Hi everyone!
Basically, I am a total newbie to graphic design. I don't have any qualifications in Graphic Design/Illustration (to be honest, I'm not 100% sure what the difference is!) but I'm an artistic person and I enjoy designing so I decided to start selling my "work" (mostly typography prints) online. I've only sold a few pieces so far and haven't had any complaints from customers yet, but I have a few fears about using fonts and I can't seem to find definitive answers to my questions. My questions are:
1. Do fonts need to be converted to paths in order to print well?
To start with, I purchased a font with a commercial license, created my design in gimp and exported it as a Jpeg. I sent the file to a print company and it came out just fine. But with the second font I purchased, the text came out fuzzy so after a lot of research, I got inkscape and clicked on 'object to path' and saved as a png which solved the problem. Therefore, when creating typography work is it best to use inkscape and convert text to paths every time or can I just use gimp as before?
2. Do I need to embed the font?
I've seen people talk about 'embedding' fonts into files otherwise, people who don't have the font on their computer won't be able to print it. Is this something I need to do?
3. Is there anything else I should know?
Ultimately, I want to create typography posters that can be printed using any computer and up to 18"x24" in size. So, is there anything else I need to know to make sure the files print well?
Thank you so much for any help and sorry for the long post!
Basically, I am a total newbie to graphic design. I don't have any qualifications in Graphic Design/Illustration (to be honest, I'm not 100% sure what the difference is!) but I'm an artistic person and I enjoy designing so I decided to start selling my "work" (mostly typography prints) online. I've only sold a few pieces so far and haven't had any complaints from customers yet, but I have a few fears about using fonts and I can't seem to find definitive answers to my questions. My questions are:
1. Do fonts need to be converted to paths in order to print well?
To start with, I purchased a font with a commercial license, created my design in gimp and exported it as a Jpeg. I sent the file to a print company and it came out just fine. But with the second font I purchased, the text came out fuzzy so after a lot of research, I got inkscape and clicked on 'object to path' and saved as a png which solved the problem. Therefore, when creating typography work is it best to use inkscape and convert text to paths every time or can I just use gimp as before?
2. Do I need to embed the font?
I've seen people talk about 'embedding' fonts into files otherwise, people who don't have the font on their computer won't be able to print it. Is this something I need to do?
3. Is there anything else I should know?
Ultimately, I want to create typography posters that can be printed using any computer and up to 18"x24" in size. So, is there anything else I need to know to make sure the files print well?
Thank you so much for any help and sorry for the long post!