Putting Graphics On Big Vinyl Banners

2007-10-24 Word Count: 590 Category: Marketing

Adding full color photos and illustrations to large vinyl banners will give your banner designs with greater impact and a much more professional appearance. Putting a full color photograph on your display banner is most often the easiest way to do this.
When you want to add a photo or graphic image to a large banner design, try to keep a number of things in mind. In order to look crisp and clear it must have the most appropriate resolution. For most large display projects such as popup displays, vinyl banners, window graphics and graphic backdrops, try to keep resolution at about 100 ppi (pixels per inch) at full size.
In other words if you have an image that is 8" x 10" with a resplution of 300 ppi - a standard resolution used for offset printing - then this image can be blown up to roughly 24" x 30". That will give you a finished resolution of 100 ppi. In fact you can often use as low as 50 ppi and still be quite satisfied with the output, because these displays are normally meant to be viewed from at least 10 feet away.
Second, you should almost always brighten up the colors of your vinyl banner images. You can usually do this by increasing the contrast. If you use Photoshop the most effective way to do this is by "pinching" the levels controls. Open the levels window and pull the shadows (dark shades) control towards the middle (to the right). Then pull the highlights control to the left. This will brighten your light colors and darken your dark colors while eliminating some of the "mudiness" of the mid tones.
"Sharpening" your images will also make them look brighter. Punch up your images with a bit of sharpening and they will almost always appear crisper with greater impact. But don't sharpen them too much.
Finally, it is best to work in CMYK mode instead of RGB. Vinyl banners are just about always printed on CMYK printing machines with solvent inks. If you send RGB images to the printer you are counting on your printer to convert them to CMYK. This is often not as reliable as converting them yourself before sending the images down to the printer. RGB can be somewhat misleading since it can display more colors than can be printed by CMYK.
What that means is that there are colors you can see on a computer monitor that you simply cannot reproduce with CMYK inks especially not with solvent based inks on a medium such as vinyl. You are best to know this before you get the printing done. If it is important to create a specific color and if you have time a proof can be printed on the actual vinyl banner material to give you a clear picture of how the finished product will look.
Another important point to realized is that the choice of ink will have an impact on the quality of the job. Outdoor projects should be printed with true solvent inks because they are best for full color printing intended for use in bright sunlight or other harsh weather conditions such as rain or snow.
Unlike water-based inks, solvent inks resist fading due to UV exposure, and stand up to wind and rain much better. Non solvent inks will fade much more quickly in bright sunlight. Even for projects intended for indoor use it is often better to use solvent-based inks because they produce a much more durable finished product.

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For more advice on producing graphics for trade shows (www.trade-show-tips.com) and displays contact the display printing experts (www.tradeshow-display-experts.com) at TradeShow-Display-Experts.com