Where?
The plotter Z3100 is located in the Computeer Center. It allows printing on paper up to 44" wide, the current options are given by what we have at our disposal.What?
The recommended format is PDF. JPG or PNG can be used for large format photos.When preparing, it is necessary to consistently use the target paper size, because PDF generators tend to shrink embedded images according to page size without compromise, such documents cannot be enlarged without visible loss of quality.
300DPI is used for printing, so it is advisable to use at least 100-150 DPI for large format photos.
Paper Size
We print from size A2 up to size according to paper width. Here are the standard DIN paper sizes.Smaller color formats can be printed in the library on a Xerox WorkCentre 7335
Coated papers (semi-gloss or glossy) are usually available:
- 610mm wide, i.e. DIN A1 portrait or A2 landscape
- 42" (107cm) wide, i.e. A0 portrait (requires manual cut of long edge) or A0 reduced to 90% landscape with no need of manual cut
- non-standard formats depend on paper width, e.g. conference poster 90x60cm - the limit to the length of printing is 129" (3.2m)
- the plotter can cut the paper according to the actual length, but it is necessary to keep it in mind when designing and place some object on the poster that extends to this automatically selected region - this applies primarily to non-standard formats
The A0 size, unless explicitly stated otherwise, prints reduced to 90% of the edge length (the size of the longer side is located at 42" paper width).
How much?
The price for students and employees of FIT is based on material costs and is 300 CZK per A0 (1sqm). Material used is counted by plotter itself. The price is to be paid in the library cash.The press for the needs of the faculty (posters for conferences) is re-invoiced to individual departments at this price.
Other BUT students and staff should use similar facilities at their faculties.
Printing is currently limited to FIT teaching, science and research materials.
How?
Printing service is provided on-request, usually Wednesday between 10am and 1pm.Requests for printing (prepared PDF) should be stored into share folder named plotter on https://nextcloud.fit.vutbr.cz. File name must be in form: login-format-comment.pdf, e.g. vonasek-A1-poster1.pdf Any questions can be sent to plotter@fit.vut.cz, exclusively from the faculty e-mail address.
The printed poster may be picked up in the library against payment. Posters paid by faculty can be obtained at the Computer Centre.
If the PDF is large, there is an error in the processing somewhere. Typically, a fairly covered bitmap poster rarely exceeds 5MB. With larger PDF sizes, you can expect troubles. If your software can't do it better, try generating a 300DPI PNG for the appropriate size (A2 / A1 / A0).
If your program (Adobe Reader) hesitates to open the PDF, there will be a problem - probably postscript is very complicated (translucent overlapping objects, etc.), the plotter can process such printing even for an hour. Try generating the PNG version in this case.
Known Issues
- depending on the application, a color shift may occur; especially dark parts of photos are critical (dark tones are cast together)
- if you have a colorful background on your poster, choose bright colors and avoid textures - what looks good on the monitor may not be nice on large paper, plus a continuous dark background means a lot of ink, there is a risk of drying
printing directly from applications sometimes produces surprising results (the application does not always agree with the driver on the size or paper rotation, etc.), the path through PDF allows a preliminary check before printing - wrong printouts are quite expensive here
Any comments to this page may be sent to michal@fit.vut.cz