They’re printed on that standard paper, using standard process inks, just like every other card you’ve seen lately.

The text is lackluster, the result of software defaults.

The logo doesn’t look quite right, and it’s lost in the cluttered layout.

Worst of all, there’s no memorable message or emotional appeal to the reader. I mean, now that I’ve seen your card, why should I care?

If there’s any seven square inches of real estate that deserves your attention it’s your business card. So frequently it’s the first and only impression of your company in print.

Of course, every aspect of your business marketing deserves your attention. Customers and prospects do notice these kinds of details, if only subliminally. Be it your business card, your website, or the just the impersonal voice mail message that greets your callers.

Is it possible to capture your unique genius, your reason for being in a business card? Absolutely! Take the time to really think this through, and you’ll be amply rewarded.

Take a look at a few of these cards. Some are truly remarkable. And please share your favorite card idea with us; I can’t wait to see where your creativity takes you!

Just spending a few hours in my office cleaning up the remaining tasks for 2009. The last decade has been a wild ride, to be sure. Hope it’s ending on a positive note for you, as it did for us.

To each of my friends, colleagues and customers best wishes for a very Happy New Decade!

I just had a phone conversation with a prospective customer during which I tried to explain the various methods and of binding a book. It’s tough to do that over the phone. So Stephanie, this post is for you!

Saddle Stitch

This method is fast and cost effective, especially when your making more than just a few books. Saddle stitched books are printed on large sheets, then folded in half before stiching. The “stitches” are much like staples, except that they’re extruded from a long coil of wire. It’s tough to stitch through more than about 50 sheets or so, thus you are limited to a 200 page folded booklet.

Perfect Bind

This method is great for thicker books, where stapling or saddle stitching can’t get the job done. It’s elegant and professional. It can be pricey for smaller runs. Not suitable for very thin books. In this method you’re using a glue to cement the text pages into the cover. Phone books and paperback novels are bound using this method.

Coil Binding
This is great for small quantities of books, and it enables pages to lie flat when opened. Coils come in various sizes, so you can bind very thin books, up to 150-200 sheets or more. This process is time consuming and labor intensive, so it can get a bit pricey.

This is by no means an exhaustive list. Many binding methods are available to fit your specific needs. Speak with your print professional to help you sort out the choices.

A word of thanks to everyone who participated at the recent Adobe PDF workshop at Copies&Ink. It certainly was a busy, informative session. Rave reviews abounded from everyone.

Kelly has once again shared her personal list of links and free resources. Here they are, for those who attended, and those who couldn’t. Enjoy!

Adobe Resource Guide

by Kelly McCathran

Adobe Groups
The group I mentioned at your event is Creative Suite Lovers, look for the white CS4 logo
http://groups.adobe.com

Kelly’s Extra Handouts
http://public.me.com/kmccathran

Adobe TV – Creative Suite 4 Demos
Cool videos on how to do almost anything in the Creative Suite
tv.adobe.com/

Creative Suite 4 Info
Suite breakdowns & Upgrade pricing
www.adobe.com/products/creativesuite/

Adobe Design Center
Step-by-Step Lessons, Guides and Tutorials for CS2 & CS3 also access to User Forums & Feature Requests
adobe.com/designcenter/

Adobe Design Center Video Workshop
Flash Movies on all Creative Suite 3 Products and many new features
adobe.com/designcenter/video_workshop

Adobe Print Resource Center
Transparency guides and PDF Print Production Information and a wealth of print related resources
adobe.com/go/print

Adobe Events
Find Adobe Certified Trainers and Training Centers in your area, on-demand and live eClasses as well as road show events
www.adobe.com/events

Adobe Education
Educational resources for K-12 and higher education, free curriculum and more
www.adobe.com/education

Still, plenty of folks like the richness of Pantone colors, and I’m among them. Ever try building 8 point serif text out of a process mix? Can’t get just the shade you need using the CMYK tables? Then Pantone colors will generally do the trick.

That said, using the standard four inks can at times bring great economy to an otherwise pricey project. For jobs like that, use a color bridge chart color bridge chart to match your color.

It’s not a perfect solution, and in some cases the process equivalent of Pantone ink can look downright nasty. I keep a comparison chart at our front counter, in case you’d like to take a look.

I looked it up; the actual saying is “The Proof of the Pudding is in the Eating.” You’ll quickly be cooking up some tasty PDFs with the help of Adobe’s ace presenter/trainer, Kelly McCathran. Those that attended her last program at Copies&Ink were riveted by her wealth of knowledge and clarity of presentation.

Register on our events page.

Please join us on the morning of Friday October 16, 2009. Admission is free for up to 4 attendees from every company. AAF-Inland Empire members should sign up through the AAF website. Space is limited, so please register as soon as possible. Your registration will be confirmed by e-mail.

Adobe Perfect PDF Event: Friday, October 16
Sign in: 8:30 – 8:55 a.m. • Program: 9:00 – Noon. Coffee, tea and light refreshments will be served.
Program and Free Raffle (a full copy of Adobe CS4, $1300 value) will conclude before noon.
Register on our events page.

Event Description:

Adobe® Acrobat®  is the de facto standard for distributing documents in today’s electronic workflow. Anyone who purchased Acrobat, or one of the variety of shareware and freeware programs to build a PDF can make a PDF file, but that doesn’t mean they are making a PDF that displays and prints well on all computer platforms. In this seminar we will cover the best practices for building reliable, complete and consistent PDF documents that work on any platform.
 
