Artwork Guidelines

Please click here for a printable PDF file of our artwork guidelines reference sheet.

We gladly accept any input from you about your design. To help us create your design, we will accept sketches, clippings, photos, written ideas and verbal descriptions that we can use to help get your ideas across. Supplying this information from the beginning will help to keep your art costs down and the quality of your finished garments up. Major additions or changes to your art after it is created will result in an alteration charge. This information will be given to the Art Department, where the design will be created on the computer.

If you will be supplying digital files for all or part of your design, they must fall within the guidelines listed below for us to use them successfully. Please attach a paper print-out of all files to be used if they are supplied on disk. This helps to ensure that all files are retrieved from the disk successfully. You may also e-mail your art to david@hipeak.com. We use Macintosh Computers, but can accept PC files saved with the format extensions as shown below.


VECTOR- ADOBE ILLUSTRATOR CS3 or earlier
1. Must be in vector format
2. All text must be turned to outlines
3. All placed images must be included or embedded
4. All placed or embedded images must be at a quality resolution:
(300dpi or above at the printed size)
5. All colors in design should be in spot colors NOT CMYK or RGB

Format extensions:
.eps (MAC or PC)
.ai (MAC or PC)


COREL DRAW 8.0 or earlier
1. Must be in vector format
2. All text must be turned to curves.
3. All placed images must be included or embedded
4. All placed or embedded images must be at a quality
resolution: (300dpi or above at the printed size)
5. All designs with gradients should supplied: one file with
gradients and one file without gradients
6. All colors in design should be in spot colors NOT CMYK or RGB

Format extensions:
.eps (MAC or PC)
.cdr (MAC)


RASTER- ADOBE PHOTOSHOP CS3 or earlier
1. Art must be created at printed size & at a quality resolution:
(300dpi or above at the printed size)
2. All text layers must be rendered.
3. All layers should be in tact (NOT FLATTENED)
4. Color format should be RGB

Format extensions:
.psd (MAC or PC)
.tif (MAC or PC)

SCANNED PHOTOS, TEXT IMAGES & SCANNED IMAGES: The following formats are used to compress images, photos, and/or text into a digital format when they are scanned. JPEG (.jpg), TIFF (.tif), GIF (.gif), BMP (.bmp).

These are single layer files. For them to be useful, they need to be at a resolution of 300 ppi and at the size you want them printed. If they contain more than one color, they will need to be separated; which may increase your art charge. Designs with multiple scanned images, ideally should be supplied as separate scans and not compressed into one.

UNUSABLE FILE FORMATS: Artwork created in Microsoft Word .doc files and any word processing files. Power Point .ppt files. Our art department works on Macintosh computers, using primarily Adobe products.

LARGE TEXT FILES: Text can be supplied through e-mail or in a Microsoft Word document when the design contains large quantities of text. Ex: list of student names. Supplying this text can significantly reduce art costs.