What is RGB / CYMK
Vector or Bitmap?
Properly prepared digit artwork.
Search engine listing
Dad ...
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What does a graphic designer do?
Decorate? Knows a little
about graphic software? Is related to the client? I mention a little
about this on the home page, a graphic designer has to understand a
number of things concerning any given project. Layout, color, the
particular media used and the point of the project are among those
critical elements for an effective piece. A pleasing/appropriate
appearance is important, but so too is the construction. It is
important to get the point across, clearly within the parameters of
the given media. And, if it doesn't have a reason to be there, it
doesn't belong there, no clutter. It's like a messy desk, everything
might be there, but it shouldn't take a lot of rummaging around to
find.
RGB is red - green - blue,
it's what you are looking at right now. It's computer monitor, TV, a
fancy colored light bulb. If you take a digital picture or scan an
image, it's RGB, that's the technology. Most laser and inkjet
printers do a good job printing RGB images, but if an image is going
to be used in a newspaper, magazine, or anything printed by a print
shop, it has to be converted to a CYMK image. CYMK is cyan - magenta
- yellow - black. The reason being, color separation for print.
Software will convert RGB to CYMK, but it requires color correction,
it's not as simple as just a click.
RGB encompasses about 16.8 million
colors, CYMK just about 250,000. Even though 250,000 seems like a lot, it's just
a fraction of that 16.8 million. When the conversion from RGB to CYMK takes
place lots of things can get funky. Color correction fixes this, although it is
horse-trading, doing the best you can.
Again, this is best done by someone
who knows how to do it, otherwise you will have to pay for something that
doesn't look like it should. What you see on your monitor can be radically
different from what comes out on paper! Monitors can be set up to give a pretty
good representation of CYMK, but they can not at present be "right on".
Light on screen and ink on paper may seem the same, but alas, they aren't.
Vector is made up of
points in space connected by lines, literally line artwork, scalable
up and down with no loss of clarity. This type of artwork is
necessary for any process that involves cutting, i.e. signs, but is
common to clip art and higher end graphics programs. Vector images
can be taken apart.
Bitmaps are made up of pixels. Your
digital camera takes bitmaps. Your scanner makes bitmaps. Bitmaps are basically
photographs, they are images made up of pixels - little
squares of color. Bitmaps don't scale as well, and when their resolution is bad
you have "jaggies". Bitmaps don't come apart, they can be masked, cut and
pasted, but are more difficult to take apart and manipulate. They make for
bigger files depending on resolution, resolution doesn't apply to vector images.
An EPS or PDF file can contain either
or both vector and bitmap elements. These file types are commonly used; EPS =
Encapsulated Post Script, PDF = Portable Document Format or Adobe Acrobat. These
formats offer fairly universal compatibility with most graphic oriented
businesses.
You have your artwork, you
are sending it somewhere to be rendered into a brochure, sign, book
- whatever. You are building a web site, you want your viewers to be
able to use it. Software gives anyone the ability to put these
things together, but it's not as simple as software. There are many
elements to set up properly to work on the other end, not everybody
has the same things on their computer like fonts or correct monitor
calibration.
Color, wonderful, but a can of worms
if you don't know what you are doing. CYMK is unforgiving and RGB can even
produce some unpleasant results.
Experience pays for itself here.
Having a web page/site is
like being in the white pages of the phone book. If people know who
you are they can find you. But if they don't know your name you need
to be listed in the yellow pages under a heading, i.e. graphic
design. When you type a keyword into a search engine like Google, it
looks for that keyword or phrase in web sites. If you type in
"restaurant" you get a gazillion listings. You need to be a bit more
specific. On the site end, you need to have appropriate keywords in
the HTML heading and on your home and other pages. In addition, you
need to list with the search engines. This involves going to those
engine's site and finding the "add a URL" link and filling out a
form about the your site. But, it's not always as easy as that and
sometimes there is a fee. Listing programs are available but
generally are ineffective. In addition, some things done on a site
can get it BANNED.
You can do this yourself or have it
done professionally, which can more than pay for itself. The search engines
change the rules constantly to thwart spammers, professionals keep (or try to)
with these changes and give you a good shot at being in the top 10.
We finished washing the plane, can we go play now?
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