Production Information

Notice to advertisers

Specifications

These specifications refer to the preparation and delivery of electronic advertisement files (copy) for publication in The Irish Times and its supplements. They apply to all display copy, both colour and mono, other than those advertisements made up in-house by The Irish Times.

Conditions of Acceptance

The Irish Times reserves the right to decline, omit, suspend or alter any advertisement in any of its publications or to terminate any contract, and will not accept liability for any loss or damage caused thereby. No liability is accepted for any loss or damage caused by an error in the printing of any advertisement.

Code of Advertising Standards

The Irish Times DAC is a member of the Advertising Standards Authority for Ireland, and all advertising placed with it is subject to the Authority’s code of Advertising Standards.

Copy Acceptance

Your copy is accepted subject to your agreement to the following terms, conditions and specifications. Should you, or your agent(s), fail to comply with all relevant requirements, The Irish Times will accept no responsibility for print quality or non-appearance (as appropriate) of your copy, and claims for credits or repeats will not be entertained. Claims, of any nature whatsoever, made later than seven days after publication will not be accepted. These specifications are subject to change in light of experience gained in handling and processing advertisement files.

Contact

If you have any questions, please contact Copy Control:

Tel: (01) 531 0992 Email: copycontrol@irishtimes.com

File Delivery

Please note that digitally transmitted advertisement copy, both mono and colour, should be in PDF format, conform to PDF/X-1a:2001 standards and be Acrobat version 1.3. We recommend that copy is sent via a reputable file delivery system that pre-flights your file before transmission, as we do not offer a copy validating service.

Your file will be printed as received and should require no interventions or adjustments by us. Each file should be a single-page PDF named as the URN (CID): for example, 3132576.pdf. It must be the exact dimensions of the booked size and not contain any crop/trim/bleed marks or layers. If necessary, in order to meet deadlines, we reserve the right to adjust your copy.

If you are not confident that you can produce copy to the above standards, we recommend using a repro/process house. Although it is not essential for copy to come through these companies, they generally have in-depth knowledge of the newsprint industry and will help you to get the best possible reproduction from your copy. Please contact your preferred repro house for details of options and costs for supplying and transmitting copy. Under these circumstances, the repro house is acting as your agent.

We strongly advise that copy is NOT sent via email as it may be rejected by our email system without us knowing. For example, files more than five megabytes in size are automatically rejected.

For further information, please get in touch with Copy Control at (01) 531 0992.

Specifications and column widths for our publications

This document contains column widths, margins, special sizes, ICC profile, total ink weight, paper weight and more for our various publications. Please click here to view the contents.

Design specifications and recommendations

Colour Ads

While colour printing in The Irish Times is among the best available, advertisers and agencies need to be aware that there may be variations in colour when printing on a high-speed coldset press. It should also be noted that we can be up to two dots out of register and still be within industry norms for this type of press.

The only options for single-spot colours are cyan, magenta and yellow. We do not undertake to match other shades, or Pantone colours, other than on the basis of reasonable endeavours.

Comparison proofs can be supplied to our print plant at Citywest. A cover note supplying all relevant information regarding publication, publication date, etc. should be attached to the proofs.They should be addressed as follows:

AdministratorThe Irish Times Print FacilityCityWest Business Campus4080 Kingswood RoadDublin 24

Type Size

Small type should be reproduced as a single colour only, preferably black. Small type is considered to be sans-serif type that is 10 points or smaller and serif type that is 12 points or smaller.

The Irish Times recommends sans-serif type, 10 points or larger, as the best choice for newsprint reproduction.

Reversed Type

Fine serif typefaces should be avoided in reverses. Fonts with fine lines filled in with ink when printed on newsprint. For a four-colour background, we recommend a minimum of 14 points bold for all typefaces. The type should not be reversed on a light-coloured background. Bold sans-serif typefaces are recommended for all reversed text. For a single-colour background (magenta, cyan or black,) we recommend 10 points for bold sans-serif type and 12 points for serif type. The type should not be reversed on a solid yellow background.

RIP Settings

The Irish Times RIPs (raster image processors) will reproduce knockout or overprint as specified in the artwork. Advertisers and/or their agent(s) are reminded that when inappropriate settings are selected, the printed copy may not match the same copy as viewed on screen.

If you are unsure about any aspect of preparing copy files (and especially colour copy) for newsprint, we strongly recommend that you have your copy validated by a repro house.

Please note our RIPs are not compatible with PDF versions above Acrobat 1.3.

The in-house setting for direct advertisers

The Irish Times offers advertisers an in-house ad-setting service for direct advertisers only. This service is intended only for advertisers who do not have access to publishing or design software and who are prepared to leave the final say of presentation and layout details to The Irish Times. However, we will endeavour to match the requested layout styles where possible.

Please get in touch with your sales representative to make arrangements. You can then email your copy, graphics, logos, pics, etc., directly to your representative. Do not send these files to Copy Control.

Any graphics, logos or photos in your ad must be in TIFF, EPS or JPEG format (CMYK only, not RGB), with a definition of at least 200 dpi at the final printed size. If logos contain type elements, all fonts must be embedded or vectorised. All text MUST be supplied in electronic format.

For copyright reasons, The Irish Times does not accept copies of font files or folders belonging to anyone else. By using this service, you agree that we may substitute fonts at our sole discretion.

PDF (portable document format) proofs can be supplied if requested, but copy must be sent to us at least 24 hours before deadlines. Only one proof will be supplied. If changes/alterations are required, ALL these changes should be relayed to your sales contact, who will ensure that they are made. No further changes will be accepted.

Colour Management in Photoshop

To prepare artwork to be printed in The Irish Times, you can download a PDF that details how to set Photoshop for the correct colour settings.

Click on the links below to download compressed copies of the Photoshop colour settings and ICC Profile. You will need to extract these files from the compressed file once downloaded using an applicable tool, such as WinZip or Stuffit.

• Colour Management
• ICC Profile
• Photoshop colour settings

Online advertisement specifications

• gutters template