Learn how to customize your printable designs in this step-by-step guide. This help guide will cover how to customize your printable designs in Arts People.
Content
Customizing Your Printable Designs
Recommended Reading Before You Start
Instructions
The Printable Design setup area is where ticket designs, receipt designs and gift certificate designs can be edited and customized.
When your system is initially set up, we will put a standard Letter sized ticket, letter sized receipt and regular gift certificate design in place with your logo. But you can then choose to further customize these designs and also configure box office ticket stock versions as well if you wish.
The designs are intended to be configured and universal for all transactions, not changed from show to show. The content can be very dynamic based on what the ticket pulls from the show setup, venue setup, etc. so the ticket printed for each show has different information. There are dynamic fields on the show and performances screen and on the venue. Using these creatively can make your tickets include very different information from show to show, while the ticket design doesn't need to change.
Each object is positioned by entering the numeric position in "points" (72 to the inch). Your account uses the PDF library called Webkit. The vertical position is given from the top, horizontal position is given from the left edge.
If you wish to rotate some objects, you may alter their 'angle.' The angle feature rotates text that is displayed on the ticket. For example, entering 90 in the angle field for Show Name will rotate the show name on the ticket to display at a 90 degree angle. To see this option, go to the Personal Settings Screen page and select the 'show advanced widgets' check box.
Designs
Letter Sized Ticket Design
The Letter sized ticket design is by default an 8.5 X 11 sheet of paper for patrons printing their tickets at home. It also will be your default ticket for your box office unless you design a Box office Ticket, and then it becomes the design printed at your box office. Due to this there's plenty of room for creativity and promotional text. Each Letter sized ticket can admit any number of patrons to a single performance - the default is 1 per page. If you'd like to update this setting to display more than 1 ticket per page, simply speak to your Client Services Rep who can update this information for you.
Objects available for the Letter sized ticket Design:
- Text. Enter the text under Text. Select the font and point size. If you enter a width, the text will wrap at that width. The text field also accepts HTML text formatting codes, such as centering, Bold and Italics.
- Box. Enter the width and height of the box.
- Ticket Data. Select the font and point size. On printout, this becomes a table showing all the tickets the patron has purchased, with the person type, seat number, and amount of the ticket, the order fee, total purchase, and total (if any) from other tickets. Make sure to allow for enough room for this table to expand down with the number of tickets printed on the page (by default this is 1 on the Letter sized ticket).
- Ticket Code - This is a unique code used to verify the purchase. The system auto-generates this for every ticket order.
- Show Name - this is pulled dynamically from the show. (this field aligns left unless you input a max width)
- Show Time and date - this is pulled dynamically from the show. (this field aligns left unless you input a max width)
- Show Note - this is pulled dynamically from the shows setup screen for that show from the "Show notes for ticket" field.
- Perf Note - this is pulled dynamically from the performances setup screen for that show from the "Performance notes for ticket" field.
- Admit X - The number of people, of each person type, to be admitted.
- Image - This is an image which you have uploaded on the Configure Appearance page. Then on the ticket design screen choose image and input the image file name in the text field. Note: only JPG images are supported to appear on the ticket, receipt or gift certificate designs. This object type will be static on all tickets printed until you remove it. This is often used for your company logo, or a sponsor logo or coupon that you want to appear indefinitely.
- Show Image - will be pulled dynamically from the show image for ticket. NOTE that this can be used creatively. Consider making a larger combined image that includes the show image itself along with a sponsor logo or some text and the show image of your next show. This image can include whatever you like. The key is to be consistent with the overall image size, so you always know it will fit properly on your ticket.
- Address Area - This prints the name and address of the patron. Position it to fit in the window of your window envelope, if you mail tickets to patrons.
- Person Name.
- Venue Name and Venue Address - Name and Address of the venue, pulled dynamically from the Venues screen. Note that you can put simple instructions in the address field as well, such as "2000 Main St - corner of Main and Broadway".
- Venue Image - Pulled dynamically from the venue screen for that venue. This might be a picture of the venue building, or maybe a small google map that you save and upload into this field.
- Barcode - Barcode is used if you plan to scan tickets at the venue entrance using a barcode scanner, connected to a computer that is accessing the system at your venue point of entry. The barcode element on the ticket design works like a font, so be sure to give it a font size of at least 25 to make it display on the printed ticket.
Other Printable Designs - Box office ticket, Ticket Header, Gift Certificate
In addition to the standard Letter sized ticket design, you can also design a "box office" ticket that will print from your box office sales instead of the Letter sized ticket. This is called "box office" since many organizations will order box office ticket stock with a logo, marketing or other messaging, then use these to print the specific ticket information onto.
The Ticket Header works with the Box office ticket design to print out a separate ticket typically with the patrons' name and address which you can fit into a window envelope for mailing or staple onto an envelope for will call tickets, etc.
Gift Certificate designs also are built via the ticket design screen.
Elements for these designs include:
- Text. Enter the text under Text. Select the font and point size. If you enter a width, the text will wrap at that width.
- Box. Enter the width and height of the box.
- Ticket Code. This is a unique code used to verify the purchase.
- Show Name - this is pulled dynamically from the show. (this field aligns left unless you input a max width, then it centers in the specified space)
- Show Time and date - this is pulled dynamically from the show. (this field aligns left unless you input a max width, then it centers in the specified space)
- Section, Row, Seat # objects - makes the section code, row letter, seat number appear where each piece is placed.
- Image. This is an image which you have uploaded on the Configure Appearance page. Note: currently, only JPG images are supported. This object type will be static on all tickets printed.
