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NWE Help: Graphics: Print
Because printed graphics reflect light instead of projecting light, print graphics differ from web graphics in several significant ways. These are the main points to keep in mind when switching from print to web graphics.
- Color Types: CMYK and RGB
- CMYK colors are substractive colors (where the colors make less
white light reflect) made from Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and blacK
colors. RGB means colors are additive (so adding them together equals
white light) made with Red, Green, and Blue.
For creating web graphics, you would use the light additive RGB range and for print substractive projects, you would use CMYK. Most programs offer these as two alternate modes that you can use during image creation. - Pixel Density
- For web based graphics, bandwidth is significant and images cannot be displayed much better than 100 pixels per inch because of the way computer monitors function. On the other hand, print images often need to have much greater pixel density for clarity.
- File Size
- Print documents do not need to be downloaded, so their file size on a computer is fairly irrelevant. Web images do need to be downloaded and so the file size needs to be kept small in order to not create problems for people with slow internet connections.