Vector Artwork in Photoshop

[audiolife]

I'm trying to mock up artwork in Photoshop using the vector pack that's available on the net, and I just can't get anything to line up. I set it up as a standard 8.5x11 but the measurements on the rulers in PS don't translate to literal when trying to test it on an enclosure.

Any tips on what I might be doing wrong? Not sure why the measurements aren't 1:1

[stallik]

Can't speak about the vector pack but my experience is that photoshop will always get the size right in terms of pixels per whatever. The errors come when you print an image. Then all he'll breaks loose as the printer driver makes size adjustment to fit the image to the page etc.etc.
Sometimes, saving as a pdf, opening the pdf and printing from acrobat can get round the issue.......but not always

[WhiskeyMadeMeDoIt]

Use Inkscape it's free and works well for that.  It is a vector graphics program.

[audiolife]

to be more clear:

I set up a session in PS at 8.5"x11" dimensions. I then slide in the vector art, i.e. the 1590B box. When I print it out, even when sized correctly, it prints smaller than it should.

[karbomusic]

to be more clear:

I set up a session in PS at 8.5"x11" dimensions. I then slide in the vector art, i.e. the 1590B box. When I print it out, even when sized correctly, it prints smaller than it should.

The printer is trying to scale down 8.5x11 since it can't print border to border on a real piece of 8.5x11 paper. You can tell the printer driver to not do that OR you can crop it smaller than 8.5x11 in Photoshop so that it thinks it will fit on the entire page, but the printer might then try to scale it larger so better to do it in the printer settings (set to print actual size, not scale etc). Either way, if the thing you are printing isn't actually 8.5x11 then you don't need make the "image" dimensions 8.5x11 in Photoshop.

[audiolife]

the PS session is set up in quadrants, essentially so I can print 4 graphics per sheet, with this size of 1590B. The problem is that the actual scale of the enclosure, even though measured correctly, doesn't translate. Is it just a matter of test printing until I get it right?

[thelonious]

When you go to File | Print and then scroll down to the Position and Size dropdown, do the settings look basically like this?

[karbomusic]

When you go to File | Print and then scroll down to the Position and Size dropdown, do the settings look basically like this?

Those are the photoshop settings, if you click "Print settings" under printer setup (as in the image above) it should invoke the GUI for the printer driver where another scaling option usually exists.

[thelonious]

Ah, good call.

[deadastronaut]

Use Inkscape it's free and works well for that.  It is a vector graphics program.

+1.. cool prog and free too.

[audiolife]

Yes my settings are essentially the same, a little different.

Should I check the scale to fit paper size box?

[thelonious]

Yes my settings are essentially the same, a little different.

Should I check the scale to fit paper size box?

No, the Scale to Fit Paper Size box (under File | Print | Print Settings | Paper Handling tab, or wherever it is with your particular print driver) and the Scale to Fit Media box (under File | Print | Position & Size) should both be unchecked.

If both of those boxes are unchecked and the vector art measures the right size on Photoshop's rulers, I'm not sure what would be causing your problem.

If you use the rectangular marquee tool

to precisely measure a section of your graphic in Photoshop, and then you measure that same section of your printed graphic with a ruler, how far off is the scale? Could it be a print resolution issue?

But you might want to give Inkscape a shot, since that's designed for vector work. Also Adobe Illustrator is amazing, but obviously that is an expensive program; Inkscape is free, as others have said.

[jmasciswannabe]

Same thing happen about one outta every eight or nine times I go to Kinkos. You'll get a new guy who goes to print and they fix it so the edges don't get cropped. It's not until I chop it up to put on the box that I realize it has been shrunk.

[eyeprod]

if it's a current version of photoshop then I can say from personal experience that it has some definite bugs and this could be one of them.  Or an issue with the vector pack? It seems odd.

So to be clear, this is a vector image that you're bringing into PS? If so, what is the original format of the image? AI, EPS? How are you bringing it into PS? Dragging? import?

PS isn't a vector drawing program, so a vector image usually get's converted to a bitmap image when you bring it in to PS. In fact, if this image is giving you a problem, just flatten the layers, select all, make a copy of the flattened image, then undo to get your layers back, paste, then print only the flattened layer. That should solve any issue for a final print.