I need some help with printing these UGC covers (did it wrong at Office Max)

[cojack16]

I had a Sega Genesis cover printed out and it turned out to be far too big. The dimensions are 3366 x 2100 for the image and I had it printed out at Office Max using regular non glossy legal sized paper. This is what happened. It's too wide and too tall to possibly fit in the UGC even if I trim the borders.



Can someone help me with what I'm doing wrong and what I need to tell them? This is for a UGC.

Also, is it okay to use matte paper (matte is the term for regular non glossy paper right?) and not semi glossy/glossy paper (will it hold up or be too thin?). I'm confused about whether matte and regular paper are the same thing or different. They said they only had legal sized paper that was of regular texture (like you typically would use for college papers). Should I go somewhere else that has better quality for these covers or will that do?

[AxelSteelBMX]

Looks like it got printed to stretch to fit the paper's dimensions. You need to specify to them that you need it printed at a 1:1 scale (provided the dimensions of the image itself are correct) or it won't come out right.

Also, as far as paper goes, the covers will last longer with higher-quality paper. If you're on a budget like me, you can just print with standard paper and it seems to come out fine, since the UGCs give the cover inserts a glossy look anyway. Being on a budget, I print at home at highest quality on standard 11" x 17" paper and cut out the cover. This works out fine for me, but I also need to let my covers dry out a certain way so that I don't end up with "bubbly" covers inside my UGCs. Higher-quality paper doesn't have this problem.

The cover insert Wiggy sent me with my EB0 order is NICE paper. If cost isn't really an issue, ask him what to use.

[Hoggs17]

i printed it on the 11x14 (i believe) cardstock, matte at office max.  turned out perfect for me.

[Arseen]

Yes matte is normal paper.

Check the image to make sure DPI is 300.
If DPI is 96 (which sometimes happens) you'll need to print at 32% scale.

Also make sure that fit to page is off, centering on on both horizontal and vertical, paper orientation is set to landsscape (or turn the image 90 degrees prior to printing) and borders are set to minimum, and you use A4 or Legal size paper or bigger. If DPI is correct set scaling to 100% if DPI is 96 then set scaling to 32%.


Or buy home printer.

[cojack16]

The DPI on my images is 300, thanks for helping me check that.

Axel, What do you mean by "bubbly" covers? How do you let them dry out a "certain way"?

I'm just wondering if matte legal sized paper will hold up with all the colors printed on it.

Am I supposed to specify that I need a laser jet/inkjet printer? I don't know what exactly they used here.

Also, my UGC's were bought recently. I heard older UGC's were bigger and the newer ones (like mine) are a bit smaller? How does that come into play when printing these covers and making em fit? Sorry about all of my questions!

[Arseen]

Inkjet is better than laser usually on images.
If the paper is thin enough. Normal paper is thick enough. Or if it's not they have used too think one, don't accept the prints.

difference in old and new UGCs is small, just try and if the cover doesn't fit right trim minimally until perfect.

[AxelSteelBMX]

Axel, What do you mean by "bubbly" covers? How do you let them dry out a "certain way"?

I mean when you print something that uses a ton of ink and the paper, like, wrinkles up. A guy on another website I found describes it better: "The moist, printed part of the paper is shrinking a bit, but the dry part is not. The strain at the intersection causes some buckling."

To avoid this from causing damage to the print to the point where I can't use it, I remove it from the printer immediately and hold the paper by its opposite ends horizontally in front of a rotary fan, the back side of the paper facing the fan and the fan on high. I give the paper enough slack so that it billows towards me like a sail. This is usually strong enough to blow against the "bubbled" portions of the image and flatten them out while drying, but in some cases I have to flatten the bubbly portions by hand before it's done drying. It's a very "hands-on" sort of process, but it's the only process I have. I don't know if I described this well enough. *shrug*

[cojack16]

Okay so I appreciate everyone's advice since it's helped me get a better understanding of what I need and have to do.

That said, I ran into a snag at Office Depot. On my first attempt, as I said earlier, we used matte legal paper and the image turned out to be too big. After cutting it out, it was far too large to fit in my UGC. I assume this happened because it was printed with fit to paper on (scale to media?).

When I went back tonight, I mentioned this to the guy and he made some changes. We made sure the orientation is landscape. I checked to make sure the horizontal/vertical resolution of the image is 300dpi. I believe it was centered both horizontally and vertically. I wasn't sure about how to have borders being set to minimum though.

What happened was this (see below).



This is what the print-out looked like after the white around it was trimmed out (It was not trimmed too much, that is what it was printed out like). As you can see, it looks like the image is cropped too much, especially at the top and bottom. I don't know what the specific problem is and maybe someone can help me figure that out? What were we doing wrong tonight?

[Arseen]

Looks like the image was cropped before printing?

[AxelSteelBMX]

That looks like an issue with the printing borders, but the size seems closer to what it's supposed to be. If they can't figure out how to make the borders an absolute minimum (should be a sliver of white on the top and bottom, if at all), then you might need to have them do it on Tabloid-size paper (11" x 17") just to ensure you get the whole image.

Out of curiosity, how does that fit in a UGC? Mind giving us another picture of it in a UGC?

EDIT: I don't see a reason that this shouldn't work, so it seems like a problem on OfficeMax's end. Even with the borders set to ~1/4", there should be enough paper space to print the full cover. I don't get it.

[cojack16]

That's what it looks like. I guess it was a border problem. Is that what everyone thinks? Where do I fix border problems/what do the options look like? I might try to find another printing place and bring it there to see if they can do a better job. Maybe they'd be better suited to knowing what to do.

Out of curiousity, are mom and pop printing jobs better than big chains (office depot, staples) money wise? I'm trying to find out how to save money since they quoted me 59 cents per cover on legal sized matte paper.

[Arseen]

I don't think it's border problem.

If it was it would try to print on 2 different papers instead of just cutting from top and bottom.
Or it would autoshrink the picture.

Money wise best option is cheap inkjet printer, price would be about 10 cents per page includiong paper.

[cojack16]

What could the problem be then? It looks like horizontally the image is fine but vertically it's cropped way too much. I don't get the full image. Maybe taking it somewhere else will help since they might know what to do?

So if I use a cheap inkjet printer, wouldn't the image itself look worse (thus offsetting the great 10 cent price per page)? I could live with 59 cents but it seems odd since it's not even glossy paper.

[Arseen]

What could the problem be then? It looks like horizontally the image is fine but vertically it's cropped way too much. I don't get the full image. Maybe taking it somewhere else will help since they might know what to do?

So if I use a cheap inkjet printer, wouldn't the image itself look worse (thus offsetting the great 10 cent price per page)? I could live with 59 cents but it seems odd since it's not even glossy paper.

Only thing I can think is that while you did not notice he cropped the image.
You might get better results at different place, it all boils down to how good the clerk is.

And I use cheap canon inkjet printer and my covers look really good, way better than the quality of that sonic print.
Actually the quality is about as good as actual NES box, only the paper I use is thinner.

It more down to the paper used than the printer.

But I'm almost certain that you can get that print quality (of that sonic 2) at home, as that looks pretty crappy.

[cojack16]

I don't know. Maybe the sonic 2 print isn't awesome but the altered beast and sonic and knuckles prints looked great to me. The pictures were all taken in pretty bad lighting. I think it looked bad because of the image I was using, not the printer quality.

I'd have to buy a color printer in order to do them myself at home. My mother actually had an epson 1400 color printer but it broke and can't be fixed (too costly, quoted as $300 to fix it). What kind of printer would you guys suggest I get for this purpose if I did want to get one?