A basic guide to decal making anyone?

Hi guys. I will have to do my own decals for a model bike and I have never done that before and I have run into some trouble. Is there anyone who could help answering a couple of questions then I'd be verry happy.

The conditions are as follows.
I have Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop, I have some logos in .eps-format, they will be printed on an ALPS-printer on transparent decal paper (most of the logos and text are white).

The questions (more might come) are as follows:

1. For the final product, shall I use Photoshop or Illustrator, or doesn't it matter?
2. What background color shall I use? As I will print white on transparant paper my guess is that the background has to be transparant as well which I know how to get in Photoshop, but how does it work in Illustrator?

well, now I see that I haven't got a clue of anything really, 1000's of questions popping up....perhaps it better if someone would like to make a shorter tutorial on the matter?
best regards
Joel

Use Illustrator as its designed for this sort of application, Photoshop is more for photos - believe it or not :iceslolan Personally I use Corel Draw as its what I'm used to and its very similar to Illustrator. Usually, unless you put in a backgrond or select a colour for the entire page then no background will be printed. Just select the page size you want, position your logo's as required and away you go.

Steve (Hiroboy) would be able to give you more specific advice on Illustrator and printing decals with it as it's what he uses.

Illustrator is a Vector based program and doesn't print a background unless you make one in the artwork. The great thing about it is that, unlike photoshop, you can get sharp edges no matter how you resize the art.... I could explain more, but this link will be much more helpful

FYI: it's about decals and part of it is about making your own

http://www.childofmecha.com/Modeling/Decals_Demyst/Decals_Demyst.html

yes I know about the vector/bitmap issue and I have the logotypes in vector graphic eps format so that's easy. Was more concerned about the background thing. I'll check the link. Thanks so far!
/Joel

And anybody knows where to get some Alps printers?? 1st or 2nd hand, I don't care, beside eBay...

Thanks a lot from me too...

If you're using Corel Draw, just place the graphics to be printed onto the page. As flyonthewall stated, unless you add a background colour onto the page it will come out transparent. If your decals are white then one thing you could do is put a backgound colour on the whole page (so that you can see where you're placing those white decals) and then delete the background colour prior to printing. I haven't got an Alps printer and haven't printed decals myself but I'm a graphic designer to trade and know a thing or two about this sort of thing! :)

Hope it helps ye!

Here's another tutorial using ALPS printers....

http://perso.wanadoo.fr/eric.evain/decalgb.htm

May i ask what an Alps printer is? or is Alps a company? thanks sry for hijack

I'm asuming that you don't own an Alps printer yourself?

I find it best to use layers in Illustrator.

The background colour (I use light blue) is just so you can see what you are doing is on a non printing layer.

I then put each colour on it's own layer, this makes printing easier to do, as decal printing in hi-quality on an alps requires multiple passes thro' the printer.