SUMMARY: How
to paste your company logo onto estimates, invoices,
purchase orders, and insertion orders. Updated 07/15/07 |
With the help of a graphics program such as Photoshop, your
shop's logo can be pasted into your Clients & Profits
X database. This means invoices, estimates, purchase orders,
insertion orders, and statements can be printed on plain
paper, replacing expensive stationery or complicated pre-printed
forms. This tech note describes the steps you'll take to
place logo graphics from Photoshop into Clients & Profits
X, as well as how to handle cross-platform printing issues
with estimates, invoices, and purchase orders.
How graphic files are handled by Clients & Profits
X
Any 300-dpi PNG graphic file can
be pasted onto estimates, invoices, POs, and IOs. The logo
can contain up to 256 colors, as well as scanned text. Clients & Profits
X can't handle EPS, JPEG, or other proprietary formats. Since the logo field does not support
Postscript, any small type in your logo may not print well.
The overall dimensions of each logo is 795 pixels wide by
300 pixels high. Any type or graphic must fit within these
dimensions, otherwise the graphic will automatically be scaled
to fit the logo area. Your logo will appear in full-color
when printed on a color inkjet or laser printer.
Cross-platform issues
Although Clients & Profits X can display graphics on-screen between Macs and PCs, the "shared picture" resolution isn't high enough for most logos in any format other than PNG. That's because in order to share a graphic image between both kinds of computers, it is automatically converted to a lower resolution unless the graphic being pasted is in a shared format, such as PNG.
Unlike previous versions of Clients & Profits, with the new version 10.1 you can now share logos between both Macs & PCs in high resolution using the PNG graphic file format. Logos created at the correct printing specifications (795 pixels wide by 300 pixels high) and saved in PNG format will print in high resolution on your reports in Clients & Profits.
Preparing your logo for Clients & Profits
X
These
step-by-step instructions apply to both the Mac and Windows versions
of Photoshop and Clients & Profits X.
While these instructions refer to Photoshop, nearly any
graphics program will work in the same way.
First, start
Photoshop and open your logo file. Then start Clients & Profits
X and open your database. Once you've entered your initials and password
into Clients & Profits X, switch back
to Photoshop.
1 Once Photoshop has started, open the graphic file containing
your logo.
2 Modify the logo so that it has an image size of 795 pixels
wide by 300 pixels high. If your logo's width or height does not
meet either of these dimensions, choose Image > Canvas Size to add
the necessary white space required to bring the graphic to the required
size.
All logos will vary in size, but none can exceed
795 X 300 pixels, otherwise they will be immediately scaled to fit
these dimensions on the printed estimate, invoice, etc. In some cases,
you may want to decrease the size of your logo in order for the entire
image to fit inside of the logo fields in Clients & Profits X.
The logo won't
be centered by Clients & Profits; instead, the logo
is placed in the top-left corner. If your agency logo is square in
shape, you must make sure that the height does not exceed 1". Then,
add additional white space to your logo to bring the total width
to 2.65".
3 Choose Select > All to select the entire graphic file.
4 Choose Edit > Copy to copy this selection to the computer's
Clipboard.
5 Switch from Photoshop to Clients & Profits X.
6 Once in Clients & Profits X, choose Setup > Preferences
(Windows) or Clients & Profits > Preferences (Mac) then select an
options area from the list on the left (Broadcast Orders, Invoice
Options, Estimate Options, etc.).
The selected preference options window opens, displaying
your preferences including any existing logo.
7 With your mouse, click inside the logo field, then choose
Edit > Paste.
The logo graphic should appear. In some cases, it
may appear bitmapped on the screen, but will print in 300 dpi quality
on the printed forms.
8 When you are finished, close the preferences window. Your
logo will be saved to Preferences when the window is closed.
The same logo can be pasted into the database's Broadcast
Order preferences, Estimate options, Insertion Order preferences,
Interactive Order preferences, Invoice options, Outdoor Order options,
and Purchase Order options by repeating steps 4-6. To paste a different
logo into a preferences window, repeat steps 1-6.
Pasting From File
You can also paste your saved PNG file directly into the program.
1. Choose Clients & Profits X > Preferences
(Mac) or Setup > Preferences (Windows).
2. The Preferences dialog box will open. In the
left-hand preferences list, choose the options area you wish to paste
your logo into.
3. Click inside of the logo field, then choose Edit > Paste From
File.
4. You will be prompted to locate the logo file you wish to paste
into the program. Once you've located the file, select it and click
Open.
5. Your logo will appear in the logo field.
Your logo will be saved to Preferences
when the window is closed.
Testing the logo in Clients & Profits X
Once the logo has
been pasted into Clients & Profits X,
test the logo's appearance by printing a sample estimate,
invoice, or purchase order. If the image quality, color,
or position isn't acceptable, you'll need to repeat these
steps. Once the logo is acceptable, it will be available
to anyone who uses Clients & Profits.
TROUBLESHOOTING
PROBLEM:
When I paste my logo, Clients & Profits X
only shows the top-left corner of the graphic.
This is usually an issue in version of Clients & Profits prior to 10.1. The "share pictures" option is enabled, causing the image to be converted to a cross-platform graphic format. There are two options: (1) disable the "share pictures" option, so that the logo appears in high-resolution on either Mac or PCs (but not both); or, (2) paste your logo in PNG format.
PROBLEM: When
I paste my logo into Clients & Profits X,
it only appears on estimates printed from the Mac. Anyone who prints
estimates from the PC doesn't get a printed logo.
If the "share pictures" option in General
preferences is unchecked, the logo will only appear on
reports printed from a Mac or a PC (depending on which
kind of computer copied-and-pasted the graphic into C&P).
This is a known limitation of the shared-picture preference.
The only option is to enable the "share pictures" option
then replace the graphic with one that prints acceptably
on both kinds of computers.
PROBLEM: PICT or BMP files saved from Illustrator
or Freehand print poorly when pasted into Clients & Profits.
You must import your Illustrator or Freehand document into Photoshop,
then paste the Photoshop file into the program. To do so, follow these
steps:
1 Open Photoshop and create a new document 300 pixels
high, 795 pixels wide.
2 Choose File > Place then locate your logo Illustrator
file.
3 Place that file in your new Photoshop document.
4 Crop as necessary.
5 Save the new Photoshop file as a PNG file.
