Sometimes it is better to come out with the frank, brutal truth. In a
great many instances, poor newspaper reproduction is the direct result
of some executive's marked preference for a certain artist or a
certain technique, regardless of whether the man is qualified to draw
for this field, or whether the technique is fitted for the purpose.
On the other hand, there is, unquestionably, a strange, well nigh
inexcusable disregard of certain fundamentals of the business. There
is too much swivel-chair composure; too much beatific reassurance,
when proofs are submitted on good paper, from a flat-bed
engraver-house press. A newspaper series is very apt to look 100 per
cent when presented on the final electro sheet, or bound into a neat
booklet for the dealer and printed on coated stock. These are ostrich
methods!
In certain advertising agencies there is a standing rule in the matter
of newspaper plates that all proofs must be pulled on newspaper
stock--and a very inferior grade. A newspaper press is used, an entire
series coming off at once. There is no make-ready to speak of.
By this process no one is deceived. You see exactly what will happen,
or nearly so, when the series fares forth to newspapers all over the
country.
The executive mentioned above had collected newspapers, big and
little, from the four points of the compass. And he had collected a
liberal number of perfectly satisfactory newspaper advertisements of
the illustrated variety. Blacks were clean black, Ben Day tints held
their own, there was no congestion, no smudging, no mishap of any
sort.
If certain rules are followed, any newspaper advertising illustration
can be made "fool-proof." You can be absolutely certain of a printable
result, despite all exigencies, all drawbacks, all hazards.
Failure usually follows a desire to attempt something beyond that
which has been tried and is wholly practical. For the present, at
least, users of newspaper space _must_ bow to the inevitable. They
_must_ realize that there is a well-defined limit to what can be done
mechanically. They must _not_ defiantly experiment, although the
desire to "do something new" and to be original is entirely
praiseworthy.