Essentials of Art paper design

Art paper, also called fancy paper or special paper, is very different from ordinary printing paper. The appearance of this kind of paper has rich colors and unique textures, and most of them are processed by special paper processing equipment and techniques. Because of its unique charm, art paper has attracted the attention of merchants since it entered China in the early 1990s and has been used in exquisite book covers, picture albums, brochures, invitations, greeting cards, high-end office paper, business cards , High-grade packaging paper, etc. At the same time, usage has also increased dramatically. However, due to the lack of understanding of the structural characteristics and printing performance of art paper, various problems often occur in the application process, causing a lot of waste. The following discusses the matters needing attention in the pre-press design, printing and post-press processing of common art paper.

Essentials of Art Paper Design

Art paper's own characteristics determine that in the packaging and printing field, it is not based on printing graphics to reproduce the value of the product, but to make full use of the unique colors and textures of art paper, and then make appropriate designs. The unique gloss and color difference of art paper will bring people different feelings. When these different paper personalities are combined with the design, it is necessary for the designer to use the personality of the art paper to convey the design intent, so that the paper personality becomes a part of the design, and is perfectly unified with the design style, thus showing a unique artistic effect . When designing before printing, the following points should be paid attention to.

1. Choose the appropriate art paper according to the characteristics of the product

When designing, we should make full use of the emotions and emotions expressed by the original lines and colors of the art paper, and achieve a simple and beautiful artistic effect through a simple design that adds the finishing touch. Therefore, sometimes it is not necessary to reproduce the effect of the product with a large area of printed graphics, which can also save printing costs and reduce costs. For example, choose brightly colored art paper, and match the appropriate ink according to the characteristics of the product, so that the ink color and the paper color form a strong contrast, and achieve the purpose of attracting customers' attention. Of course, you can also choose some art papers with higher transparency, and make use of their translucency to make a reasonable design to enhance the artistic sense of the product.

2. Understand the threadiness of art paper and consider the stiffness of the product packaging

Effective use of art paper's characteristics of good strength, toughness, stiffness and elasticity can increase the appearance stiffness of packaging products and improve product quality. In the design of the paper box, it is often necessary to mount plain paper and art paper. At this time, pay attention to the thread direction of the paper. The usual practice is to make the thread directions of ordinary paper and art paper as the lining perpendicular to each other to increase the stiffness of the carton.

3. Use special post-press processing technology

It mainly adopts embossing, UV coating, hot stamping and other processes. Due to the high content of long fibers in art paper, it has good stiffness and toughness, and is usually thicker, suitable for embossing processing to improve the artistic effect and grade of the product. Many art papers have rich textures and special textures. This feature can be used to make it contrast sharply with the gloss produced by UV coating to achieve special artistic effects.

4. Choice of printing method

If the product is required to have bright colors and a thick ink layer, screen printing should be considered. But if you want clarity, you should consider using offset printing. The choice of printing method will have an important impact on the final product.

5. Selection of printing ink

In order to pursue a gorgeous appearance, many customers will consider using silver ink and gold ink printing. However, in the design process, the layout should be reasonably designed according to the characteristics of art paper and the printing process. It should be beautiful and generous, but also fully considered The characteristics of silver ink and printing process requirements, try to avoid printing failures that should not occur. Generally speaking, gold and silver inks are mainly used on the solid part or color blocks, and it is best not to design them in gold or silver for very small inscriptions, embossments and level transitions. The color sequence arrangement of gold and silver ink should be considered in the plate design process to ensure the metallic color. Also consider the requirements of gold and silver ink printing on art paper. If the art paper is very absorbent to the ink, the binder will be absorbed quickly, and the metallic pigment in the ink will float on the surface of the art paper, lose its luster, not adhere firmly, or even fall off. Art paper with strong acidity can easily react with metal powder, causing the metal pigment to change color and lose its luster. When printing gold and silver ink on art paper, the base color ink is usually applied first. For example, when printing silver ink, a layer of light white ink is first applied. This can improve the gloss of the silver ink layer and strengthen the silver ink on the paper. The adhesion. After printing gold and silver inks on some products, UV glazing or water-based glazing, or film coating should also be considered to prevent metal pigments from oxidizing, discoloring or falling off.