TIPS Archives - Page 3 of 3 - Design Bytes

August 28, 2019

How to get your packaging printed in China | 9 insights for Designers, Entrepreneurs & Startups

How to get your packaging printed in China in simple steps. This topic covers how to get your packaging printed in China from the concept to sending your design to a Chinese factory and getting printed proofs!

This post has been written based on past experience, in working with factories from overseas. My packaging design and artwork has featured on boxes in the UK and across the globe. If you would like to see some more samples of my packaging feel free to have a look!

Getting your packaging made in China — Getting your idea made!

General information about this post :

– The pitfalls
– What to expect when working with the factories.
– The typical stages
– Other details experiences

This article discusses my professional experience in getting packaging artwork printed with Chinese suppliers – all experience told from a design perspective.

I hope that this post will help you make an informed decision and how to go about getting the results you want from your suppliers.

You can get your artwork printed in China from a reputable factory or supplier. The challenge is finding a reputable factory and supplier and when you can’t speak the language, it can be difficult.

1 ) How to get your packaging made for your product (Chinese Factory)

If you are a business, an entrepreneur or someone looking to get a product manufactured for the retail market you will need packaging for your product, unless you are intending to sell only online using brown boxes. If you would like to read or see some of my eCommerce design you can view it here.

To be taken seriously, you will need to have professional packaging made.

Working with Chinese suppliers can be a great cost saving measure but you will need make sure you select the right one.

2 ) Why do companies get packaging for their products manufactured in China?

There are many reasons for a why a company may want to get a product or a piece of the packaging made in China if you are from a western country such as the USA or United Kingdom.

By far most common reason for getting products manufactured in China is to save money on production, printing or manufacturing fees. From a business perspective, this is great news – but it isn’t always as ideal or as cheap as it actually sounds. If you pick the wrong supplier it can cost you time and money and can even lead to trouble further down the line.

3 ) How to supply your packaging design to a Chinese factory

This isn’t as tricky as it sounds from the designers’ perspective but be prepared to teach the factory how to suck eggs. DO NOT Assume they will understand what you want. And DO NOT assume that things will be created ‘as is’, on occasions factories may ‘help’ and tinker with your work without your consent.

Stay vigilant on the process

Very vigilant…

Frustrated Designer… Frustrated factory, Frustrated business… etc

When you create a design you will need to annotate and make it as clear to follow as possible, be it using spot UV or any extra features this will need to be told in FULL.

I would also strongly advise on sending rough mock ups or drawings to help communicate what it is you are setting out to achieve. Visuals often make one of the best lines of communication when having your sample made with a Chinese supplier or factory.

Getting angry at the factory won’t accomplish anything.

It won’t fix the problem.

And it wont make you wealthier and it wont speed up the process. The ball is in your court in the end and it just needs to be right.

Send them visuals and explain EVERYTHING.

4 ) How to find a Chinese packaging a supplier

There are hundreds, possibly 1000’s of businesses online that are looking to print your packaging in China alone. You could go onto a website such as Alibaba to find a supplier or through Linkedin.

I still hear from suppliers coming through my Linkedin account.

By the far, the most effective (not cheapest) way is by hiring or contracting someone to work as a middleman or woman to work between you and the suppliers.

Communication is key in getting your design correct otherwise you will get something you didn’t want from the factories.

I would argue that getting a good supplier from one of the factories should be a top priority. A bad supplier will result in bad results – funnily enough!

Here are some key points when finding a factory or supplier to work with:

– *Find someone you can trust*
– Work with a factory that offers a quality service
– Get as much written down in the beginning as possible
– *Try to get prototypes or samples from factory supplier before mass production.

5 ) What to expect when having your packaging or product made in China

It all comes down to your supplier, communication and how you supply the artwork. It’s best to have everything ‘exactly’ as is when supplying artwork to factory and also be prepared for a bit of randomness when it comes to how they may produce the work.

Be vigilant and make sure to get ‘proofs’ from the factory.

I have written a couple of quick steps for you to follow when producing your packing:

– Find a reputable supplier, if you have somebody that is fluent in Chinese this can help tremendously

– See if you can get proofs or past evidence of packaging and material samples. What they sometimes say you will get and what you actually get is not uncommon in my experience.

– Getting digital proofs of your artwork through photos, and flat-screen image is a must.

– Delays can happen due to miscommunication from either or both parties.

– Don’t let the factories take the initiative.

– The factories are generally better at giving you want you want if you send a 3D mock up or illustration.

– They are often very good at the cardboard engineering stage but not so much on the creative side.

– The factories can improve as with any working relationship with the more work you send them.

– Weather can affect how and when your packaging may arrive.

– The Chinese factories can damage the packaging during ‘packing’ if they are rushed. Try not to rush them if you can help it.

