Sharper text for print

[dauricejordan]

I am creating a postcard in Photoshop. The postcards contains photos and text. It seems that the text could be sharper. I have heard that it is better to use Illustrator for creating text for print and then somehow importing it over to Photoshop. Is this true and can someone point me in the direction of some useful tutorials? I am pretty new to both photoshop and illustrator.

Thanks!

[rocknbil]

Welcome aboard Daurice! :-)

You are mixing and matching "advices." Look at it this way:

Bitmapped artwork is resolution dependent. That is, if you want something to print to a monitor, you have to create an image whose pixels are the same resolution as the monitor. For the same image to correctly render the halftone dots required for printing, you need to recreate the image with at least 300 pixels per inch at the same size. If you don't, you get a fuzzy and blurred image because there's not enough pixel information to accurately render it to a high resolution imagesetter. In this sense you will need two versions of a bitmapped file at different pixel resolutions for each task.

Vectored artwork is not resolution dependent. If I define a mathematical equation for a circle, then theoretically I can display that circle on any output device - a monitor, a printer, an imagesetter - by just applying the appropriate math. The conversion to the pixels, a process called rasterization, is done at the time of output. So the same file can print to a monitor at 72 DPI as well as an imagesetter at 300 DPI by simply applying the appropriate math.

So what you are suggesting by pasting an Illustrator or Freehand type into a Photoshop document is this: the second you paste that vectored art into your file, it is going to assume the same resolution as your Photoshop file. NO IMPROVEMENT whatsoever.

The correct way to do this to maximize type quality is one of two ways: place the IMAGE into the Illustrator file and print from there, or place them BOTH into a page layout program and print from there. When managed this way, the vectored art stays vectored until output.

If all this fails you, apply an unsharp mask filter to your type layer before the final save. :-)

[tedster]

Also note that when you are in the Photoshop type tool, there are controls along the top bar (or in the character pallete) for the type of anti-aliasing. There are 5 different choices: None, Sharp, Crisp, Strong and Smooth. Given the exact graphic you are creating, any one of these choices may appear better to the eye than another.

[dauricejordan]

Thank you for information. It has been very helpful!

[dillonstars]

Another consideration for keeping text sharp is the file format you save in and the amount of compression you use.

If you are saving your postcard as a flat bitmap file using a lossy file format (such as JPG) then using more compression when you save the file will adversely affect the quality of text more than that of photos.

If you have to save it in a flat format (and you are not saving the file for web use) then you should use the maximum quality settings - or even better, use a non-destructive format such as TIF when you save.

In my opinion the best solution for you would be to put together you postcard in illustrator and save your file as a PDF. All good printers will be able to handle these files and then your photos and text will be kept seperate - ensuring the best quality of print for your type.