Question - Thin, white font on dark...

I have a design where my customer wants a small, thin, white font on top of a fairly dark, multicolored 4/C background of a photo.?To make matters tougher, the background has some detail and bright spots, though I have minimized that as much as possible.?He really wants this particular font and I cannot make it any larger.?I am concerned about it becoming illegible when printed on press, especially if there is any misregistration.

I am wondering if the following is a legitimate approach.

1.?Add a very thin white stroke to my white text, making the stroke thickness between 0.10 to 0.25 pts.

2.?Duplicate the above text, convert text and stroke to black, paste in place (behind white text), then increase stroke width to about 0.5.

On my monitor, this creates a black stroke all the way around the white so the text is readable where it lays on top of lighter areas.?The white stroke added just a little weight to the white text to beef it up a little without totally destroying the look of the font.?Will this work okay on press??Do I need to convert these to outlines and then group them, or can I leave it as two layers of text, one atop the other?

Any suggestions (other than changing font or size) to get this to print properly and avoid it closing up on press and becoming unreadable?

Thanks,?Lou

Question - Thin, white font on dark...

There are a lot of variable you haven't covered here. What is the paper stock? Dot gain may play as much or more of a role as registration.

If you have lineweights under half a point I think you are right to be concerned. You'd be better off, in the long run, explaining the reality of reverse type to the client (and asking the printer if they think your proposed font and size would hold on press), and choosing an approrpiate font for the job, rather than trying to fudge and having it not look good anyway.

Just my $.02

Peter

Question - Thin, white font on dark...

Agreed, Peter, but the client wants what he wants and I hope to deliver.

Paper will be glossy coated on a sheetfed press, so I am not as worried about dot gain as I am misregistration and trapping.?Will my proposed solution work, or is there a better way?

I did one job awhile back where I used a fine script (Zapfino light) and needed white text on a rich black background.?In this case the background was consistently black without any light areas, so to prevent trapping and misregistration from eating into the fine script, I outlined my white script with 100K at 0.25 pt.?Then I duped it, made both the outline and the text pure white, and used it below as a knockout.?Even with trapping up to 0.25 pt, the knockout protected the script on the top layer and it worked out fine.?But, the above scenario is a bit different.

Anyone done this before??(my original scenario, that is).

Thanks, Lou

Well your solution sounds like it will work, but I'd ask the printer what he thinks (or are you the printer?). In any case, get a proof and make the client sign off on both the proof and a statement that he is aware that fine lines in reverse type may be lost on press.

Peter

Peter.

I zoomed in to 800% magnification and drew a white line next to the thin text to determine the font width.?It is about 0.65 pts.?That is the heaviest and the thinnest this font gets. That is above the 0.5 pts you mentioned in your previous post (but I suspect that was a ballpark estimate to indicate where trouble starts with reverse type).

So, I think the method I used last time will work here too.?As long as it looks good, I will probably add a 0.25 pt 100K outline to the top text, then put an all white duplicate (text plus 0.25 pt outline) directly below for knockout to handle trapping and misregistration. That's probably the safest method, assuming I stick with this font and size.

If a black outline all around doesn't look good, I will consider a white font above with a 0.15 pt white outline to ''beef it up a little''.?That will give me a 0.90 pt font width and still looks pretty good.?Then I will place an all black duplicate below with a slight offset.?I prefer the first method if it looks good.

I have a few more days before the job is due, so I will consider my options and remain open.

Thanks, Lou

Hi Lou,

I think your basic idea of creating a single color black background for each of the white characters is very good, and should take care of most of the potential misregister

If the job is being printed on a modern 4 color press, and the plates are made by CTP, the problem if any, would be due to paper stretch. What size press sheet is the job printing on? What is the largest distance (on the press sheet) between instances of the white text? Paper stretch is greatest across the grain, and stretch will be worst when the paper grain is arround the press cylinder due to fan out, and these problems are more pronounced on lighter weight stocks. Discuss these concerns ASAP with the printer.

I just had a job with 10 pt. 4 color serif text printed on a 28 x 13 inch 70# matte coated stock running grain short (worst case), and the 4 color text 26 inches apart (on the press sheet) looked fine. Of course this was a little less sensitive than white text on a 4 color dark background. But I think that if the press sheet is about half parent size and you use your method of providing a single color black background near the white edge of the type, you are going to be fine.

Let us know how it turns out.

Al

It sounds like a lot of effort is being wasted. Just make a new process colour swatch hat's 100% black and use that to stroke the text by whatever value you or the printer thinks is appropriate. The term for this type of trap is a ''keepaway''.

Thanks for the suggestion, Scott.

Question, though......?Even though I'd be using a black build to ''stoke'' the text, won't I still have the same concerns about the text closing up due to slight misregistration of the four plates??Seems to me it would, but I may be mistaken.

That was why I went to all the trouble.?I'm trying to buy myself a little insurance policy to make sure all the white text stays white.

Regards, Lou

Thanks, Al.

I will certainly report back after the job runs.

Lou

Scott,

You might be right on target, as long as the ''keep away' black does not overprint.

Al

Edit: see this thread for related information: How to globally set K100% to overprint?

Al,

Thanks for the link.?That clarified Scott's suggestion and it now makes total sense.

Scott, at first I thought you were talking about creating a 4/c black build, but now I see you were talking about 0/0/0/100, which automatically knocks out, and routine trapping will take care of the rest.

Thanks, that is a lot easier.?

Lou