– When supplying artwork, leave nothing to the imagination.

6 ) How long will it take to see your design once it is printed and shipped from a Chinese factory?

When having packaging printed In China, I have often seen a sample come back within one month, they can be very quick! Occasionally 3 months, depending on the weather, suppliers workload and method of transportation.

7 ) How to get packaging printed in China | The realities

When it is good it’s great and you will generally save money. When it isn’t great, as with some things in life, it can be a complete nightmare!

Working with new suppliers can be the most problematic as neither of you are familiar with working with each other, you don’t know each others strengths, habits, communication etc.

One of my mistakes when working with a new Chinese supplier is ‘assuming’ – assume NOTHING. Below are some assumptions to avoid based on past experience.

– Point 1 – Don’t assume that they know what is in your head.
– Neither should you assume that a single colour should go all the way around the packaging eg – if you leave white bits on the fold … they will print it as is.
– Don’t assume that they will offer the same level of service twice, they may be busy or rushed – or just – won’t offer it for some unknown reason.
– And don’t assume that the factory understands what is to be made when you supply the artwork. You need to make sure what you want is as clear and as transparent as possible – in the end, if you are the designer, or manufacturer, the buck ends with you.

Make it easy and clear, and talk about everything you can. Don’t assume their knowledge.

Get it right you will have a great piece of packaging. Get the communications wrong and you will be in for a whole load of pain.

8) Great reasons for having your work made In China

I feel that I have covered many of the perks scattered through the post but it may be easier to bullet point why it is a good idea to have your packaging and product created in China in a quick to scan list.

– Getting work printed In China or overseas is often cheaper than getting work printed in western countries such as the UK or United States
– There is an abundance of suppliers of products and packaging manufactures on websites such as Alibaba
– It’s easy and quick to get wholesale and bulk quotes for your product
– Using a factory in China will help you save money if you are looking to reduce overheads.

9 ) The ‘challenges’ with getting things printed in China

For its many perks and plus points for getting packaging and products printed in China it also comes with its shortcomings and challenges. I have listed a couple of points below based on first-hand experience and industry observations.

Copyright theft: the factories are notorious for stealing and selling your product ideas as their own. Not every factory is like this, but it is not uncommon. I have witnessed Chinese factories use my previous employer’s artwork and pass onto a competitor. There are other random knock off’s I have stumbled upon ranging from copies of renown books, bad copies of Hollywood films etc.

Stealing Kickstarter’s: I have seen factories steal Kickstarter campaigns and undercut the creators. Worse, the factories release their copy to the retail market before true creators have made it themselves. Sad stories really.

The decrease in quality: This isn’t something that always happens but on occasions, the suppliers I have worked with would do little things like: use less glue, ship scuffed or damaged work, rush on the packaging if you have blisters inside your box etc.

I also think this was a case of reducing expenses and overheads, but that is only my opinion.

As with anything, there are always challenges that can come when producing products. I have also worked with printers in the UK which have ignored specifics such as bleed and just printed it as is. Although one bonus as with most things online, is that you can check reviews

Getting packaging and artwork printed in China

Thank you for reading this post on how to get packaging and artwork printed in China. If you would like to know more about getting your work printed feel free to get in touch or view this post about packaging design

I have over 10 years commercial design experience and over 8.4/5 years working with retail design and producing packing through the Chinese factories.

You may wish to read more on :

How I designed a novelty flash drive product
Packaging Design
Creating a Killer Kickstarter Page
How to have your brand tell a story

July 23, 2019

Speed tips for Photoshop layers!

Speed tips and shortcuts for Photoshop layers!

If like me you need work layers in Photoshop any time saving measure is a bonus. I have a compiled a short list of shortcuts for making the best use of Photoshop’s layers for both the Mac and PC – Enjoy!

(Swap CMD for CTRL on Windows)

Photoshop Layer Icons — Photoshop Layer icons

Change the layer order,
move it up and down :

Cmd+[ Move Down
Cmd+] Move Up
Cmd+Shift+] = to move it to the bottom of the stack
Cmd+Shift+[ = Move it to the top of the stack

Direct select a layer

With move tool selected (V) hold Cmd to highlight the layers directly from the art board. This will also highlight groups.

Duplicate a layer

Ideal for copying a layer! Cmd + J to copy a selected layer! Or you can drag the selected onto the ‘New” icon! OR right click and duplicate – A personal fave.

Colour Coordinated

In addition to organizing you layers into folder and groups, why not colour coordinate the layers so you glance at groups? Brown for dirt, green for sea etc. Right click and select a colour.

New Layer Cmd+Shift + N brings up the new layer dialogue.

Cycle Through Blend Modes

Need to see what a multiply, saturation, or overlay will look like on the fly?

