Coming up with a solution to a problem on the spot is a blessing. Sometimes the insight comes; sometimes it doesn't. But I was grateful last night as my fiancee and I assembled a new standee for Ghostbusters that I had a realization on the spot. It solved a problem and offered some awareness into the particulars of large format printing, die cutting, corrugated paperboard, and the printing process of flexography.
“Saving money.” These words have a nice ring to them. Here are some ways to do this.
An Example: Using a Cutting Die More Than Once
A print brokering client of mine is about to (hopefully) award me a job she has been sending my way for a number of years. It is a small print booklet with diagonal, step-down flaps in the corners of the successive pages. Each is a different color, and together they provide an easy way to navigate through the sections of the booklet.
I got a call from a printer this week saying a file I had submitted hadn't passed preflight. Given my experience with printing and prepress, I was somewhat chastened, but after a discussion with the custom printing supplier, I went off and did my own research, and I learned something.
My fiancee and I just finished assembling a huge standee for the Transformers franchise. It is called Transformers: The Last Knight. It is huge. No, huge would be an understatement. It took us nine hours to assemble and install. And we may need to go back to another movie theater and assemble a second one.
Out of the blue today a client I hadn’t heard from in over a year emailed me. She had a custom printing project and wanted my help.
A print book designer colleague of mine had a problem with a graphic last night, so I called her up, and we discussed infographic design at midnight (she’s a freelancer, and she was on deadline). Her design wasn’t working.