Transfers (or decals)

[DavidB]

I have a lot of lettering I want like to make for my collection of 4mm road vehicles. I have done the artwork for some on Affinity Designer as vector graphics. I have printed them on (clear) laser transfer paper. Not having done this before, I tried paler ones but found even some of the bolder colours did not show up, along with the paler graphics. This was simple learning through trial and error.

Clearly, I need a printer that prints white so I contacted Black Square Decals who have been very helpful but . . . . .

I was warned there can be difficulties (for them) importing svg files and sure enough, this has been the case. Although some of the artwork is fine, other examples are not.

First an example of my artwork (forget the black background is not for the transfer, just for me to see the graphic):



This is what Black Square got when they downloaded the svg:

There is a font change and a shadow has appeared and separated. My font is Copperplate which I believe is a common one.

Another example of my artwork:



. . and Black Square got:

. . . where one worked and another changed. My fonts are Copperplate (again) and Snell Roundhand. Perhaps these are not common on Windows?

There are other examples, especially of the 'shadow' which separates. My screen grabs come off the original file and Black Square's from an email, so don't take account of the image quality, just the content.

One major difference is that I have produced the artwork on a Mac and Black Square uses Windows. Perhaps this is the source of the problem?

So, where does one go from here? May I ask WT readers what (if any) their experience is? Any observations, thoughts or suggestions?

I have put a stroke around the first example and perhaps this is a problem, yet it should not be. I have created the designs in one tab, larger than what is needed, then transferred them to a second file and scaled them to what I want for the final transfer. Being an svg, any stroke should also be in proportion. However, I am no expert in this sort of programme, so any advice will be welcomes.

ps. Any thoughts on the H.T. Glossop?

 

[ianlbsc]

Have you converted all the artwork to curves before creating the svg file? This would negate any problems with fonts as then the whole drawing is a vector illustration.
Hope that helps
Cheers, Ian Mac in Blackpool

 

[DavidB]

Ian. No, because it is something I didn't know about. However, Black Square have said:

'You could try exporting it as .eps or .psd but that format will turn text into curves which is harder to work with.'

Damned if one does; damned if one does not?

 

[ianlbsc]

It may be they are saying it would be harder for YOU to work on them. Basically you wouldn't be able to edit the lettering in a word processor type of manner after converting to curves as they are now just a set of curves and not lettering. You would need to keep a set of normal work files with the fonts in them and only export as .eps etc each time so you could work on the original files if there were any issues. Then send them as an eps file for them to print.
Hope that is clear.
Cheers, Ian

 

[DavidB]

Thanks, Ian. One lives and learns. Much appreciated.

 

[76043]

All the commercial paper based printing I do gets exported to PDF for the printer. Are they offering this option because PDFs are the standard in the paper print industry.
Tony

 

[DavidB]

I, too, have used pdf for commercial printing (very little) I have done. However, pdf has a white (or coloured) background; svg can have a transparent one which is better for lettering applied to a painted model.

 

[76043]

https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/acrobat/using/transparency-flattening-acrobat-pro.html

True, you have to watch out for flattening, but PDFs can have transparent backgrounds, see this help page from Adobe
Tony

 

[DavidB]

Interesting and thank you, Tony, but it needs a subscription. I don't subscribe to Adobe pdf. The version of Acrobat I bought no longer works on this OS. I don't have enough to do with pdfs nowadays to make a subscription worthwhile and what I do I can manage with some free website.

 

[Phil O]

David,

I'm no sort of expert in all things digital, but could you do a screen shot and get it printed as a png or a jpg.

 

[Stephen Freeman]

The computer program doesn't really matter, the problem is that most printers expect you to be printing on white paper, so if white is required...
You could try the decal paper for printing on an inkjet printer which claims to have a transparent background. The white background version works well enough but I think the transparent type is more difficult to get a good result.