Shift + (Minus or plus, top right of the keyboard)

Layer Opacity
With the layer selected you can quickly change its opacity by pressing >

Shift + (Minus or plus, top right of the keyboard)
Shift + 22, 30, 23 (a number from the top row) typing the number in quick succession will change the layers opacity percentage. Hold shift and then press “22” the layer will be 22% “30” = 30 %.

Very handy for digital painting or retouching.

Group Layers

Select your layers and press Cmd + G to group them together. If you are not grouping your numerous layers… you should start. For sanity’s sake.

The original text for this was created and added to blogger in 2016 (Jimm Odell Blog). This has since been tweaked and added to this blog – the professional blog.

April 2, 2019March 19, 2024

Simple techniques to reduce ‘banding’ ( Posterization ) in Photoshop | Tricks

Simple techniques to reduce ‘banding’ ( Posterization ) in Photoshop ( *updated )

Posterization or ‘banding’ as it is known in Photoshop is a bane to many graphic design professionals or those working in print.

However, ‘banding’ is not limited to just print.

Banding, or posterization can also occur with screen-based imagery but it tends to be more pronounced and commonplace with print-based media in my experience. There is nothing more frustrating than seeing your lush and smooth gradient onscreen only when printed to see the same artwork with segmented bands across your gradient.

Over the years as a professional in-house designer, I have come across banding on more than one occasion. One of the worst culprits for showing banding is when working with greyscale or black. It was a challenge that used to drive me up the wall.

After much trial and error, here is a quick overview of some simple techniques I used to employ to reduce banding in Photoshop.

Some of the simplest techniques to reduce banding or posterization in Photoshop is by either applying ‘noise’ to your brush ( in your brush settings F5 ) or creating a separate ‘noise’ layer and overlaying this on top of a gradient layer to disguise the banding. This will give the illusion of smoother better blended artwork and remove the ‘stepping’ from your gradient. These techniques for handling banding can work especially well when working with mono-colour gradients such as black and white. There are also other tricks I have used in conjunction with this method written below.

“It often took various attempts to get it correct before sending it to print so don’t become too disheartened if your first try isn’t quite on par with what you expect.“

Simple techniques to reduce ‘banding’ | how I handled it

I often ran into banding situations when creating super smooth blends with colour.

It often took various attempts to get it correct before sending it to print so don’t become too disheartened if your first try isn’t quite on par with what you expect.

*Simple tip! If you have a local home printer or high-quality photographic inject printer, use this to test and measure your artwork.

I found these methods I have written below to make a world of difference when it came to creating a prototype or print production. All these methods I have actively used when working in Photoshop.

Some may call these hacks, others tricks but I like to regard them as ‘techniques’ for fixing a problem in print.

You may need to try various levels and settings, brushes and overlays to cure your banding problems. One solution may be enough, but you may wish to employ more than one if you are struggling to get the result you want.

Here is a detailed overview of some of the simple techniques I used to reduce banding.

Simple techniques to reduce 'banding' ( Posterization ) in Photoshop example banding — Look in the top left of the brush, and notice how you can see the steps/rings on the outermost edge? This is much less obvious in the lower part of the black blob where I have switched the noise on. This is an example of where I have used noise! Take note of the speckly grainy edge of the soft-brush. This brush helps the ‘steps blend better!

Simple techniques to reduce ‘banding’ ( Posterization ) in Photoshop – tricks

Simple techniques to reduce 'banding' ( Posterization ) in Photoshop - how to smooth... — Silkly smoote !!

Before jumping in with the simple tricks you can use. Let us start with the basics. Or if you can’t be bothered reading about banding and when it occurs, you can jump straight to the tricks and hacks for dealing with it.

Banding & Posterisation in Photoshop – When it occurs

If you don’t wish to read about when “banding” has occurred for me, feel free to jump to the next section.

The dreaded banding aka Posterization in Photoshop.

Drawing, digital painting, and creating renders in Photoshop have been a core part of my past and present career.

I have seen the issue of ‘banding’ arise over and over again, so have had to find techniques to better deal with it.

This issue rears its ugly head when it comes to working with radial and linear gradients and tones of black and grey inside Adobe Photoshop.

When working with black as part of the colour palette, I have witnessed these scenarios of when banding tends to happen :

When rendering characters like Rufus the rat as ( black and grey ) ( illustrated below )
When trying to gain soft curves of light-darker areas
When light grey curves around to dark grey
It was more common when working with black

The methods above were used on this character – Copyright Satzuma LTD – Rufus Rat.

Trick 1 ) ‘RGB?’

Controversial, I know. But when waging a battle to reduce ‘banding’ in Photoshop, any tool at your disposal can help.

RGB ‘can’ offer a greater degree of flexibility in the beginning when trying to wrestle with artwork to remove banding such as playing with filters or seeing how the art works on screen.

