Goin' it on our own: Print Quality Images

I've now learned the difference between a web quality image and a print quality image. I learned it in a very frustrating way that made me want to reach through my email and choke the heck out of someone, anyone, at a print place even though it really wasn't their fault at all that I'm a novice at a lot of this design crap and that I thought I knew what I was doing when I really didn't.

After going through the design process for our business cards (initial design, feedback, changes, more feedback, changes, etc) I was happy to finally be ordering the damn things. I was also excited that I had found a vendor who looked like they had good quality products at a great price and who would let me handle the whole thing online without having to talk to a person (always a bonus for me).

So I uploaded the files. A few hours went by and I got an email stating that the images did not meet their specs for print products. I spent some time figuring out how to make the needed changes in the png files and then I uploaded the files again. A few more hours went by and I got a second email that said, "Your images are very pixelated. Please provide a better quality image. If you cannot provide a higher quality image we will cancel your order and you will not be billed".

WTF? I emailed customer support because I was annoyed and said, "Can you explain exactly what the hell is wrong with the damn images? Are you referring to the first friggin' set or the second set I uploaded? Should I just start over and create new files to replace the shitty ones?". The last line was dripping with sarcasm, but sometimes that's easy to miss in an email (at least I hope they missed it). Oh, and I did remember to remove all of the expletives before I hit send.

Then I read their FAQ section and found some great information about why the images needed to be better, what horrors would occur if they printed from a pixelated image, etc. So I started from scratch and made clean, brand new images that met their specs (which only took about 20 minutes). I uploaded the files...again. Lo & behold, they were good to go.

Later, just before I received an email saying that the files were good, I received a response to my email in which they confirmed that it would probably be best if I created new images. To their credit they didn't add "moron" onto that sentence.

Lesson: Pay attention to what your vendors tell you. It's their business to know what works best in their world. And it can save you a lot of time and frustration.

PS: spellcheck suggests replacing 'png' with 'pong'. Not ping-pong. Just pong. I didn't know that was a real word on it's own, so I looked it up. Most common definition found: a distinctive odor that is offensively unpleasant. Just in case you didn't know about it either.

Goin' it on our own: Phone System Recordings

I've found that one of the most enjoyable things about starting your own business (shameless plug: http://www.slamindustriesllc.com/) and doing everything yourself is that you get to be part of all of the bloopers that you probably would never be aware of if you had money to simply pay someone else to do it all.

Over the past few months we've given ourselves crash courses in everything from web design to how to convert high quality WMA recordings to low quality WAV recordings, so that they work with the phone system and callers don't just hear "crackle crackle dead air crackle hang up".

Mat, one of our Key Contributors (a fancy name for people who are working with us and will eventually make some money, but aren't gettin' paid shit right now) and our Resident Comedian (so we'll give him a semi-shameless plug here and tell you to check out http://www.matstreet.com/) is doing the recordings for our phone system.

Now, if we wanted to we could pay 10 bucks per recording and have a professional "voice artist" do them for us. But that wouldn't be nearly as much fun as Mat sitting hunched over a voice recorder in his little apartment over the garage, leaning his matress against the wall to muffle sounds from outside and making fart noises every so often. And, if we paid someone to do it I can guarantee that we never would have gotten to hear the bloopers.

For your amusement:
http://www.houndbite.com/?houndbite=12467
http://www.houndbite.com/?houndbite=12468
http://www.houndbite.com/?houndbite=12469
http://www.houndbite.com/?houndbite=12470

By the way, if you're looking for a good online site to store some funny audio clips, www.houndbite.com is great.