HOW MY PHOTO BECAME A FRONT COVER IMAGE!
When I moved to the Oxfordshire village of Bodicote, I never imagined I’d be asked to photograph the front cover image of its parish magazine!
It’s a stunning church and so I didn’t need to think twice! I quickly grabbed my camera bag and hotfooted my way through the village.
The photo above is the third front cover image I have secured since my first shoot for them. So as I reach my hat-trick, it seems a great time to show you what happens once my image reaches the printers!
DESIGN TRANSFORMATION
The image is sent to Technique Print in Banbury which has the important task of printing nearly 2,450 copies of Bodicote’s Parish Magazine. The first step is to add the magazine masthead and copy that helps promote the magazine’s content.
ON THE PRESS
Once the entire magazine has been designed, the artwork is transferred onto ‘printing plates.’ The printing process includes four colours of cyan, magenta, yellow and black with each one having its own printing plate. You can see one of the plates for the front cover below with my photo delicately etched onto it.
The printing plates are thin metal sheets which are then loaded onto the huge £1m printing press pictured above. Then it’s time to load the ink!
Each sheet of paper is then sucked up and carried through the entire press on a cushion of air that prevents the paper being marked.
This machine prints 15,000 sheets per hour which is extremely rapid and quite a challenge to photograph! The sheets of paper pass over the four coloured plates layering each coloured ink until the final image is produced.
THE PROOF’S IN THE PRINT
Waiting patiently at the end of the press is Dean who is a master craftsman. He starts by running a proof and then calibrates the ink levels to ISO standards. This ensures they’re printing the colours exactly as I photographed them.
Once Dean is happy, he prints 2,450 copies of each page. They are then loaded onto a pallet ready to be machine folded, cut and stapled into the final magazine.
THE FINAL FRONT COVER IMAGE!
And voila…the final magazine is printed, delivered to St John The Baptist Parish Church and hand-delivered around the parish! And I’m very proud to say that I have already been asked to photograph the next front cover!
To learn more about Technique Print please click here. Or if you’d like me to photograph your business then please click here!
Such an interesting article…takes me back to my old screen printing days. things have moved on a bit! I still think it is exciting to think that only the basic colours go to make up every colour.