so there's no other place to put this

Tonight, I started on an invitation a girl I know needs for the junior/senior prom at the school where she teaches.

So far, I have the mainline of text and a peice of artwork, borrowed from MS Office Clipart. Keep in mind, I am doing this for her for free, so I am not profiting off of it...cept brownies...I like brownies.

Also, keep in mind that I have never, ever, done anything for print. Until now, my target has always been screen. So beat it up if you must. Mostly looking for input from the folks who do desktop publishing.

without further adeu

http://antistatik.oesm.org/sofa_invitation.gif

I think it's too dark. If it's a happy ever after pic I wouldn't use dark purple or magenta. Maybe fade from white to a lighter shade? Make your gradient nice and even too.

I would choose a different font, a little more elegant without being too scriptive. Did she want it to say, "Happily ever after". I would use a different phrase. Like "an evening to remember" or something like that.

Try putting the text underneath. Or, move the picture down. There needs to be space between the text and the picture.

Add something else. Get a divider, some fancy way to 'underline' the text and add a little interest. What if you made a circle outline around the clip art, cutting off the bottom and having their heads stick out? It's kind of hard to explain. But if you could focus on a larger part of the couple, making it more a 1/2 or 3/4 pic than a full-length, it might look more interesting. On the other hand, the dress is interesting. I think if you just add something else so it doesn't look like a floating image it would be fine.

It looks fine.

I would make the guys tux shirt white though, since you already have white in there.

Are you planning on using white paper??

yygrökk!! Hate that kind of gradients!!! Yuc!!

..but, if you drew the pics yourself, I guess it looks nice....

1- Gradients is what she wanted. The schools colors are that purple and that grey. They look like ass, but they are bearable on a peice of glossy cardstock. Trust me, it looks 3 times worse if I have the colors butted up against each other in a solid edge.

2- I changed the typo more to my liking.

3- The theme of the prom is "Happily Ever After". Changing the name on the ticket would be very stupid, considering the entire junior class voted for what the theme and title would be. Nope, Not very flexible there.

yygrökk!! Hate that kind of gradients!!! Yuc!!

..but, if you drew the pics yourself, I guess it looks nice....

Did you read what I said? Or did you just click on the link to see what it looks like? If you had you would know 1)This is the first time I have ever done anything for print. 2) I didn't draw the artwork, I got it from the Microsoft Clipart cd.

To the others, thanks for you input.

I'm not sure exactly what you're going for, but I'm hoping you are keeping in mind the fact that print work involves ink. Since this is for free and for a friend and not "professionally" done, I'm assuming you're using a inkjet. I'm not sure I would use purple and black for print work. For me, print work means I need to make up for the color I'm certainly not going to use up by adding a bunch of fancy text and semi-hidden eye candy. Stuff like curls and curves in the background to help accent the piece. I would put the people dancing in the background behind the Happily Ever After. White backgrounds are always good.

Actually no, I work at a print/copy shop where I can use the equipment for my personal use as long as I pay for it. I plan on using a Xerox Docucolor 12 to print them out.

White backgrounds are always good. But she doesn't want a white background. Rest assured, I have already talked to several of the people who do the desktop publishing at work. Once I get to work tomorrow, I will do a couple proof's of it to make sure it comes out with the desired result.

I don't think I want to print on heavy, glossy paper at home with my inkjet, no matter how good it is.

Where I work, you dont pay for how many colors or how much ink it is going to take for a print-out. We charge by the sheet and the heavier the paper, the higher the cost.

Sorry, Axiom, if I was rude... :( The shouts were just personal opinions..i do hate gradients.. lol.. missed the text about the clipArt...

A docuColor should cope with the colors, I think...
No hard feelings?? *bows head in shame*