Art Department

 

High Level Activities / Processing

  1. Receive Art Work Requirements / Instructions for orders.
  2. Ensure Suitable Art Work is received for #1
  3. Create and provide Artwork Visuals and costings for client approval
  4. Capture and record client approval for visuals/costs
  5. Create Art Assets required for decorating processes.
  6. Arrange Outsourcing of Embroidery (DST) Art File creation
  7. Create / Populate Technical specifications necessary to correctly apply artwork during production processes
  8. Check existing artwork / tech specs / visuals for repeat jobs.
  9. Approve created artwork and technical specifications.
  10. Save down all created artwork files for production usage.

 

External Service Capabilities

As well as servicing TOT's art requirements, the Art department has the following capabilities that can be offered to clients outside of job requirements

  1. Design
  2. Website development / decoration
  3. Art Decoration
  4. Social Media Art Work

 

The ability to offer/track/invoice these services to clients needs to be accommodated in a Future state

 

 

Inputs

From

Details

Production Admin

Art Requirements on job order

Production Management

Scheduling (Date) Requirements for Art processes

Webstore

Art Requirements on POD order

Website

Art Requirements on Design Your Own order

Client

Images that require artwork creation for usage on order (i.e. separations)

Client

Approval (or amendments req.) on in-house created visuals

 

Outputs

To

Details

Artwork assets

for usage on production processes (Print Screen, DTG, Embroidery, Vinyl)

Colour Visuals & Art Charges

Client approved visualisation of how decorated image should be positioned and look

Visual provided to clients includes art charges, so de facto art charges are approved also.

Stencil Requirement(s)

For artworks that will be screen printed, the details for screen-set necessary to print the image (inks, mesh sizes, sequencing)

Technical Specifications

Detailed technical configuration information as to how the artwork imagery needs be applied by the corresponding decorating process.

Supplier

PO for Embroidery File processing

 

 

Current Processing Flow: New Orders

  1. Art Requirements arise from job orders (new / repeat work) and the required artwork dates are derived from the schedule dates of the associated decorating processes. (Art is required before the actual decorating process date)

  2. For each art requirement received, the art room staff interrogate the requirement to ascertain what actions are required  - i.e. separate imagery / check over art on repeat orders / create vinyl transfer etc.

  3. For new orders, the Art Department will create a visualisation (colour visual) of how the artwork will look once decorated. As part of the colour visual process, the Art department will populate all art related charges

  4. The visualisation is provided to the client (via email and/or customer portal) for their approval.

  5. Upon approval of visuals & costs the Art Department will begin to process the actual art requirements. Note if approval has not been obtained, the Art Department will communicate with the client to obtain this.

  6. Source artwork from the client is required in order to process the art requirement. Typically high resolution artwork is provided by the client electronically - email / dropbox/ we transfer or other electronic transfer services

  7. Once the source artwork is received the Art Department will begin processing it (separating / ripping etc.) according to the instructions on the Art Requirement record.

  8. Note: as per visuals, the art department will chase clients for source artwork. Should this not be received in a timely manner, the Art department may push the process date forward.

  9. Processing of Artwork is typically done in external graphic specialist packages as summarised below:-

    Process Type

    Art Creation Package

    Screen Print

    Adobe Photoshop, illustrator

    DTG

    GTX Graphics Lab

    Embroidery

    TOT outsource the creation of DST files for the Tajima Embroidery machine to an external supplier in USA.

 

  1. As creation of Embroidery files is outsourced the Art Department raise a PO to reflect the order and cost.

  2. Upon creation of the Art Work Files needed for production machinery, the Art room staff save down the associated files to

    1. Internal; File servers for Screen Print and DTG

    2. email DST files to the embroidery department

  3. The Art Department then populate the Technical Specification which provides detailed information of how to carry out the decoration process. For Screen Printing the technical specification contains details of the stencils and inks required. This creates stencil and ink requirements for the corresponding departments..

  4. Upon completion of the technical specification, the Art Department run through a series of checks to ensure all required information has been captured and is accurate.

  5. The technical specification is marked as approved, and the Art Requirement is complete

See here for workflow schematic

Current Processing Flow: Repeat Orders

  1. For repeat jobs that have art requirements, the Art Department check the previous art records to ensure that it is appropriate for the repeat order. Specifically this involves checking that the Technical specification details are still applicable (ink types previously used may now be defunct)
  2. Any required updates will be made
  3. Once the record and all associated art assets have been checked, the record is marked as checked and is deemed complete.