Some advice re Publisher and Newsletters

7roland8

Hi - I do a village newsletter and use Publisher - but am nowhere near an expert at it.


This last time I used some cliparts with transparent surrounds - they all looked fine when I printed some off to check but now they have been printed there is a faint box showing around the images. I asked the printer and he said I should have cropped around them using Paint or Photoshop. (I've not got Photoshop and would not know how to do it in Paint anyway.)


But why would it show fine when I printed my drafts but not when properly printed? Surely a transparent background should be just that?


Just want to know to get it right for the next time, or stick to everything with a white background.


Thanks in advance.

Le_Kirk

I uses Publisher quite a lot in the past. When you placed the Clip art did you use a placeholder, such as a picture or text box? If so, you can right click on it and set the style/colour of the line around it. When you say it was fine when you printed it but it wasn't fine when it was printed do you mean you sent the file to the printer?

cookie365

Publisher is a horrible program. I've got it but would rather use Word even though that's not designed as a desktop publishing app.

Are the images in .png format? Other image formats - in particular jpeg - don't support transparency. It could be that the way you're importing them is bringing them in on a white background that's not quite the same shade of white as your Publisher background.

Or as @Le_Kirk says - it could be your image placeholder has a border line.

7roland8

Thanks both - yes I printed a draft copy at home and it was fine - but when printed at the publisher the area around the image showed darker than background image - on the cover the holly supposed to be on my green background had a darker square of green around it - shall have to do a pic to show you. I don't always use a placeholder so don't think its that and often just copy the image into the text box by the text.


I was searching for free clipart and made sure they were images with transparency around them.


Will probably just have to be more careful what I use in future!


I only use Publisher as I took over from someone else a few years ago and that was what she used so I just copied her format.

System

Hi

Scribus is an easy to use program for producing newsletters etc and no cost.

https://www.scribus.net/

AND I know this does not directly address your address your problem, but may help to avoid problems in the future.

7roland8

Thanks John - shall check it out.

beardiedog

Did you send it to the printer as a Publisher file? Different versions can change the way pages are displayed and printed. It might be better to save and send as a PDF file in future.

I do a lot of DTP using Publisher and would not have gone ahead and printed if it was showing background shading but would have spoken to the client first to make sure that's what they intended and/or made the changes myself.

7roland8

Thanks Beardiedog.

Yes it went as a PDF which is what they requested.

Otherwise the printing is fine - its only the second time we have used them for a colour issue as we were having the B/W ones done elsewhere.

As you can see mine draft when printed was fine (bottom) and as it was also the cover it was readily visible to anyone.

[IMG]https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-JQ47Q0E3- DM/WCxAZGmzJhI/AAAAAAAAJpg/6sit2jnrQLg_pjf2b5ALpdJPIDTk7EXCACLcB/s400/101_9505.JPG[/IMG]

beardiedog

Ugh! See what you mean, and lower resolution as well by the looks of it, that may be what's happened.

You'd have a job cropping it although it's possible in Paint with a bit of work, though as it was OK on your draft you wouldn't know you needed to do it anyway.

7roland8

Thanks - I did get back to them but apart from suggesting cropping around the image there was no other response. Though it was glaringly obvious to me as soon as I saw it.


And as you say to me it all looked fine anyway when it was sent off - so a bit disappointing when it was done.


No one else would probably bother but you know yourself after doing something you do try your best. Anyhow I shall just be careful in future and only use the transparent ones with on white background - and I'll ask them to check better!