Gift Mugs make great coffee Mug Gifts

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• Why is the full-color reproduction of my digital art work on your coffee mugs different from what I see in my monitor?
  
  There are many reasons why the reproductions on our white photo coffee mugs differ from what you see in your monitor. Here are just a few of them:
  • Images seen on any monitor are in the RGB color mode while all printed images are in the CMYK mode. There will always be a "loss" change or "deterioration" generated somewhere in the translation process. (Consider: The basic color of your monitor is black and that of paper is white);
  • All spot colors are converted to process colors as our composite printers can only print with process colors (still more "translations");
  • Colors out of gamut will be automatically "replaced" by printable, similar colors available to our composite printers. Hence the reproductions cannot be the same as those you see on a monitor. (Consider: Your monitor can theoretically display up to 16.4 million different while that many colors can never be printed by anyone.)
  • Diversity of devices used to create and print an image:
    Each device that is used in the creation of a digital drawing, photo, etc., has a range of colors, or color gamut, that it can reproduce. For example: a monitor displays a different range of colors than a printer can reproduce. This means that a drawing might contain colors that display properly on a monitor but cannot be printed properly.
    Different monitors, scanners, printers, digital cameras, and other devices might all have a different gamut.
  • There is no way that all the components/settings you use in creating a digital art work will correspond to the settings we use in the printing process of your digital art work files.

  >There will always be differences in what you see in your monitor and what you see on our coffee mugs - sometimes they are minimal and sometimes they are rather very pronounced, even unacceptable. The reproductions can never "look" the same in a monitor as they do on paper or our white coffee mugs.

  If color fidelity is of importance, Sample Mug decorations are a MUST so that the digital file can be adjusted to what the final outcome on the coffee mugs should be. In other words, you have to work ";backwards" - from the final mug decoration to the digital art work as sometimes color shifts are unavoidable. More on this can also be found here. You might also want to read question # 40.

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  For an independent view on this aspect of digital decorations we are offering you here the opinion as expressed by the world-renowned CorelDraw expert, Foster D. Coburn, in a recent article entitled: Secrets of Color Management. This article is partially re-printed here with the express permission of the author.

  Secrets of Color Management © 2000 by Foster Coburn. All Rights Reserved. A question that arises quite often is geared towards color management. Users of graphics software are frustrated that the colors they see on screen do not match the colors that come out of their printer. In short they will never match so get over it. If you need to match colors, there are a number of ways to do it and I'll cover them in this article. Why Colors Don't Match To first understand the concept of color management, you have to understand why colors don't match. The screen on your computer displays colors in RGB (Red, Green, Blue) colors. This is what is called an additive color model. As you add more of each color, you get closer to white. With no color, you get black. Printed colors are exactly the opposite. They use the CMYK model (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black) which is a subtractive palette. The more color you add, the closer you get towards black. Each of these colors models has a gamut or a range of colors that can be represented. There is some overlap within these palettes, but you would be surprised at how few colors are represented in both palettes. Thus the reason that the colors you see on screen don't match your printer. If the color you want isn't one of the colors that is within the gamut of both models, it won't match. Well over half the colors won't match. If that isn't confusing enough, let's throw in some other variables that further confuse things. The colors you see on screen are dependent on the video card and monitor that you use on your system. And as monitors age, the colors change. So two separate users won't even see the same color on their respective screens unless their equipment is identical and the stars are in alignment. Then we throw in different brands of printers, different brands of ink and different kinds of paper. So many variables to consider and it all leads up to colors that just won't match.

  Click here to read the full article and many other, very interesting tips and suggestions as they apply to digital graphics in general and vector-generated graphics in particular, especially those created with CorelDraw.

  
  
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• Why does the same color in a bitmap/raster file not turn out to be the same in a vector artwork file or vice versa?
  
  As strange as it may seem, the same color (for example: R255 G0 B0, which is red) comes out a little bit different depending on what graphics program was used to create the digital artwork in, and/or was imported into.

  Furthermore, it is possible that the raster/bitmap art file was create in the RGB color mode and the vector art file in the CMYK mode.

  Based on these observations, a vector text for example, placed over a bitmap or raster image that both contain the same color red, for example,will print out slightly different red colors. This phenomenon is due to the different ways vector-based images and bitmap/raster-based images are prepared for printing by the various digital printing engines.

