Online Labels Forum

I'm sorry to hear about the issues that you are experiencing. I am confident that we can help troubleshoot and resolve the issue.

I will need to get some more details from you in order to get a further understanding of the issue. Are you using our Maestro Label Designer software? If not, what software are you using to format the labels and which of our templates did you download?

I looked up your email address in our system, but I don't see any orders or any saved Maestro Label Designer files under that email address. I do see several sample requests. I assume you ordered using a different email address than the email address that you used to log in to post to this forum.

Based on what you are explaining it sounds like it something related to the template. Please provide some additional details and we can try to further troubleshoot.

Also, here are some critical items that we think are very important when it comes to getting your labels formatted to print correctly.

http://www.onlinelabels.com/Support/Maestro/AlignmentGuide/Alignment-Guide.aspx

It sounds like this is a template issue that you are experiencing so the recommendations above will not likely resolve the issue, but I think they are helpful either way.

I'm glad to hear that you were able to solve the issue. Generally speaking, our sheets do not have a top or bottom. They should have even margins all around. In some cases, during the production process we get small variances in the top / bottom / left / right that can cause the sheets to not have perfect margins effectively making it so there is a top / bottom to the sheet. We normally try to make sure are margins are within 0.0625" (1/16th of an inch) of the margins specified on the dimensions page for the item on our website.

It does sound like there may be a template issue. I need to look into templates to make sure that are templates on our site are exactly the same as the tooling that we are using to make the labels. I assume you are using our PDF templates that are provided on the site? Can you confirm that you used the PDF templates from our site?

I also highly recommend that you add bleed to your design and give yourself room for at least 0.125" (1/8th of an inch) of movement when printing. If your design doesn't have much margin of error, you will waste a lot of sheets in the process of printing your labels.

I will have one of our team members investigate our templates for the OL1762 to make sure they are correct.

Thanks for the feedback. Feel free to contact us if we can help out in any way.

I went into our system and reviewed your most recent design on the OL2088 labels (Snickerdoodle). The first thing that that I notice is the fact that you don't have bleed on the design. You definitely need to have bleed on this design to have any chance of getting good prints.

I noticed that your uploaded image is exactly the size of the label. Are you able to go into the program that you used to create the original image and extend the gray circular area to 1.75" rather than 1.5". Once you do that, you can upload the new image into Maestro Label Designer with the bleed already on it.

If that is not an option, you can use take your existing image/design that you have on the computer and use an image program on your computer to break out the 2 pieces with wording to create 2 separate images. Once you have the 2 images (the top image and the bottom image) as separate files with the gray background already on them, you can upload them into Maestro Label Designer. Once you do that you can create a background that matches the gray color. You can then bleed that background over the edge of the label.

I am happy to further clarify these steps if they are not clear.

I did a test print on my end and I am not seeing a difference in color where the text box is on the sheet and the background color. In some cases, it has to do with how your printer renders the PDF file. Please try the option below to see if it fixes the issue.

http://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/kb/quick-fix-print-pdf-image.html

Thanks. I hope these recommendations are helpful.

Sarcomere - Can you provide some additional information so we can troubleshoot the issue?

Which of our products are you using?

Are the white lines showing up on every label on the sheet or just the labels on the outside margin of the sheet?

Did you bleed your design over the edge of label (see this article on bleed - http://www.onlinelabels.com/Support/Maestro/AlignmentGuide/Printer-Bleed.aspx)?

Let me know and we can try to help troubleshoot the issue. Thanks.

Dave

Jeanne - Thanks for the feedback. Rather than try to trouble shoot this issue over this forum post, I will have one of our customer service representatives contact you tomorrow to work with you on the issues that you are experiencing.

I am confident that we can work with you to help you successfully complete your project. We are also happy to provide some additional sheets if you have wasted sheets during the set up process.

Thanks.

Dave

Jeanne - Thanks for the positive feedback. We appreciate your comments and look forward to working with you on future projects.

Dave

Sara - Can you provide some more specific details on how the template is off? How much is it off and in what direction?

Are you printing directly out of Adobe Illustrator or are you generating a PDF and then printing from Adobe Reader?

There is always going to be some movement when printing so you definitely want the template layer to be set non-printing in your Illustrator file. Are you setting the template layer to non-printing in your Illustrator file so you are not printing the die lines? It is also critical that you have some bleed on your design (color going over the edge of the label).

Let me know more specific details on the way in which it is off and I can offer some suggestions to resolve the issue.

Thanks.

Dave

Sara -

I'm sorry to hear about the issues that you've experienced. I've spent some time this morning analyzing both the PDF and EPS templates for our product OL7425 and have found that they are formatted correctly. To verify, I used Adobe Illustrator to create and print designs using both templates. The designs consisted of a thick, color border and centered text. In both cases, when printing from Adobe Illustrator the designs printed perfectly aligned.

There are a few additional suggestions I can make that could potentially improve the alignment of your printed labels.

- It's very important to make sure that page scaling is disabled with any software that you are using to print labels. If you check the scaling options when reviewing your print settings, and scaling is set to something like "Fit To Page" or "Custom Scaling" the labels will almost certainly print misaligned.

- Label material is thicker than standard copy paper. Some printer models have a difficult time feeding thicker materials, which can sometimes cause misalignment. If you haven't already, try setting the material type option in your print settings to a heavier material, such as labels, heavy paper, or cardstock. This should result in the sheets feeding more slowly through the printer, and often leads to better aligned prints.

- If you've tried making the adjustments listed above, and you're still experienced misaligned prints when printing from Adobe Illustrator, try saving the completed template as a PDF file and then opening the saved PDF file within the newest version of Adobe Reader. Some customers have reported better alignment when printing from the newest version of Adobe Reader - this may have something to do with the version of Adobe Illustrator or Adobe Photoshop they were using to print their labels. If you do opt to print from Adobe Reader, remember to make sure that page scaling is set to "Actual Size".

If you've tried the suggestions provided above and are still experiencing issues, please feel free to contact our customer service department for technical support. One of our representatives will be happy to take a look at your template and work with you to improve your alignment. You can reach our customer service department directly by calling 1-888-575-2235. You may also click on the link below to submit a support ticket.

https://secure.onlinelab...port/SupportRequest.aspx

I hope this information helps. If you need any additional details please just let me know!

I checked your account and it appears the item you are experiencing an issue with alignment on is item OL2088 (1.5" circular labels) not item OL288. I checked your saved design in Maestro Label Designer and it does appear that you are having to make a pretty big adjustment to the left which isn't normal. Small adjustments are sometimes necessary when working with circular labels.

I would like to establish that the issue isn't a page scaling issue when printing. Is the alignment only off left / right or is it off top / bottom also? Can you confirm that your page scaling in Adobe Reader is set to "Actual Size"? Can you measure the left / right margins on the label sheet? I want to confirm the sheet is cut correctly and within our quality tolerances. The left / right margins should be 0.25".

Let me know and we can continue to troubleshoot the issue.

Thanks.

Dave C.
OnlineLabels.com