If you’re new to the printing industry and have a keen eye for detail, you’re probably wondering what those little color bars and bullseye symbols in newspapers are for. And if you’re interested in logo design, chances are you can’t help but ask yourself why the Enfocus logo looks a bit like those bullseye symbols (or like the BMW logo, if you’re a car fanatic). In this article we explain all about old-skool preflighting, and you’ll find out why the Enfocus logo looks the way it does.
What’s in a color bar? Loads of information!
Unlike page content, color bars remain consistent throughout the entire print job. Serving as a benchmark for printers, color bars are used to check whether all pages of a job are consistent in terms of ink coverage and color density. Evidently, printers can compose their own color bars according to the capabilities of their printing equipment and a job’s particular requirements.
Registration symbols
The miniature bullseyes we mentioned in the introduction are actually called registration symbols. Printers use them to verify whether each color plate is correctly lined up to the next. If that is indeed the case, the registration symbol will be printed as one solid area.
If a color plate is not properly lined up, the registration symbol will appear unfocused.
(So, now can you see where the inspiration for the Enfocus logo comes from?)
Crop marks
Remember when we talked about bleed? Next to registration symbols, printers also rely on crop marks (or trim marks) to crop jobs correctly. Bleed should always extend beyond the trim area as printers are unable to print to the very edge of the paper.
