Designers! Pulling my hair out w/simple design project! Tips?

by Nightengale

Posted: 15 years ago 11 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

Hi Warriors,

I need Speaker Fulfillment Services to put a teleseminar I'm doing on CD. Which means I need to design the CD label.

I'm NOT a designer and am having such trouble with this...

I downloaded a CD label template and am using GIMP to do this. SFS tells me that the CD label needs to be 5.188" x 5.188" and 300 DPI.

In GIMP, if I change the DPI, it, I can't make it exactly 5.188" x 5.188" It will go to 4.72"

I have NO idea how to make it do what I need it to do and it's driving me CRAZY! I've seen good reviews of GIMP online when I've done searches for help on this issue, but I can't seem to make it work for me. I'm sure it's my incompetence, but I have no idea how to meet their requirements.

Can someone please tell me how to do this? I'm close, but no cigar and I can't turn this in to SFS until it meets their requirements. (And the design is super simple. Nothing fancy. But the size and resolution are still creating a problem for me!)

I'd appreciate any help you anyone might be able to give me.

Thanks!

Michelle

P.S. I know DPI means dots per inch, which translates into pixels per inch (PPI), correct? I hope I'm doing this right!

#design #designers #hair #project #pulling #tips #w or simple

Steven Carl Kelly 15 years ago

Does SFS allow for bleed?
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- Nightengale 15 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by Steven Carl Kelly
  
  Does SFS allow for bleed?
  
  Yes. The bleed is 1/4"
  
  As I said, I'm a writer, NOT a designer. However, I figured I could do this pretty simple because I have a template. The label is a background color, some text (the title of the teleseminar and my URL) and my logo. That's it!
  
  Very simple.
  
  I edited it again, thinking I had it correct and sent it off again to SFS. The woman there told me that the resolution was correct, but the size was incorrect.
  
  The template displays as 472 x 472 (in pixels) and 100.000 pixels/inch resolution when I open it in GIMP. As I said, I was able to change the resolution successfully, but I haven't been able to change the size of the whole image.
  
  The image properties gives me this info:
  
  Pixel dimensions: 5188 x 5188 pixels
  Print size: 439.25 x 439.25 millimeters
  Resolution: 300 x 300 ppi
  
  Thanks!
  
  Michelle
  
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  Nightengale 15 years ago
  
  Somebody? ANYBODY??
  
  I can't seem to change the DPI AND resolution to be what I need. I can change the DPI to 300, but if I change the height and width, it changes the DPI! Then, if I fix the DPI, it changes the height and width!
  
  Grrr!
  
  Can someone help me with this?
  
  Thanks,
  Michelle
  
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  ronc0011 15 years ago
  
  Send me the file and I will do it for you. It'll be done in Photoshop. I can send it back to you as whatever format you need.
  
  Just give me the specifics on what you need.
  
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  ronc0011 15 years ago
  
  Smoke break
  
  Thanks
  
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ronc0011 15 years ago

BTW I have to go pick up my niece from school at 2:50 but I'll be back in about 30 minutes.
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- Brian Alaway 15 years ago
  
  This may help: Digital image resizing with the GIMP
  
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  Nightengale 15 years ago
  
  Ron,
  
  Thanks so much for your kind offer. I appreciate it.
  
  But... I just now got it fixed!
  
  I'd been searching through GIMP's documentation and saw lots of stuff about manipulating images, but couldn't find how to solve this particular problem. But I just found it.
  
  (If you're wondering, the height and width are linked to the resolution, so if I change one, I have to change the other. I had to break the link by clicking on the chain link icon to change them to what I needed. And I have to change it in two separate places: first I have to change the DPI in one dialogue box -- remembering to click the link icon -- and then I have to go to a separate dialogue box in another menu to change the height and width, again remembering to click the link icon to break the link.)
  
  (And of course, THAT info was buried in just two lines in the documentation somewhere.)
  
  I'm a writer and the menus in image software are very foreign to me and NOTHING behaves as I want it to or think it should. (They don't even resemble the picture menus in Word!) Just making a super simple CD label design has been such a headache. I probably ought to take at least one basic design class to help since I can't seem to generally figure it out on my own.
  
  But now I've finally figured out how to design a simple CD label and I made sure to write every step down and save it so I don't go through this again. I need to know how to do this because I have about 4 labels to design now and more on a regular basis. (I'd been working on this several times over the last few weeks and could never remember the steps.)
  
  Thanks again for the offer!
  
  Michelle
  
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  Nightengale 15 years ago
  
  Ok, maybe not.
  
  I could SWEAR it was saved in the correct size!
  
  I created an image and saved it in the correct size. I then set out to create a second similar image.
  
  I'm having trouble with it and out of curiosity, opened the first image (which I THOUGHT was saved in the correct dimensions). It's the right DPI but not the right size!
  
  Grrrr! I honestly don't know what the problem is.
  
  Ron, maybe I'll take you up on that offer after all. I appreciate the help but really feel like I need to know how to do this myself. It's driving me batty that I can't do this!
  
  Michelle
  
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Lloyd Buchinski 15 years ago

This isn't any direct help, just a stray comment. I Haven't done exactly what you are trying to do so might not even know how.

Their on site help is the most difficult to decipher of any program I've used. When I am trying to do something with it for the first time, I usually find out how about 2 months later while looking for a way to do something else with it. While doing that I run across a clue about the first problem.

Almost always the clues do not come from the Gimp site, but from other sites in the search results. So just trying to say, at least don't worry that you are deficient, it's them
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- Nightengale 15 years ago
  
  Thanks for the encouragement, I appreciate it.
  
  Something just occurred to me: is it because I'm taking a small image and making it bigger??? It's the only thing I can think of.
  
  What boggles my mind is that somehow, I did it earlier today and sent SFS the good copy. There was a small problem with the text on the label though, so I set out to correct it by creating a new one and I can't get it to the correct size to save my soul!
  
  I REALLY wish I knew what the issue was.
  
  Michelle
  
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