Help with File Types

[Alissanos]

Hey everyone

I've become a little obsessed with pixellation and more than a little frustrated with file exporting from adobe illustrator! So just looking for some clarification or tips

In the zazzle design tool, we can use jpeg, png, pdf, svg and ai files as far as I can tell. When I create an svg, I can edit the colors as long as there are 5 or less but cannot tile svgs, is that right? So these are not pixelated on large items like shower curtains. So svgs are great for smaller things but without tiling not so good for bigger items? If I want a pattern. I know I can scale an svg up to any size but the design doesn't always work for what I need.

So if I want an svg pattern I have two options, create the pattern in illustrator so colors can be edited in the design tool, or make a tile for a pattern and upload as an ai file which is tileable but cannot change the colors. Both ways are great quality, no pixels..

Png, generally every png I upload is 8000px square so I rarely get the error message that it might look blurry, but when I zoom in I see pixels and that kinda drives me crazy, but if zazzle is not throwing an error, it should be okay?  I guess I could also make an svg tile and export as png for tiling, but I'm not sure why I would do that if I can just use the ai tile for better quality? 

I've stayed away from pdfs so far because every time I export them from illustrator they are a different size than I set, it also came out worse than the png in quality. I know I'm doing something wrong there I just dont know what. 

As you can probably tell, I have been overthinking all this and have confused myself as to which method to use for best quality to the point that I'm not working on making more designs.

So if anyone can untangle my mind on all this so I can get back to being more productive, I would really appreciate it!

Thanks

[KeegansCreation]

For the AI PDF files, try Save As PDF rather than Export As. I Save As and never had a problem. It doesn't seem like Export rather than Save should be a problem but maybe it is. It will be far smaller than it should be when you bring it into Zazzle but should not be pixelated when you scale it up.

[Alissanos]

Thanks, I will try that, can I ask why you choose to use pdfs? I have read several times that they are better resolution than png or jpg which would be the obvious answer, but since zazzle supports ai and svg, are those not a better choice? Or am I missing something about pdf? 

[PenguinPower]

Unless you need someone who doesn't have access to Illustrator to see the files, there's not really any reason I can think of to save them as PDF rather than .ai...  

.PNG files are raster not vector, so they do need to be large and are made of pixels - but don't fret too much over the screen previews of products.. they aren't showing the original files, they've been converted and resized six times probably to warp onto the product and then to display on the web page, so you aren't seeing the original file anymore. On certain products the up close previews of even vector images look pixelated... in real life they definitely aren't. 

[Alissanos]

Thanks, I think that's what I've been trying to figure out too about pdf, but you said it better. 

I never really considered that aspect of it, that the previews are not showing the actual quality. I think I've become too focused on that aspect of it. I tend to upload all my pngs to a printing site that give you a quality rating for print sizes and the maximum size it can be printed without being pixellated, but the sizes they say my files can be printed at are always huge which makes me doubt it. I mean it says that 8000px square can be printed at excellent quality up to 72inches which just seems unlikely to me.

[CrazyMermaid]

You are not all tangled up. It is just there is no easy way to get the best of both worlds. I love using svg files and changing the colors. However, I don't do this for patterns, because there is no way in the design tool to get the pattern to be the right size. Just increasing the size of the .svg files usually makes the pattern too big. So I change the colors in illustrator and then export to .png. I have spent many a dizzy afternoon musing over the best way to do all of this. Sounds like you understand all of the issues pretty accurately.

[Alissanos]

Thank you, I think you have it right, there is no way to have the best of both. I also love svgs and the ability to change the colors, it would be amazing to be able to tile them.

I've been experimenting with fabric recently and there doesn't seem to be a way to change an svg color in the fabric tool anyway but it's easy enough to make an ai file for a yard of fabric with a repeating pattern and then upload the entire thing instead of tiling. Still experimenting with that.

I suppose the benefit with tiling for a pattern is that the tile can be small and the quality will be the same when repeated but it took me a few days to work out how to make them look right at the seam.

There are so many products I havent even tried yet here on Zazzle and I wanted to get my design process streamlined before branching out to lots of different types. I really need to work on that because at the moment if I make a pattern, i will put it on one or two products, when there are so many more I could add it to

But I procrastinate way too much and am too much of a perfectionist at times, I have 150 or so saved designs that I havent published because they arnt exactly right for my liking or I want to work on them a little more before publishing, but the list just keeps getting bigger