Before we get down to the tips of laser-jet printing, we need to discuss the nature of most laser-jet printers and what they are best suited to handle. In general most laser-jet printers are engineered to be workhorse printers that handle a great volume of printing. The use heat to apply powdered toner to paper, which cuts down on ink cost but sacrifices in color quality and accuracy. Designers should use laser-jet printers for inexpensive proofing of element placement, organizations, spelling, punctuation, grammar, pagination, color separations, and sometimes contrast. Laser-jet printers should not be used to check color accuracy and balance.
Another thing to remember is how old is your laser-jet printer. Most laser-jet printers cost more at initial purchase, but do not require you to replace ink cartridges often. Depending on usage laser-jet toner can last months or even in some instances years. Most often than not computers are updated and replaced multiple times before a laser-jet printer will be replaced. This puts some laser-jet printers at a disadvantage to software, and hardware that is constantly changes. This is why sometimes you may want to avoid some new features such as transparencies in illustrator with spot colors. Just because your computer and software can reproduce the image, does not mean that your laser-jet printer can accurately recreate what is on the latest version of Photoshop. When it is possible it is best to let your computer and software handle the hard work, such as flattening layers in Photoshop vs letting the printer flatten the file. Another example is when you need to print a file in black and white, but the file is RGB. Your computer will typically have more memory than your printer, and can process the file faster that an old HP B&W printer. Photoshop is most definitely more adept at handling a color conversion than most of your older black and white laser printer. So printing from a Photoshop file that was converted to a Grayscale color mode typically has higher level of accuracy in contrast and is faster to process. Knowing what a specific printing device is engineered for makes it easier for a designer or technician to analyze the printing results.
Here are some basic tips for printing on laser-jet printers.
• Don't expect exact precise color reproduction
• Do not print from removable media (CD,Jump Drive, Flash Drive, External Hard Drive).
• Print from a file that has been saved onto the computers desktop or documents folder.
• Always go through the process of checking page setup and printer setup options.
• Make sure you are printing to the printer you think you are. It is a common mistake to print to a printer in one room, but check for the printout on a completely different printer. This problem leads to the classic head scratching HMMM..."where did that print go to" moment.
• If your file contains multiple layers, flatten layers before printing. This is especially applicable to Photoshop files. (Use caution and do not save over, or replace the original layered file, you might need the layers to edit the file later.)
• If you you are printing to a black & white printer, convert your color mode to grayscale. Converting color modes with software vs printer will typically produce a print with higher accuracy and will be processed faster by the printer.
• Check printing status dialog box before sending more than one print. Often times when people experience printing difficulties the will try to resend the print. Later the print finally gets processed and all the prints that were sent print out. Both Apple (In the Doc) and Windows (Bottom right bar) computers will display a print icon when printing starts. When you click or dbl click you will get a dialog that displays printers status. You can track, trouble shoot, pause, and even cancel print jobs from these printer windows.
• If you have difficulties printing from a specific program, try to save file as a pdf and print from Adobe Acrobat Reader or Adobe Acrobat Pro.
• Check attribute settings. A problem can sometimes occur when a designer knows enough to be dangerous. If you have a graphic element that is white and has it's attributes set to overprint, you will get an element that will not print. The invisible logo...Where did the logo go? I swear it was right there when I looked at the screen. This problem usually occurs when a designer who knows what overprint is has a black logo and they set the attributes to overprint in Adobe Illustrator. Then another designer uses the same logo but changes it to white, but never turns off the overprint status. Overprint on white vector graphic = WILL NOT PRINT.
• If you have graphics that are not reproducing accurately due to transparencies, special effects or complexity of graphics, you can copying and paste file into Adobe Photoshop, flatten layers, and save as a jpg file. This technique is more of a last resort method and is only recommended for extremely problematic files.
Some of the above points can apply to more printers than just laser-jet printers and are a good reference for other types of printers.
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