  To overcome this "oddity" it is possible to create all text in the same raster/bitmap program that also created the image file. To assure that the text so created will not be reproduced in a pixelated manner, the resolution of the raster/bitmap file should be at least 300+ dpi's. In the case of an artwork completely created in a vector program, there are no limitations as to colors nor resolutions, as all vector files are resolution independent.
  
  
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• Why are there differences in appearance from one mug decoration to another using the same digital art work file?
  
  Sometimes there is a slight difference from one decoration on one mug to the same decoration on another mug using the very same digital artwork as their source. This is sometimes more noticeable with full-size raster/bitmap decorations containing continuous-tone images than with vector-based artwork.

  These differences can be caused by many factors, as for example by:

  • the surface differences of the individual ceramic coffee mug itself; 
  • the composition and quality of the mug coatings;
  • the chemical composition of the white glaze on the coffee mugs; 
  • slight variations of size and circumference of the coffee mugs; 
  • differences in the pigment inks used for the printing of the decorations;
  • the use of a given printer, as no printer prints the same;
  • color correction applications produce different outputs;
  • printer drivers for different operating system and printers generate different print images;
  • the quality and characteristics of the paper medium the decoration is printed upon.

  Since we purchase all of the above (such as blank coffee mugs, pigment inks, paper media and printers) we have absolutely no influence over the final printed mug decoration and hence cannot guarantee the same identical mug decorations from one production run to the next.

  Slight differences from one mug decoration to another are unavoidable especially for full-color reproductions of continuous tone images such as scanned photos and/or raster artworks with rather large dark areas. Even some banding has also to be accepted as normal for spot- and full-color mug decorations.
  
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• What is the difference between a "Wrap-Around" decoration and a "Handle-to-Handle" decoration? (For a graphical representation, please click here)
  
  
  The human eye can only see a certain amount of information placed on a cylindrical surface. In our case this works out to about:
  - 3" in width for our 11-oz and 18-oz mugs; and to about
  - 3.5" for our 15-oz and 21-oz mugs.

  Based on this, the standard decoration included in the price of a custom mug is:
  - 3" x 3" for our 11-oz and 18-oz mugs;
  - 3.5" x 3.5" for our 15-oz and 21-oz mugs;

  If we now place another decoration (based on above indications) on the other mug side, we then obtain two images that can be seen with one "eye-full" on either side of the mug. This is what we call a decoration on both mug sides.

  Measuring from the extreme right of one image to the extreme left of the other image (as defined above) we can now determine the total "width" of a Wrap-Around decoration - whereby the space between the two images is also decorated.

  The Handle-to-Handle decoration represents the TOTAL width/height we can physically decorate on any given mug, stopping short of the mug handle.

  Thus we can decorate areas with the following approximate dimensions only.
  (For a graphical representation, please click here.)

  	Standard Size	Wrap-around	Handle-to-Handle maximum areas we can decorate	Horizontal Center Distances
  11-oz & 12-oz mugs*	3" x 3"	~ 3" x 7.75"	~ 3" x 8.33"	~ 5.02"
  14-oz stainless steel mugs	2.75" x 2.75"	~ 2.75" x 7.75"	N.A.	~ 5"
  15-oz mugs	3.5" x 3.5"	~ 3.5" x 7.75"	~ 3.5" x 8.33"	~ 5.18"
  18-oz steins	3" x 3"	~ 3.0" x 7.75"	~ 3.0" x 8.33"	~ 5.09"
  21-oz mugs	3.5" x 3.5"	~ 3.5" x 10"	N.A.	~ 6.2"
  * Note: For dimensions of our Coaster mugs please consult here. Please note that above measurements are what we can physically decorate on our white coffee mugs. The designs shown in any of our web site  illustrations or anywhere in this web site are only for illustration purposes and might or might not correspond to the dimensions and/or measurements above indicated. All measurements are approximate and can vary from mug to mug. They are not absolute. We always recommend to have a sample mug decorated before running a large custom mug order.

  
  
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• How "light" a color can you reproduce on the sublimation coffee mugs?
  
  Like with any other printing process, the sublimation decorating process cannot reproduce all the colors you can see on your monitor.

  "Light" colors with a density of about 15% or less will print so faintly that they will not be very noticeable on the printed mug.