- Show Image - will be pulled dynamically from the show image for ticket.
- Address Area - This prints the name and address of the patron. Position it to fit in the window of your window envelope, if you mail tickets to patrons.
- Person Name.
- Venue Name and Venue Address. Address of the venue, pulled dynamically from the Venues screen.
- Ticket Add-ons - This will print the ticket add-on selection short name if the patron has selected a ticket add-on with their tickets.
Previewing Your Design
To preview your design, you must first sell yourself a ticket on the box office screen, or a gift certificate via the retail screen. It should not be a comp (use the test credit card method by inputting your admin user login as the credit card number - test transactions go away at midnight), and it's best if it has multiple performances and 10 or more tickets on at least one performance. When you complete this test sale you can print the ticket to see it on your screen. Then use the ticket code on ticket design screen to preview: click Save ticket code. Then click on Preview Letter sized ticket.
Overflowing to Additional Pages
Box office tickets, by default, will print one per page. If your page has more than one ticket you will specify this on that design screen and it will print them down the page before rolling to the next page.
Box office Ticket specifics
In most cases the box office ticket design will be for a thermal ticket printer that prints one ticket at a time. So you input the dimensions of your ticket, 1 ticket per page and design for that measurement.
If instead, you are sheet printing tickets wherein you have more than one ticket on a sheet with perforations, you will input the dimension of the entire page, input the number of tickets per page, then you will design the ticket from the bottom for the BOTTOM TICKET. So the vertical position will start from the bottom, not from the top of the sheet. Start with numbers in the 100's to see how it fits on the ticket. Then if printing a multiple order, the tickets will fill the sheet and roll to the next sheet as appropriate.
Also, the types of objects available to place on your ticket changes when you choose box office tickets, because instead of having the ticket data as a single object, it's broken out. You may select:
- Full Seat No. This gives you the entire seat number (S-B10).
- Seat No. This gives just the number of the seat (10).
- Row. Just the row (B).
- Section. Just the section code (S).
Of course, you can also use just the full seat number. If you're interested in purchasing a Boca thermal ticket printer for your box office, our clients are offered a special discounted rate on Boca printers and their ticket stock. See Boca Ticket Printers.
Gift Certificates also are designed from this screen in the same way as above.
Receipt size selections & options
Receipts are hard coded with selections of letter, boca or dymo sized designs.
A logo can be added for your letter sized receipt by uploading a logo jpg file on the Setup Configure Appearance screen into the Logo field. It will then appear at the top left of the letter sized receipt instead of your organization name.
A custom note can be added to the letter sized receipt. This can be useful for tax ID information or other details. It will then appear on all letter sized receipts as a footer.
Patrons at home will always access a letter sized receipt.
For box office receipt printing, you can choose your default to be letter size, or boca or dymo ticket stock size. If you select boca or dymo options then the box officer will have the ability to select letter or the chosen ticket size option for ticket and receipt printing.
Note that your receipt size should match the ticket size that you are printing so they can be printing in combination.
Note that on global settings screen we have an option to "collapse all tickets to the same performance to one line in ticket-style receipts?" This setting will change how performances are listed on ticket sized (boca, dymo) receipts. Instead of individual ticket rows following the performance row, there now will just be a # of tickets at the end of the performance row. This can help save ticket stock based on less paged needed.
Customizing Your Printable Designs
For this example, let’s add a show title to the Our Season section of the letter size ticket.
- To make this change, select Setup from the main menu on the left.
- Under the Public Design section, select Printable Designs. Here you can view all possible printable designs. Simply select the tab labeled with the size you wish to customize.
For this example, let’s customize a letter sized ticket. Select the Letter Sized Ticket tab.
- The last purchase that was made will show up in the Test Code field. Select Preview Design to view this ticket. This will open in a new window. Close the window when finished viewing.
Note: Before you make changes, it is important to note that you should not make changes to the template. If you make changes to the template, it will clear all the information that was previously built within your template. You will have to build a new template from scratch.
- There are some features that are pulled dynamically. You will not have to put this information in yourself. This includes the top section which is pulled from the show information and the ticket sale and the venue information from your venue setup.The information on the bottom of the ticket is what may be customized within this section. If you would like to make a change to this design, first locate the field you wish to change from the list. In this row, select the Pencil icon.
- Make the changes within the editable field within that row. When finished, select Save.
- To check your changes, select Preview Design.
Note: Changes are saved automatically and will be visible to patrons as soon as you select Save.
Uploading an Image
To Change the image on your printable design you need to upload the image so it is available within the system. When adding an image to printable design, you will enter the title of the image instead of the image itself.
- To complete this process select Setup from the main menu on the left.
- Under the Public Design section, select Configure Appearance.
- The Image Upload section is an area you can change yourself. If you would like to change images on your printable designs, select Choose File at the bottom of the page.
Note: If you do not have a web designer on staff, we highly recommend you contact Arts People before making any changes to the Header, Top Section, and Footer section. Arts People web designers will make the chances as needed on your behalf.
- Select the image from your computer. Then, select Open.
- After, select Upload.
- Return to the letter size design by selecting Setup from the main menu on the left.
- Then, select Printable Designs.
- Under the Letter size tab, can now add the image to a section on your ticket. At the bottom of the page, select the position of this image by using the horizontal and vertical position columns.
Note: if your image is not placed where you like, simply adjust the vertical and horizontal placement in the first two columns.
In the Type of Object section, select Image from the dropdown menu. In the text box, enter the file name for the image you wish to include.
Then, enter the width of the image. When finished, select Save.
- Preview your design to check your changes.
