Art Requirements

The Howard Company's Designers have more than 5 years of experience in Menu Board Design and their services are included when purchasing our menuboards or products that includes graphics*.

You may choose to opt out of this service by providing your own artwork created to the specifications below. You will receive a layout to review and to approve for production. All layouts are allowed up to 3 free revisions/changes (additional charges will apply after the 4th). To reduce the amount of revisions, we recommend reviewing the Design Basics for Menu Boards— which includes information on how to determine legible font sizes.

See File Preparation for Print See File Preparation for Digital

File Preparation for Print:

Please verify that artwork meets the requirements below before uploading:

**Adobe Illustrator (.PDF, .EPS, or .AI) *preferred format**

Art can created in Adobe Illustrator and provided as an editable .PDF, .EPS, or native .AI file
**Please provide any support elements (links, images, fonts) or Embed images within the file
- Layered .PSD and .TIFF are also acceptable, but for best turn-around time on revisions, please label the layers
  - If artwork is flattened, Howard can not make revisions or future edits
- If artwork is created in Adobe InDesign —Please export packaged file (Indesign: File/ Package) and submit the packaged folder (Indesign file, Links, Fonts)
  - Please Note: designing in Indesign versus Illustrator can result into a longer production time and design fees because the machine that cuts the graphics reads illustrator files. If a PDF (exported from Indesign) is submitted, the file will be opened in illustrator for production set up and can result with some graphic elements dropped/lost (ie: gradients, RBG photos) from the program. If you see these errors on the layouts it's due to the communication of the two programs, but our designers can recreate the lost elements prior to production
- You may export files from Layout programs (ie: Quark, Corel, Publisher, PowerPoint, etc.), but note that Designers will likely need to recreate the design in Adobe Illustrator. This could lead to a longer turn-around time
Fonts need to be supplied by customer or outlined / rasterized

**Howard cannot make edits for customer if fonts are outlined/rasterized
Art should be actual size (.25” or .5” scale if over 225”)
- For Outdoor Graphics, Please refer to Graphic Sizes for Drive-Thru or Download Templates to ensure graphics are created to correct size
Include 1/8” (.125”) bleed on all sides
Product images & supported backgrounds should be 300 dpi or above

**Low resolution images that have been re-sampled to 300 dpi in Photoshop are not high enough quality and will not be accepted
Include Pantone color swatches for correct color matching and future reprints. Click here to choose Pantones. (You may also be provided a physical proof for color matching if Pantone colors cannot be specified). If Pantone swatch is not specified, designers will pick a Pantone that closest matches the artwork provided.
Include all support artwork / photos
CMYK color mode

File Preparation for Digital:

The requirements below are necessary in order to create editable templates that will allow you to make your own content changes (ie: Updating pricing or Images). Note that the digital software is a Digital Content Manager, and not a design program.

File should be created in Adobe Illustrator and provided as an editable .PDF, .EPS, or native .AI file
- There may be an additional art charge if artwork is supplied as .PSD, .TIFF, .Indd as these are not suitable for building templates
Artwork for digital must be set up in pixel dimensions of 1920 x 1080

**1920px x 1080px for Horizontal screens Download Template

**1080px x 1920px for Vertical screens Download Template
Do not include bleeds
Photos & supported backgrounds should be at least 96 dpi or above
Fonts must to be supplied by customer to have editable templates made
**Editable templates are created in our Digital Content Manager program and does not support font tracking, kerning, percent skewing, or text styles. Fonts will be displayed on screen how it naturally appears for any editable areas.
- Click here for more information about the Digital Content Manager
Include all support artwork / photos
RBG color mode
Supported Formats

*Graphic orders only and future digital design changes could be subjected to art charges

Upload Graphics for Menu Board