Your graphics designer may not be aware that the printing process used on these mugs is quite different from conventional
offset litho, Please ensure your designer follows these guidelines to avoid delay and extra costs.

What's so special about these mugs...
The Colormug is a ceramic mug with a colored heat sensitive coating, which is overprinted. When hot drink is added the colored coating becomes transparent to reveal the design in full colour. The effect is dramatic.

The mugs are printed by dye sublimation: the foto is first printed using special inks onto a carrier paper and then transferred by a heat process to the ceramic surface. Under heat the inks vaporise and permanently dye the mug with your design.

The process is quite different from conventional printing and there are limitations. Orders are only accepted on the basis that these limitations are accepted and that these guidelines are followed. On the other hand, the sublimation process gives an exceptionally bright and attractive finish unobtainable by any other means.

Your design can be printed on the outside of the mug, leaving one centimeter clear either side of the handle ("partial-wrap") or all the way round, including under the handle ("full-wrap"). lt's a matter of taste. The mug can also be overprinted with a name or logo in a single color. This is permanently visible, hot or cold.

Proofs: Using your artwork, a machine proof is printed for your approval prior to the production. Although expensive, this is the only way of making a sample that will accurately match the colors reproduced in production.

Other methods of proofing, eg cromalins or even using a
low cost Epson printer with dye sub inks, do not provide a close match to a production run on a large offset press. lf artwork requires modifying or the proof has to be remade for any reason or the customer decides not to proceed these costs are charged in full.

Color matching: There is a color shift when the inks
are vaporized so color matching is difficult and not always possible. lf it is critical to match accurately a
particular color in your design, it should be separated out as a special.

Please note however that the range of base colors available for dye sublimation printing by offset litho is limited and some color matches are not possible.

Supply everything we need on the disk:
1. Finished version of the artwork.
2. All of the source files used to create the finished version, including all high resolution scans, all screen and printer font and all Tiff and eps files.
3.Label the disk with job title and return address.
All artwork supplied must be fully editable. The finished version should be supplied as a CYMK file
(plus spot color separations.)

Supply a print out: Black and white or from a low-cost color printer using the right file, not an earlier version. Label with PMS references for all corporate colors or other critical color matches. Supply color samples or swatches at the outset. Customer supplied printouts cannot be matched because there is no consistency of calibration between their machine and ours.

Only supply artwork on disk

Disk: Zip, SyQuest (up to 20OMb), CD. 3.@" floppy.
Programs: (all versions accepted)
Mac: QuarkXpress, Illustrator, PhotoShop (do not apply anti aliasing to files), Freehand, PageMaker
PC: PhotoShop (do not apply anti aliasing to files).

Mugs with a full wrap print: 257x 88mm. Mugs with partial wrap: 225 x 88mm.
Do not add bleed. Keep live matter (eg text) 5mm away from top and bottom of the mug and 5mm away from handles in a full wrap. Do not place any part of a permanent screen overprint within 5mm of the top of the mug, l Omm of the base or 25mm from the handle. lt is not possible to register closely the screen overprint to the underlying dye sub print.

Available coating colors for Colormugs

Designs printed on a black or royal blue PMS 294 coating are only faintly visible when cold. Designs on following lighter backgrounds are partly visible: red 186, pink 227, orange 172, green 327.

Design Recommendations.

Choosing the best coating color. Designs often look best with a background color close to the coating color with foreground detail in sharply contrasting colors. lf reversing text out of a solid background. Dye sub print gives more problems with bleed so avoid fine typefaces. Set text in bold. Minimum point size 11. Tints: Minimum of 10% difference between tint values to give a visual contrast. Printable range of 20% to 80%.
Scans:Low-resolution scans produce poor print. 600 dpi
minimum for best results. Ensure scans have no color cast. The print process will exaggerate the slightest contamination.
Full wrap print. Avoid contrasting colors or elaborate print detail at either end of the design as this may create an ugly join or unavoidable misregistration under the handle. Please ensure we have artwork, which is complete and unambiguous.