Creating PDF Files Anyone Can Open and Print
Preventing Common File Problems
Document Properties
Checking Font Embed Status
PDF/X – Why Does This Matter
Where and When to Flatten Transparency
Customizing Adobe PDF Output Quality
Building a Preflight Profile
Performing Single Fixups
Converting Color
Adding or Removing Crop Marks
Modifying PDF Files
The Best Distiller Settings

Our speaker:

Kelly McCathran is the Service Provider Evangelist for Adobe, her mission is to maintain relationships with the top print shops in North America. To fulfill that roll, she is the primary contact for printers to get the support, training and information they need to successfully work with Adobe’s line of products. In addition Kelly is a Certified Technical Trainer and an Adobe Certified Expert in InDesign, Photoshop, Illustrator, Acrobat, GoLive and PageMaker. Kelly has traveled North America and abroad teaching applications to the largest print shops in the world.

Ever since Photoshop became a verb, a tacit expectation rose that (regardless of your background, training, interests, job title or schedule) you should have a working knowledge of most all current graphics software. Still using Corel Draw? Good heavens, you’re a relic! Not sure if you own Adobe Acrobat or Adobe InDesign? What, were you born in a barn?

Now Hiring: We’re looking for a few good clients who don’t Photoshop and are proud of it! The ideal candidates don’t have a mind cluttered by the minutia of application menus, operating systems and process color separation. Instead, they can clearly articulate project goals and objectives in a comprehensive yet concise manner. They haven’t spent the last two weeks trying to strangle an electronic document into submission, and hence there’s plenty of time for someone else to produce the project in question from scratch if necessary.

If you’re great at creating electronic documents and images, our prepress department is most thankful for that. Still, all too often I feel the pain of my customer who is under tremendous pressure to produce work that is far outside of his/her skill set on a schedule that an expert graphic artist would be hard pressed to match.

If I’m wandering here, perhaps I should get to the point: spend your valuable time doing the brainwork. Have a clear marketing plan in place. Succinctly define your objectives in writing and then rent the best graphic design specialist you can afford for a few hours. It just might be the best investment you’ve made all year!

Perhaps you’re old enough to remember video of John Cameron Swayze delivering the iconic Timex slogan: Takes a Licking and Keeps on Ticking. Fans of the recent TV series Mad Men were recently reminded of the classic Think Small print ad campaign for Volkswagen. Both ads were conceived and penned by the legendary copywriter Julian Koenig.

Seems like great copywriting is largely a lost art. A recent blog post by from a well known e-mail marketing company posited that “e-mail copy that sells” must include benefits, subheads, short blocks of conversational copy, a well crafted subject line, etc. All of these elements refer to form, and little falls to content. There’s nothing about reaching out to the reader with a single coherent message. Nothing about capturing the readers’ imagination. Nothing about ideas that are compelling and memorable.

And then there’s the disturbing adulation of psychological trickery in web marketing content as well as the ascent of highly paid Google AdWords strategists. All of this seems to nicely coincide with the collapse of our economic system. It’s like the dot com bubble all over again, this time accompanied by credit default swaps and insanely over-leveraged financial institutions. Lack of substance might be the appropriate words to sum things up.

In the good ol’ days, marketers were gifted writers who worked in a commercial setting. Though these writers of short sentences weren’t revered by their peers, today one can find much to appreciate in their work. A fascinating account of the advertising world, including a contemporary interview of Mr. Koenig can be heard on a recent installment of This American Life.

Today’s e-conomy can be looked at as a house of cards. Much is free or cheap on the internet, and the temptation to do-it yourself is the order of the day. The problem is that talented graphic designers, skilled commercial artists and great copywriters (for that matter all stripes of writers) need to eat too. Ironically, their talents are needed now more than ever.

Over a decade ago typographer and graphic designer Kathleen Tinkel wrote:

Armed with our Macs, we presumed to compete with our creative partners (typographers, illustrators, airbrush artists, retouchers and more), helping to put some trades out of business. But the computer isn’t as capable as a talented artist or skilled artisan, so we traded quality for glitzy tricks and techniques, and turned ourselves into high-tech production artists in the process… Our clients…believed the ads that said they could dispense with expensive designers, and instead began to buy their own Macs and WYSIWYG software… Is graphic design dead?

Personally, I’m prone to agree with Monty Python and wheel out the discipline of graphic design on a cart. This opinion is based on countless experiences over the last decade, as well as the dearth of thoughtful, well designed print in all but a small minority of examples currently in circulation.

One such experience was the recent phone inquiry from a new customer excited at the prospect of fancy color business cards now within her $50 budget. When advised that she’d need to supply a ready to print PDF or application file, there was a moment’s hesitation. “It’s just a logo, a line and a little bit of text. Isn’t there any way I can get around paying someone to set that up?”

All too typical.

After some thought, it occurred to me that today many a person would easily shell out $75 to get his/her car washed and waxed but never even consider a similar amount paid to a graphic designer to create a vibrant design which could and should last for years to come. Design is dead, because today all too few marketers see its inherent value.

Yes, creating your own home-brew design on a PC or Mac can be an immersive experience. Hours fly by, and we become increasingly attached to our creation with each passing minute. Regardless of its merit.

Herein lies your opportunity: Invest in good design. With so many routine layouts in circulation these days, your own professionally designed presentation will likely jump off the page and grab your customers’ attention.

And, also you’ll have time to use your computer for something that’s fun.