POD Card Printing, Maybe (split)
williamhessian:
once you are accepting outside orders i would like to put in an order for 100-250 cards (depending on how many i have finished at that point). I am guessing it is best to have all the images done in jpg form ready to be printed?
is there anything else I can do to prepare for printing so that when the machine are up and running my order can be all set to go.
i am really excited about your POD trials. keep me informed.
william.hessian@gmail.com
for details about the game I want to make prints of see my first post:
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=25791.0
Ron Edwards:
Hi everyone,
The above post was split from POD card printing, maybe. It's an important topic, so let's continue the discussion here.
William, I split your post out because that discussion needs to remain in its own time. Threads at the Forge are considered "old" (and not to post to) at about three weeks of age or so.
Best, Ron
P.S. As a message to everyone: moderation and thread-splitting is no big deal, so please do not apologize when I do something like this. William, I'm not implying that you were about to.
williamhessian:
Fair enough, you are a strict moderator, which is very good for forums. especially when some newbie like myself comes in and messes things up with crazy posts.
POD card prints, I also noticed the guild of blades does art prints as well. I am very interested in the printing prices and abilities of your services from top to bottom, because I might have a number of projects to potential run your direction.
I currently do all my printing next door at a local printing place, but as far as printing CCG cards, i know they will be too expensive and not particular enough to make sure everything lines up correctly. this is something i assume that the Guild of Blades does very well. Or do you also have problems printing consistently, or having uneven lines ect?
Looking forward to hear more from the Guild of Blades
guildofblades:
Hi William,
Thanks for your interest.
The Guild if Blades is first and foremost a game publisher and have been since 1994. We largely deal in board games right now, but we've published every kind of game excepting card games. Our distribution numbers just never made it practical to go to China for a 5,000 deck print run, so we never did them.
That's how we stumbled upon the new retail store model we plan to open. We had spent several years investigating a means to print our own cards in more reasonable numbers and the hang up was always in the die cutting. A fellow publisher of ours turned us onto a line line of computerized die cutters that after investigation, we found can do the job. So after investigating the costs of buy up all the machinery to do POD cards, we ultimately opted that with all the machinery we already own for our publishing operations, that made some great sense to just go ahead and up a retail store to house our POD printing operation out of to expand it services. So our POD operation's opening is tied to a retail store opening (think slapping a game store and a Kinkos together). I had originally planned for a February opening, but my Wife's career track threw us a curve ball. Due to market conditions in her specific field of IT consulting, she chose to open her own consulting firm. I've been helping her to get established and put it on a solid footing first, before I can commit the time to opening the new retail store. I just don't want to stretch my time to thin and end up doing a bad job at the store's launch. And launching a store with a completely new retail model and where that store also contains a completely new POD model (as far as I know, this will be the first real POD card printing operation...though Rapid POD had sort of attempted it earlier, but with lackluster results because they couldn't get the card sizes consistently correct, using Paper Reim cutters rather than die cutters to cut the cards) is going to be something I am going to have to commit nearly all my time to at first, till we can get it all set up and operating smoothly. I'm fortunate that the Guild has grown enough that the day to day operations are now staffed enough where they don't require my babysitting, so I'll be able to pursue this new area of expansion. But I have no illusions that it'll be easy at first. lol.
For POD cards, the "print quality" isn't the problem. The newest high end laser printers print beautifully. The problem is always with the registration and the die cutting. The newest evolution of small computerized die cutters prove to be pretty spot on too (with careful and accurate usage by the operator anyway...they are actually a bit tricky to use). So that leaves registration. If you plan to design cards somewhat like most other CCG card games, where you have a definite border around the edges of the card, then there is plenty of margin for error within the printing and you won't have any problems. That border is placed on cards because even offset presses tend to need that small margin of error when trying to get the font/back registration correct when printing the card sheets. The laser printers these days have a fairly tight registration, but in order to print on the 12pt cover stock needed for the player cards, the paper can only be fed into the printer through the bypass tray, which can be a little more difficult for the front/back registration, but typically falls within the margin of error allowed by the typical border area on cards.
The file set up I will require in order to handle printing is going to be very specific. Its going to have to be a PDF (with embedded fonts already) with a very specific card layout on a 12" x 18" press sheet. The cards have to be aligned on the sheet at very specific points or else the front/back registration when it comes to die cutting won't work out. I have a layout template already if you plan on using white bordered fronts and backs. I still need to make the layout template for cards that will use a full bleed instead, which is slightly different.
I plan to get some web pages up shortly that will have all this information, but until then feel free to shot me an e-mail at dowrie@guildofblades.com and I can add you to my update list for when I have no specs and such ready for folks.
As for quantity, given the nature of the die cutting process, we're not going to be able to offer true POD (ala, one set of cards at a time), so our minimum order will be 10 sets. A "set" will be however many cards are in a group that I have to package together for collating and shipping. Cards are printed 18 to a 12" x 18" sheet, meaning I can pretty much do sets in quantities of 9 or 18, and if 9, they have to be doubled up. You don't have to use every card slot on a sheet, if you don't have a full set of 9 cards to fill that part of the sheet, but by the sheet is essentially how we will be charging so if you can figure out a means to use all of those card slots you get the best pricing "per card".
For the now, all I can do is work with folks who are interested to get their card files and such more ready for printing. I'll be happy to update everyone once we've signed a lease for the store front and put the machines on order, which means we'll be ready to begin processing orders within about 2 weeks of that date.
Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com
http://www.1483online.com
http://www.thermopylae-online.com
williamhessian:
Thanks Ryan,
I admit I am jealous of your company. It seems like a really cool profession.
My specific card game is a little more difficult, because sides of my cards need to be actually touching the edges. This causes problems with setting, and cutting because it can be very particular. It can be a nightmare for printers, which is something i didnt consider during building my design.
you can see my card design here: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=25791.0
the reason it is so important for my cards to be borderless is that 50% of all conflict is resolved by lining up cards side by side and resolving a battle. Lining up the edges is crutial to gameplay.
I understand how your sheets work for print. On a sheet of nine, would it be a complete sheet of the same card, or nine different cards? I plan to start by printing approximately 20 of each card, and I am in the range of 50 cards to be printed. I still need to play test and stat edit a few cards before i set that number.
What would you suggest, given my difficult card design, to do to prepare for a successful print run? And once it becomes available what is a realistic time frame from sending you my images, to the finished print back in my hands?
It may be something I think of for my larger run in a year or so. I may just be buying some card stock and printing my own cards for my first invite only tournament and to send off to playtesters. Which may be my best bet at this point. Granted, the quality will suffer during this prototype phase.
Looking forward to your response.
William
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