Microscopic Printing?

[puppetpimp]

Hi all,
Im a creative who is not very well versed in manufacturing side of things so forgive me if this is in the wrong forum.

I'm looking to produce a promotional item with a "secret message" printed on it. The secret message would be revealed when someone views it through a magnifying glass or even better a microscope.

It would not have to be any kind of beautifully detailed image, just something to get a point across.

My question is, is this technology even available? If so, what terminiology would I use to type into google to find vendors?

Thanks in advance!

Jesse

[gordo]

[SNIP]
I'm looking to produce a promotional item with a "secret message" printed on it. The secret message would be revealed when someone views it through a magnifying glass or even better a microscope.[SNIP}

Here's a sample of "microtype":


The letter "e" is 8pt type The word "CREO" is about 1/4 point high and repeated forms what simply looks like a solid 1/4 pt rule until you look at it under a loupe or magnifying glass.

This might give a better sense of scale. Here the microtype is beside part of an American penny. I've also place a copy of the letter "T" aligned with the type so that you can compare it more easily.


I know that it can be done by printers who have a Creo/Kodak Trendsetter CtP device to make plates. It may be possible with other CtP systems - but that I don't know.

What I suggest is that you make your secret line of text at several point sizes, say 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 points in all caps using an application like Adobe Illustrator. Then bring that graphic into a page layout application and scale it there to 75%, 50% and 25%. Make sure that the total graphic area size is as small as possible. Then ask your printshop to do a test for you by imposing this graphic on the off cut area of one of their jobs. The off cut area is normally trimmed away. Tell them to ignore your graphic when the real job it's running with is printed.

It shouldn't cost you anything for them to do this. The test will show you what the smallest types size your printshop can reliably print. Keep notes so that you don't get confused about which size is which.

best, gordon p

[puppetpimp]

wow this will work perfectly!

Thanks so much gordon. Off to find someone who can do it!

Anyone here that can please contact me at jessewroblewski @ hotmail.com
(remove the spaces)