What is Large Format Print?

Large format print refers to any kind of project that is printed on large sheets or any other substrate that is too large for production on a typical commercial press. There are two types of large format digital printing: flatbed printing and roll-to-roll printing. 

With flatbed digital printing, the sheet or substrate is placed on the flat printing surface and UV light turns liquid ink into solid ink in order to print directly into the substrate. Roll-to-roll digital printers can print right through the substrate, making this type of large format printing ideal for materials like canvas or vinyl banners. 

There are a couple of common use cases for large format print, particularly in the sales and marketing realm. Some of these applications include: 

• Event banners

• Architectural blueprints

• Promotional posters

• Trade show displays

• Retail signage and fixtures

Of course, these aren’t the only contexts where large format print can be beneficial, and that’s one of the biggest advantages of digital print technology: versatility. 

“There are few print opportunities out of reach for inkjet and the designers who understand its capabilities,” write Gooding and Schilling. 

There’s a lot of crossover in creating design files for more traditional types of commercial inkjet print and large format, but there are also some important variables designers need to consider when working in this form of print. Not only can keeping these tips and tricks in mind help enhance the quality of your large format project, it can also streamline the production process to help save time and money. 

The ideal image resolution for most commercial inkjet applications is 300 dpi. However, given the size and scale of large format, you want to set your image resolution to 100 dpi for the highest quality print and image quality. In fact, you may need to work at an even lower dpi depending on a variety of factors, some of which include the photo editing software you’re using or from how far away your large format print will be viewed. 

The big advantage of using vector images over other formats for designing large format print is that vector images will not lose quality when they’re resized. Other file formats may become pixelated or demonstrate diminished print quality when they’re resized for use in a large format application. Raster images can become grainy, blurry, or jagged when scaled for use in large format print. 

Cropping or resizing images in design files for large format print can result in excessive pixelation when the image is produced at such a large scale. This can not only produce a lower quality large format project, it can also be extremely costly in terms of reprinting the project to achieve the desired quality. To avoid this, try to stick to the original image size, or capture photos as close to the object as possible.