors.
To see our PMS color chart click here.
Be sure that artwork is
black & white and
not in color as shown below. Color is only useable if we are doing a
digital print process, for silk screen printing we need black & white art.
 +
 = 
Blue Separation
Red Separation
Finished 2
color Job design
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