As far as Laser printers are concerned, I haven't tried printing transfers with mine but I think it depends to a large extent on the printer. I believe the way to go if you want white printing is either an Alps printer (hens teeth come to mind) or what I believe is called a dye sublimation printer. Or you can get white toner for some printers, at a price.


As the ordinary inkjet decal paper works for what I want to print I haven't explored it further.

Having said that, many years ago I had an Acorn Archimedes computer and I had a program for that, the name escapes me at the moment, which could make a passable stab at a sort of off-white using a standard Canon colour inkjet printer. I don't know how good it would have been for transfers though. I think I still have the diskette with the program on it, current PC does not have the capability to read such disks, I'd have to get an external drive. (Yes I have internal diskette drives but there is no way of connecting one to the motherboard).

 

[Osgood]

Somewhat related question - is there an easy way (an app, maybe?) of identifying a particular font?

Rabbit hole question - how ever many fonts are there out there?

 

[76043]

Interesting and thank you, Tony, but it needs a subscription. I don't subscribe to Adobe pdf. The version of Acrobat I bought no longer works on this OS. I don't have enough to do with pdfs nowadays to make a subscription worthwhile and what I do I can manage with some free website.

Hello David, Apologies I should have been clearer, I wasn't advocating getting an Adobe account, I was just pointing out that technically it is possible because Adobe originally developed the PDF standard. Should be possible with Inkscape (free) or Affinity Publisher (not a subscription, but paid for)
Tony

 

[Stephen Freeman]

I think Snell Roundhand is probably less common, I have both Copperplate Bold and Light and can achieve a similar but perhaps not quite the same result in one of Affinitys predecessors, from Serif. So should be printable on a Windows PC . Though when I publish it as a PDF it loses the outline colour.

How many fonts? More than I or possibly anybody else can imagine. I have a difficult enough job keeping track of the ones I have, I definitely don't want any more.

 

[DavidB]

Thanks for your comments, chaps. There is no problem printing on transparent decal paper with a laser (mine is a Xerox) with coloured typeface on a lighter background. It is much less satisfactory when one tries to print paler lettering on a darker body colour. The lettering all but 'disappears'.

Long and short, to make satisfactory transfers, one needs a) to make them as vector images, which have a sharp edge and scale without the ragged, pixel edge and b) print them on a printer that lays down white first. The cost of such a printer to the occasional user is prohibitive, so I have been recommended to look at Precision Decals.

It will be a while before I send them my artwork as I will need to fill a decent size sheet, so I will work through more things that I want first. The artwork is no problem for me as I am getting quite used to Affinity Designer.

 

[ianlbsc]

I bought a cheap HP printer and an expensive Ghost white toner cartidge for it. Print the transfers on very thin media in two layers, applying the white first, then a thin varnish and then the colour. All good. Several people using them and get good results. This was my first attempt - renaming Dapol Thames Terrier to Bramley.

 

[Pete_S]

Somewhat related question - is there an easy way (an app, maybe?) of identifying a particular font?

WhatTheFont | MyFonts’ AI-Powered Font Finder

www.myfonts.com

Can't vouch for their app, but the website version can be useful.

Rabbit hole question - how ever many fonts are there out there?

Too many. Especially if you include all the ones that don't exist.

My fonts are Copperplate (again) and Snell Roundhand. Perhaps these are not common on Windows?

They're not, for a full list of fonts supplied with Windows (from Windows 7 onwards) see:—

Font List Windows 10 - Typography

List of fonts present in Windows 10 and their information.

learn.microsoft.com

MS Office had an 'install on demand' option that included Gill Sans, & Adobe Creative Suite installs a bunch too.

Font Substitution is a thing, as you've found. It can even happen if your version of a particular font was produced by a different manufacturer to that of the printer. So if your Copperplate Gothic was produced by Linotype and the printer's came from Bitstream wrongness could still occur.

Converting the type to outlines removes this danger.

Pete S.