Comments on: Cafepress Art Books

Question: Cafepress Art Books

quibx — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 08:14:35 -0800

I want to use cafepress to publish a small book of black and white illustrations, maybe about 100 pages. I'm concerned that their 100mb pdf limit will result in poor image quality. This is a personal project. Has anyone made an artbook through cafepress? Were you happy with the result?

By: terrapin

terrapin — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 08:32:12 -0800

I have uploaded 72dpi images for use on coffee mugs and they look as if they were printed on special film paper. I haven't used them for print materials, but I am thinking of creating a family calendar to give out, and I have the confidence it will look great. YMMV

By: zelphi

zelphi — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 08:37:36 -0800

quibx: you're actually getting files over 100mb?

By: XQUZYPHYR

XQUZYPHYR — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 08:51:33 -0800

zelphi- monochrome images require a much higher DPI for graphic quality- a B&W graphic runs at least 600 DPI standard for printing, as opposed to grayscales and colors at 300 DPI or even less when running on newsprint.

an 8x10" 600 DPI image can easily be over a meg; quibx wants to print a hundred of them.

By: rschroed

rschroed — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 09:15:46 -0800

Are these Black & White line illustrations or greyscale?

By: fake

fake — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 09:59:48 -0800

XQUZYPHYR- just curious, do you have a link about that? I'm curious as to _why_ a monochrome image takes up so much space. Is it due to the inability to interpolate edges into shades of gray (sorry, I don't have the vocab...)

By: XQUZYPHYR

XQUZYPHYR — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 10:06:30 -0800

No link, just the concept that filesizes are usually larger because the resolution is higher. Bitmapped (as opposed to vector-based) images store the data of what pixel has what color in it. If you have a 100 DPI square image, and the same image at 200 DPI, the doubled pixles by both length and width would make the larger resolution files four times the filesize of the other, generally. Monochrome in itself doesn't take up more space- they just need a higher resolution for quality because there's no opportunity for fading/blending of colors/tones.

By: quibx

quibx — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 10:22:31 -0800

Yeah, its lineart. I'm just thinking that the scans are going to be over 1 meg each...

I'm going to try it and see, but I was curious if anyone had any experiences. Typically, like XQUZYPHYR said, the files are large.

By: agregoli

agregoli — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 11:17:28 -0800

Where is this book option you speak of? I can't find that as a valid product on the cafe press site.

By: sonofsamiam

sonofsamiam — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 11:25:03 -0800

Could you use something like potrace to vectorize the lineart? That should cut way down on the file size.

By: fake

fake — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 11:30:09 -0800

they just need a higher resolution for quality because there's no opportunity for fading/blending of colors/tones.

ahhh, that's what i suspected. thanks. good luck, quibx, sorry for the derail.

By: quibx

quibx — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 11:35:19 -0800

agregoli:

Sell your book:

http://www.cafepress.com/cp/info/sell/

By: quibx

quibx — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 11:36:15 -0800

oops, sorry, it's http://www.cafepress.com/cp/info/sell/books.aspx

By: rschroed

rschroed — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 12:04:20 -0800

Do they mention what type of printer they're using?

If I had to guess I say it's a Xerox DocuTech 120 or similar. If so, you don't as high res as you would for offset, you'll get pretty good results from even 300dpi.

I'd suggest running a sample book. For example: 4 pages with the same image @ 150, 300, 600, 1200 dpi

By: joeclark

joeclark — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 12:33:15 -0800

You can also use utilities to slim down PDFs for printing. You do know about Reduce File Size... in the full Acrobat, right?

By: maledictory

maledictory — Tue, 07 Dec 2004 14:44:58 -0800

What about Lulu? I just checked their site, and can't seem to find anything about a file size limit. You'ld probably have to email them though.