: Move design from Photoshop to Illustrator for printing I'm working on some business cards in Photoshop and I come understand it's not the best medium for print since it's not vector based like

@Kevin459

From Photoshop

It is possible to print vector shapes from Photoshop, although it appears to require a PostScript Printer.


Print vector data

If an image includes vector graphics, such as shapes and type, Photoshop can send the vector data to a PostScript printer. When you choose to include vector data, Photoshop sends the printer a separate image for each type layer and each vector shape layer. These additional images are printed on top of the base image, and clipped using their vector outline. Consequently, the edges of vector graphics print at the printer’s full resolution, even though the content of each layer is limited to the resolution of your image file.

Note:
Some blending modes and layer effects require rasterized vector data.


Choose File > Print.
In the options box at right, scroll to the bottom, and expand PostScript Options.
Select Include Vector Data.



From helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/printing-photoshop1.html#print_vector_data
From Adobe Reader

If you don't have a PostScript printer, then the easiest way I found was to export to PDF and ensure you select the option to include Layers. Adobe Reader (or Acrobat) seems to print vector data nicely.

As others have mentioned you could also import the data into Illustrator via PDF/EPS although it's not strictly necessary.

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@Rambettina927

You can keep your background in Photoshop and continue to use Photoshop to manage the calibration, colors, resolution and effects as you like to do.

And for your texts, you can save them in a new layer file in Photoshop (a .psd), and then open this file in Illustrator.

Here is the way to do it

Once you have your text in vector (converted from your Photoshop layer file), you can simply add your background to it and use Illustrator as your new publishing software. You should now type all your texts and draw the sharp graphic in Illustrator, and not use Photoshop anymore for this.

Yes, ideally you should use Indesign especially if you need to do multiple pages layout. But Illustrator can be used for single page layouts such as postcards or business cards.

When you'll prepare your files for print-ready use, you can select all your text and do a "create outline" (menu "type") and it will make that text non-editable. Then you can save that file to PDF with the highest quality possible. (Some tricks to compress a PDF to lower size here).

if you need to create a multiple page document but still prefer to stick to Illustrator, it's always possible to merge all your PDF files in ONE single PDF file. This is how it's done if you can use Adobe Acrobat Pro that comes with the Creative Suite/Cloud from Adobe.

You could always keep working with Photoshop but... You really gain more in simply learning Illustrator and even better, Indesign. In Indesign, you can easily combine together your vector graphics from Illustrator and you pictures from Photoshop; and the best thing is InDesign creates vector texts that are always perfect for printing and is also created to handle files to the max performance of your computer. You will find this interesting if you ever need to work on a catalog for example! You can also use Master-Pages with Indesign and it saves a lot of work. Indesign is really better than Illustrator for publishing and productivity.

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Note: Exporting a PDF from Photoshop WITHOUT flattening your layers should keep your text layers in vectors. Use the "save as", no need to "print" the PDF.

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@Tiffany317

You could always try saving your image as a Photoshop EPS, or PDF. this is usually much crisper than a PSD or JPG if placed into an Illustrator file. Unfortunately, you will probably not be able to further edit the type or image.

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@Marchetta832

InDesign would probably be the better choice but Illustrator will do. What I would suggest is placing your Photoshop File in Illustrator and then set the text again, using the design in the background as your guide. After that's done you can hide the text layers in the photoshop file. Same goes for any shapes that you created in photoshop.

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