Designing Your Own Zed Card
Building your own Zed card takes time, and specific skills.
To create a high quality Zed card layout, you -the designer, must have proficient skills in one of the following programs: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign or Quark Express.
If you are not familiar with these programs, it is best that you leave the designing to a professional.
If you do have the skills and the programs, then read on for advice on designing your own Zed.
The first thing you must know is that you need digital images to design your Zed.
If you don't already have digital images, then you are going to have to digitize your film or prints.
Assuming that your images were taken with film, you will want to take your negatives to a photo lab and have them put them on a disk.
Most photo labs should be able to do this for $5 - $10 per image if not less.
Some labs may require that you either print your images first, or put your images on slides before they can put them on disk.
Make sure that when they have your pictures printed they are large enough to retain the highest quality.
Once all of your images are digitized, you need to check for quality.
Your images should be at least 300 dpi (dots per inch) at the actual print size.
For instance, the image that is going to be on the front of an 8 1/2" x 5 1/2" Zed card should be at least 300 dpi at 8 1/2" x 5 1/2.
" Any size larger than this is fine, but you do not want your images to be smaller, as that will result in reduced printing quality.
You should end up with a relatively large file - if the image is a JPEG (.
jpg) file then it should be anywhere from 1 - 4 MBs.
Tiff (.
tif) files are much larger - they can be anywhere from 15 - 75 MB per image.
After you have checked for quality, you will want to make any color corrections and photo touch such as bags under the eyes, stains on clothing etc.
Do this before you resize the image.
(This is where all of the headaches come in and the professionals take over.
) Keep in mind most monitors are not calibrated to the printer they will print from, so the colors you see on your computer are not necessarily the colors that will print.
This can be fixed but it requires software and hardware that can cost hundreds and even thousands of dollars.
Once you have completed all of your image touch-ups, you will resize the images appropriately and then insert them into your layout.
To build a layout, you will want to use a program like QUARK, Adobe InDesign or Adobe Photoshop.
Be sure to build the layout the actual print size you desire at 300 dpi.
Once you have this file as you would like it save it and send it on.
If you used Quark the file will save as a .
qxd.
If you used InDesign the file will save as a .
ids.
If you used Photoshop you can save this file as a high quality (12) large .
jpg, a .
tif, a .
psd, or a .
pdf.
Talk to your printer to see what other formats they accept.
That's it.
You have built your zed card.
Your next step is to sent it to your composite card printer and they will do the rest.
Do not try to print these at home because chances are your printer cant print on 12 point stock, and the cost of ink for a home printer is way to expensive.
Make sure you send it off.
To create a high quality Zed card layout, you -the designer, must have proficient skills in one of the following programs: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign or Quark Express.
If you are not familiar with these programs, it is best that you leave the designing to a professional.
If you do have the skills and the programs, then read on for advice on designing your own Zed.
The first thing you must know is that you need digital images to design your Zed.
If you don't already have digital images, then you are going to have to digitize your film or prints.
Assuming that your images were taken with film, you will want to take your negatives to a photo lab and have them put them on a disk.
Most photo labs should be able to do this for $5 - $10 per image if not less.
Some labs may require that you either print your images first, or put your images on slides before they can put them on disk.
Make sure that when they have your pictures printed they are large enough to retain the highest quality.
Once all of your images are digitized, you need to check for quality.
Your images should be at least 300 dpi (dots per inch) at the actual print size.
For instance, the image that is going to be on the front of an 8 1/2" x 5 1/2" Zed card should be at least 300 dpi at 8 1/2" x 5 1/2.
" Any size larger than this is fine, but you do not want your images to be smaller, as that will result in reduced printing quality.
You should end up with a relatively large file - if the image is a JPEG (.
jpg) file then it should be anywhere from 1 - 4 MBs.
Tiff (.
tif) files are much larger - they can be anywhere from 15 - 75 MB per image.
After you have checked for quality, you will want to make any color corrections and photo touch such as bags under the eyes, stains on clothing etc.
Do this before you resize the image.
(This is where all of the headaches come in and the professionals take over.
) Keep in mind most monitors are not calibrated to the printer they will print from, so the colors you see on your computer are not necessarily the colors that will print.
This can be fixed but it requires software and hardware that can cost hundreds and even thousands of dollars.
Once you have completed all of your image touch-ups, you will resize the images appropriately and then insert them into your layout.
To build a layout, you will want to use a program like QUARK, Adobe InDesign or Adobe Photoshop.
Be sure to build the layout the actual print size you desire at 300 dpi.
Once you have this file as you would like it save it and send it on.
If you used Quark the file will save as a .
qxd.
If you used InDesign the file will save as a .
ids.
If you used Photoshop you can save this file as a high quality (12) large .
jpg, a .
tif, a .
psd, or a .
pdf.
Talk to your printer to see what other formats they accept.
That's it.
You have built your zed card.
Your next step is to sent it to your composite card printer and they will do the rest.
Do not try to print these at home because chances are your printer cant print on 12 point stock, and the cost of ink for a home printer is way to expensive.
Make sure you send it off.
Source...