Designing for Digital Printing

While the digital print process has improved significantly
over the past few years, it is a different process than conventional
lithography and different rules apply when designing a project to print
digitally. Some things you should consider when preparing your project for
digital printing:

Cracking

All digital print processes involve heat to cure the inks or
toners. The heat applied to the sheet will cause it to dry more than the litho
process. Therefore dark solids over folds on heavier stocks are more prone to
cracking on the spine than with litho.

Resolution

Most digital machines will print from non-postscript
applications and are more forgiving with lower resolution images than
high-resolution litho plate-making equipment. So if your photo is not quite
300DPI it may reproduce fine.

Large solids

The digital process uses heat rollers to set the sheet and
can sometimes cause a slight streaking or latent type streak. Large solids in
dark blues or blacks can lend themselves to streaking in some cases.

Backup position

The backup position from one side of the sheet to the other
can only be guaranteed to one millimeter, and therefore crossovers in small
booklets are difficult to keep accurate.