A Guide to your Logo Files
About your logo’s color models
- RGB is for web and email and should work adequately for things you plan to print on your printer. RGB is what your computer monitor understands best.
- CMYK is generally for full color ads and press.
- Spot Color logo files have PMS match codes that allow an exact color to be mixed to formula before printing. Some spot colors can’t be produced accurately with CMYK printing and will be visibly different. Consequently, we are not big fans of selecting spot colors for logos that will not reproduce reasonably well with full color (four color or CMYK) printing. Spot color printing can save money over full color printing.
- Grayscale and B&W, of course, will be handy when color printing is not an option or in the budget.
About the types of logo files we provide
- .AI and .EPS are the native design files and are typically opened with Adobe (or other professional) Design Software. These are the best files to use in your designs intended for press.
- The JPGs and PNGs are files you would most likely use for Web and Email. Also, these are the easiest files for the layman to use.
- The TIFs are higher resolution files you could use in, for example, MS Word or MS Publisher if you were unable to work with the EPS files.
- The PDFs are good for viewing the logo at its best or sending to press.
Types of art in the files
- Vector Art – this is scalable without loss of quality. For enlargements, signs, banners… It also provides the crispest, truest text rendering. Your AI, EPS and PDF files contain vector art.
- Raster Art is comprised of a bunch of little dots of various colors. Your JPG, PNG and TIF files contain raster art. Raster art does not enlarge well. It is good for the web, email and other lower resolution purposes. The TIFs we’ve provide could go to press in a pinch, but would generally not deliver the text as crisply as vector art.
We send our clients quite a lot of files when we close a logo job. Native design files, EPSs, JPGs, TIFs, PDFs and more… containing both raster art or vector art. While some of the files aren’t of immediate use to the client, usually they don’t have the software to open many of them, their service providers always love the huge selection of files we provide to cover a variety of needs.
MAD House Graphics has designed many logos over the years. You can view a few of them online at https://www.madhousegraphics.com/services/logos/