What do frozen pizza and LPi’s Art and Media Portal have in common?

Not a thing–unless you count the phrase “For best results…”.

Do your graphics look blurry?  Is the text hard to read?  Are there “jagged” edges that looked smooth when you saw it on screen?  Chances are, the graphic was copied and pasted from the web.

Web graphics are “dumbed down”–their quality is reduced–for display.  This allows a webpage to load quickly, showing the page to you faster.  However, this means that the “display” images on the web don’t have the quality needed to print clearly when transferred to paper!

“For best results” is one of those phrases seldom thought about–except when it isn’t followed.  Just like an overcooked pizza, low-resolution graphics can still be used–they’re just not as tasteful (tasty?).  The result of a less than proper graphic will be blurry, the edges jagged, any text almost illegible.

So…why go with less than optimal results if you can avoid it? With this thought in mind, here is a simple “For best Results”.

Following these directions will help avoid blurriness, difficult-to-read-text, and other pitfalls found when using graphic art.

When you have logged onto the AMp and selected the graphic you would like, please do the following.

1) Left-click the download button located below the graphic (or to the right of the graphic in the “expanded view”.

2) Choose to “save” the graphic to your Desktop, your My Pictures file, or some other location you find easy to access.

3) Open your publication (in Word, Publisher, Quark, Indesign, etc.) and go to the page where you would like the graphic.  (From here on in, the steps are different, depending on the program you use.)

4) Place the graphic according to your particular program.  for instance:

–In the various versions of MS Publisher, and MS word (pre-2007): choose the Insert command from the menu (Insert–>picture–>from file) to browse to the graphic, and double-click on the graphic to select it and place it on the page.

–In MS Word 2007: Click the Insert command, and select the Picture Icon from the Ribbon Menu. Browse to the graphic and double click to place it on the page.

(If you use Quark, Indesign, or other program to create your document, please speak to your tech support representative for additional assistance.)

This method will make certain you have a high-resolution graphic, with the proper color information.  (CMYK vs. RGB–a topic for another post.)

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It should be noted that there is an exception to this rule, as with most rules.  If you need a TEXT file from the AMp (scripture readings, verses, etc.) you can copy and paste the text information, because the text does not need to be “dumbed down” to display on the webpage.  (Again, please feel free to contact your tech support representative for more details, as formatting issues may occur.)

Please be advised that some files are stored on the AMp as both a Graphic (text as art) and a TXT (text as…well….text) file.  Your tech support rep can help you identify which is which as needed.