  For example, a 15% black (which would be a light gray on your monitor) would not print "right", and so is it with almost all colors, except for white.

  You can very easily determine the percentages of the colors in your digital artwork by temporarily switching from your RGB screen mode colors to CMYK, "the printing mode colors" in your graphics program.

  There under the CMYK color scheme you'll see the percentage of all the four CMYK colors, namely, cyan, magenta, yellow and black.

  You can now adjust the "density" of your colors so that they are around 15% or higher to assure that they will be visible on your printed mugs.

  At the same time you can also check if your colors are out of "Gamut", that is, colors that cannot be printed under any circumstances and with any printing process and hence, should be changed to colors that can be printed.
  
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• I cannot decide on what mug side (with respect to the mug handle) to put my mug decoration.
  
  We normally recommend to have the mug handle to the left of a single-sided mug decoration so that when sitting at a table/desk the person(s) sitting across from you will see the mug decoration instead of "a blank" mug.

  This, of course, only works with right-handed coffee drinkers - as we presume that the coffee drinker knows what decoration is on his/her mug. Thus, the more persons that sit across from the coffee drinker the more will see the mug decoration - how about this for multiple exposure?!
  
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• How come that sometimes text, straight lines and delimited designs appear a little bit tilted. That is, they're not completely parallel to the mug's top or bottom?
  
  Since we do not print directly on the mugs themselves but first on flat media which we then apply around the mugs, the slightest difference in the mug's physical dimensions, or the mug not being perfectly cylindrical and straight, causes these slight misalignments which can and do vary from mug to mug as not all mugs are created equal. This effect can be seen on the mugs as the decoration does not appear to be parallel to the rim/bottom of the coffee mug

  These slight misalignments are not because we do not have any quality control. Even though we cannot guarantee a perfectly perpendicular appearance of the decoration on our mugs, these effects can only be minimized by designing art specifically to account for this rather irksome and unavoidable fact. To "compensate" for this we very slightly rotate our own images depending on which mug side they are. We do, however, not change, re-touch or rotate any customer supplied images which are always used AS IS.

  Thus, should you have single-sided design that is to be applied to both mug sides send it to us as single-sided images or panels and do not incorporate them into one continuous - wrap-around - image as this will prevent us or you from rotating them individually into the right position.

  Unfortunately there is very little we can do for wrap-around and handle-to-handle full area designs that cannot be broken down into distinct "right" and/or "left"; image portions or panels which could then be independently rotated slightly.

  A sample mug decoration will permit you to determine the approximate amount that your digital image file should be "adjusted" so that a more or less horizontal mug decoration will result. The ideal adjustment would be along a curve. Yet, since every mug is different, no perfect solution can be found and every mug decoration will be different.

  To minimize or "hide" this effect, a total up-down mug decoration can be chosen whereby the decoration covers the entire "hight" of the coffee mug. Yet even there, any horizontal straight line might appear as a slight curve on the finished coffee mugs.

  For a discussion on this subject and how to overcome the "curvature" or "warp" effect, please consult our Gift Mugs Corner where we and our customers try to hash out these "problems".

  As you can see, the decoration of coffee mugs is not - and maybe never will  be - a perfect science.
  
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• The size of my photo you show on your virtual mug decoration of the order confirmation is smaller than what I see in my monitor. How is this possible?
  
  We print all of our mug decorations with a resolution of 300 dpi's and hence all our graphic programs are calibrated to this 300 dpi resolution. This means that any image we display on our monitors will be shown in that resolution. If the image you supply has the desired final dimensions and has also a resolution of 300 dpi's, then the resulting virtual mug decoration will show in the proper dimensions/size and also be printed as such on the finished mugs. If your digital image does not meet with these requirements, than the resulting mug decoration will be in the dimension shown in our virtual mug decoration that accompany all our order confirmations.
  
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• My design appears centered on the design mug. However, when I print a sample the cup outline in gone and the design is to the left of the box. How can I tell if it is correctly centered. I cannot locate the full resolution (300x300) diagram
  
  Since you have created your mug with our Design Generator, the image you see in the monitor cannot be printed as shown in the monitor. We suggest you submit your order exactly as you created it in the monitor and then send us an e-mail telling us of your concerns.
  
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