But remember, that once you tinker with filters and have done what you need to do with trying editing your artwork remember to turn your artwork back to CMYK if this for print. CMYK is a common colour format preferred by most UK printers.

Sadly though, CMYK can…
1 ) Offer a more candid look at your colours at the end of the process.
2 ) Make your colours look like a sadder version of RGB.

‘tangent alert’ Using RGB in the early stages is my preferred method for some projects, not all. It depends on the project.

“Isn’t this madness? You won’t see the genuine colours of your artwork!”

Well unless, your screen is calibrated exactly and you’re using pantones, guaranteeing what you see on the screen to print can be tricky anyway. Besides, I work across both mediums of screen and print, hence working with either CMYK or RGB ( digital )

Trick 2 ) Think of the ‘Bits’

I have tested this method in Adobe Photoshop CS5 and CC with similar results from version to version of Adobe Photoshop. There has been some improvement when working to problem-solve banding.

64-bit – 32-bit – 16-Bit RGB to CMYK

The difference has shown to be marginal but still of noteworthy impact when trying to reduce banding in Adobe Photoshop.

Although the steps are unnoticeable between 8-bit, and 16-bit at reducing banding, this can be enough to tame mild banding.

However, at 32-bit, the latter offered tighter rings and hues around the banding and showed to reduce some of the posterization in Photoshop – 32 bit helped the bands to better blend and higher still should only improve upon this further.

Below is a screenshot from the menu option in Photoshop, when with banding.

*Note : Also the colour profile listed below is on an iMac. This is by no means a significant contribution to the final outcome with reducing banding but may be worth noting in case you are reading this as a Windows PC. Although, I am of the opinion that this should make no difference whether on a Mac or PC. But your screen type might.

Beating posterization in Photoshop. — Caption of colour modes

Trick 3 : ‘Ultimate Trick’ – Brush & Noise

Assuming that you are running into this issue whilst using a soft-edged brush tool in Photoshop, I would advise turning the ‘noise’ on under the brush panel ( as shown throughout – press F5 to bring this window up)

With noise ticked in the ‘brush setting window’ this helps in the blending steps with greys as shown below.

Based on my experience, this improved the overall smoothness and graduation of the tones from light to dark regardless of bit mode or any other trick and hack for beating banding. Texture can help with the blending, and noise can help with texture. You can also dabble with the filters if you are using large radials (That would be a different article ).

Example
As you can see below, the black brush at the top has rings that appear like tide marks, (banding). The blend below has far fewer rings as I had the ‘noise’ ticked on my brush. The speckled effect will be less obvious once you take your artwork to print. And shouldn’t look grainy.

But, be mindful not to be overzealous with noise. You may need some trial and error to get the balance right and run some text prints for good measure.

Example of Noise and brush in action

techniques to reduce 'banding' ( Posterization ) in Photoshop example of success.

Trick 4 ) Big to small – experiment with scale

Another trick for tightening banding is by shrinking/scaling down your completed artwork, illustration, or photo.

This works well if you use some of the tricks above to blend and tighten any remaining bands before shrinking your work to hide evidence of banding.

Do this.

When you have applied the ‘noise’ to help blend your artwork, then shrink the image to hide some of the messier details.

This is method not only disguises banding when painting or retouching but also gives the appearance of tighter line work and detail in both photography and illustration. This is a principle I have adapted since being taught this trick in college.

In principle, all you need to do is the following.

Start with your artwork at 100%, and then scale the artwork down to 75%.

If you intend to use this technique, do remember to factor this into the sizing of your artwork with a 25% drop in size!

Eg, if you want your artwork to be 150 cm wide for argument’s sake, consider starting at 200 cm to scale down. Or if you want something to be 750mm wide, start at 1000 mm.
Or if you want to 75 px wide start at 100 px.

In other words, knock a 1/4 quarter of the size but remember to factor in scale back at the end. If you don’t, you may end up with an image that is too small.

Step 1 piece of art = 100%
Step 2 scale art to = 75%

In theory, nothing is stopping you from playing with lesser scale-backs and scale-downs.

How can this work with hiding banding?

When you print the document some of the details and blemishes are hidden away from the naked eye.

This approach can also hide some of the rings in banding. With an added element of noise, you can combine this to scrub out the bands

Otherwise your hard could look like a dirty spill stain!

Simple techniques to reduce ‘banding’, the final tip

Using a combination of the above has helped me to kick banding into touch. My favourite by far is my experience with noise without going over the top with artwork to make it look fizzy.

You may also find this post interesting :- working the black in print. Or how to edit the text in a card game.

Simple techniques to reduce ‘banding’ – Credentials

My name is Jimm ( Jim ) and I am designer with over 14 + years of experience. I have had to deal the banding. My old college course and grit and experience is what has helped me to deal with banding.