- In this movie, I'll finally introduce you
to the print command.
Now, the thing about the print command,
which is located here under the File menu,
you can get to it by choosing the command,
or pressing CTRL+P, or Command+P on the Mac,
is you may or may not find it useful.
It really depends on your work flow.
So, for example, let's say that you do
most of your printing from InDesign.
So, you place the files into an InDesign document
and then you print them from there.
In that case, all you need to do is choose Save As,
and save the document as a standard AI file,
which is all together supported by InDesign.
And incidentally, it doesn't matter if it's an RGB file,
or a CMYK file, because both Illustrator and InDesign
use the exact same color engine.
The only advantage to setting your document to CMYK
is that you're gonna get a better sense for how your
colors will print, but even in a carefully calibrated
environment, the screen display
tends to be an approximation.
And so, the real reason to use print,
is if you want to print the document directly
to a local printer, such as an inkjet, or laser printer
in your home or office, or, if you want to prepare
the document for commercial reproduction.
In which case, go ahead and choose the Print command,
in order to bring up the vas Print Dialog box,
and then set your printer to the desired device,
which if you're preparing the document
for commercial reproduction should be Adobe PDF.
Now, go ahead and save a PDF file
complete with all of your settings.
Or, if you want to print to a local printer,
then go ahead and choose that device.
In my case, I'm gonna choose my Epson R3000,
which is a really great inkjet device.
Now, notice as soon as I switch
by the way, from Adobe PDF to a specific printer,
I then have this orientation option
that's available to me, Auto Rotate,
and if you turn that on, then Illustrator is going to
automatically rotate the artwork to better fit the page.
If you want manual control, then you can
turn that checkbox off, and then select
from one of these orientation options.
Generally speaking, Auto Rotate is the way to go.
In my case, however, the artwork is
a little too big to fit on the page.
Now, I could drop down to Scaling here,
and I could select Tile Imageable Areas,
which is gonna tile the artwork across multiple pages.
That can be a way to work, generally speaking;
however, it's a little bit clunky.
Because, then it means you have to
somehow combine those pages together.
Which is why you're generally better off,
scaling the artwork to fit the page,
by either choosing Fit To Page, like so,
which is gonna reduce the size of the artwork,
and it's no longer auto rotating,
so, we'll go ahead and turn that check box back on,
so that we have a better fit.
In my case, however, that's making the logo too small,
so I'm gonna switch over to custom instead,
and then I'll click inside the Width Value,
notice that the width and height
are linked together by default,
and I'll press Shift down arrow
in order to reduce the value to 90 percent
and then I continue to nudge that value down
to, let's say, 86 percent.
I might also switch to a different paper size.
Now, currently my printer is loaded with letter size paper.
But, I could switch it to Super B,
which measures 13 by 19 inches,
which is gonna give me a lot more room,
as we're seeing there,
after which point I would change
my custom value to, let's say, 130%,
and press the Tab key in order to increase
the size of my artwork.
You also have the option of dragging the art on the page.
If that messes things up, then just go down here
to this Placement option, and select the Center Point
inside that little reference point matrix,
and that'll go ahead and once again center your artwork.
Now many printer software's specific options
that you might want to take advantage of,
for example, let's say I want to print this
to a specific kind of paper,
and I want to use my matte ink,
instead of my photo black ink,
in that case, I would need to click
on the Setup button.
Now, for what ever reason, Illustrator gets
pretty grumpy at you when you try to access
the Printer Specific Options.
And as you can see here, what it wants you to do
is return to the Print Dialog box.
Just go ahead and click Continue
in order to bring up your options,
you may then have to click on Preferences,
here on the PC for example,
in order to bring up your Printer Specific Options,
and by the way, your options
are gonna totally differ from mine
unless you're using the exact same printer as I am.
Now, at this point, I could say, you know what?
I don't want the photo black ink,
I want matte black instead.
I have to click the OK button
in order to accept that change.
And where this artwork is concerned,
I don't need border-less,
although that is an option for this printer,
but I would like to see the Print Preview,
after which point, I'll click OK.
So, that's just an example of stuff that you can do.
Notice then, in order to escape out,
I'd have to click on the Print button,
which actually returns me to the big Print Dialog box.
And now I have the option of actually printing this document
by clicking on the Print button,
or, if I just want to save all my settings,
then I could click on the Done button,
and that'll go ahead and save
those print settings for later.
Now, the one thing that can be
a little bit of a gotcha when you're printing
documents from Illustrator, is Artboards.
And so, I'm gonna switch over to this document right here,
which contains a total of 100 Artboards,
which is as many as you can create.
And by the way, I'm viewing them all,
because I went to the View menu and chose
Fit All In Window.
But, let's say I don't really
wanna print every single one of these.
Then, I go up to the File menu,
and choose the Print command.
And, you can see that by default,
Artboards is set to All right here,
which means I'm seeing one out of 100 Artboards
listed here inside the preview.
And I can go ahead and cycle from one Artboard to another
by clicking on these arrow buttons.
Now, let's say I don't wanna print
every single one of the Artboards,
I wanna print a range, such as four through 10,
let's say, and I also wanna print page 14,
so I'll enter, Comma 14, like so.
And then, if I press the Tab key,
I can see that I'm now looking at
page one of eight, in parentheses, four
to show me that is the fourth Artboard,
and so then if I like, I can go ahead
and cycle through those Artboards
by clicking on one of the arrow icons.
After which point, I can either click on the Print button,
in order to print this document,
or, I could click Done, in order to save my settings.
And that is my introduction to the powerful
print command, here inside Illustrator.