Following on from my last blog, I hope these free handy guides are of value to you!
Today we’re looking at design files which every business should have!
As a business owner knowing the difference between a .PDF and .PNG file format might not be on the top of your priorities, but sending the wrong the file format to your printer or designer will have a huge effect on the quality and presentation of your marketing materials.
We hope to save you some time and money by detailing the most essential print file formats you will typically need to get going.
Let’s start with the most basic of examples, your business logo.
You should have your logo in the following vector and bitmap formats. If you don’t, contact your designer or get in touch with us, we’ll help you create the right file formats for your business needs.
PDF (Portable Document Format) – This is the most preferred file format for almost any printing you can imagine, the reason for this is a .pdf file is a vector file, meaning that if you scale the size of file up or down it won’t lose any fidelity. This is a perfect format as it will always print the way it was intended without any pixelation or distortion.
EPS (Encapsulated PostScript) – The .eps files are the next best file format to supply to your printers. Like the .pdf file format, an .eps is a vector file, perfect for large printing such as billboards or banners. These file formats are typically created and edited on industry standard illustration software like Adobe Illustrator.
Next up are the bitmap file formats, these are just as important as the the above formats but typically have more uses for website applications.
JPG / JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) – Probably the best know file type for images and pictures. .jpg files are often used to reduce the quality of an image to minimise the file size for speedy loading on the internet or email. .jpg files use lossy compression, this means that some of the image date is lost and can never be recovered.
GIF (Graphics Interchange Format) – .gif files were once the most popular format on the internet, but over the years that have become more popular for quick slideshow-like images. .gif uses lossless compression meaning they can output much higher quality but are restricted to 256 colours.
PNG (Portable Network Graphics) – .png files were created as a powerful alternative to the traditional .gif format, they offer the same great output quality but are not restricted to 256 colours. Ontop if this, they can be created to have transparent backgrounds giving greater flexibility for the image use.