12" records are both the standard LP size cut at 33⅓rpm and the standard for club DJ’s cut at 45rpm. 12" offers maximum flexibility as the larger size enables more defined sound when mastered at 45rpm as well as maximum capacity when cut at 33⅓rpm. Depending on the total track length per side we will advise you on best cutting speed.

We also offer heavier vinyl records at 180g, if this is a preference.

To find out about recommended lengths and technical specifications please see the playing times section.

Cutting into lacquers is an older method of mastering for vinyl records, but still has many supporters and fans. This analogue mastering technique is widely accepted and used thanks to bigger number of lacquer cutting lathes available and the tradition of lacquer mastering through the years.

Hundreds of various lathes were produced during the golden era of vinyl records between the 50s and 80s and many of them are still operable. The softer lacquer material allows very high cutting levels resulting in very loud records, but with risk of various distortions and mistracking on some turntables. Lacquer cutting requires well trained engineers and years of experience to create the best sounding vinyl records.

The audio signal is transcribed into a master plate called lacquer through a dedicated cutting head comprised of two moving coils perpendicular to each other – one for the left and one for the right channel. Movements of both coils are transferred to a cutting stylus with a sharp triangular tip on the end. The stylus for cutting into soft lacquer is heated and is made out of sapphire or ruby gems and cuts a spiral V-shaped sound groove into a nitrocellulose layer covered on an aluminium disc. Stampers for record pressing are manufactured from such mastered lacquers by a three step electroforming process in electrolytic baths. It is recommended to start these processes with already cut lacquers as soon as possible to avoid deformations of grooves caused by heat and other environmental factors.

The advantages of lacquer cutting are that a hicker lacquer layer allows for bigger vertical amplitudes, which can carry more out-of-phase low frequency signals (e.g. a bass guitar or a kick drum placed only in one channel), but with higher risk of mistracking. They also allow wider and deeper grooves which are more tolerant for most kinds of surface damage and offer a little bit higher resistance for skipping caused by badly calibrated turntables. However, very wide and deep grooves can cause issues in the subsequent galvanic and pressing processes. It often results in higher noise and more crackles and pops.

Lacquers deteriorate over time, hence we prefer that lacquers are cut and processed in the shortest possible time frame. If you have your lacquers produced by your own engineers and supply them to us for plating, please ensure that these are sent to us quickly (in coordination with our projects team) and insist on adequate packing and labelling. Long journeys and wrong storage during transport is detrimental to the final quality of the pressing. We don't accept liability for the inferior quality of test pressings resulting from improper handling of lacquers. We advise you send us backup WAV files with every lacquer.

Stampers for record pressing are manufactured in a single or multi-step electro plating process in electrolytic baths. It is recommended to start these processes with already cut lacquers as soon as possible to avoid deformations of grooves caused by heat and other environmental factors.

During the galvanic process a metallic copy of the lacquer is made. For this step the surface of the laquer has to be made electrically conductive. Then a thin silver layer is applied, this silvered foil is immersed in a galvano-plastic nickel bath and the foil works as the cathode and the nickel is used as anode. Once electricity flows through the solution, the metallic nickel settles on the silvered surface of the foil. After achieving the desired thickness (ca. 0,23 mm), you have to remove the foil from the nickel layer.

By doing this you receive the first Galvanic copy of your laquer, also called “father”. This can, depending on the physical properties, become a stamper (in single step processing) or become a father from which more generations of stampers can be formed. It is a negative, which means, instead of grooves there are the corresponding elevations. At this point, if the “father” is used for making another copy, called "mother"- this one is then used for making the "son", which is the stamper that is essentially used for pressing. The stamper is then attached to the press and used to press the grooves into the vinyl.

Pressing vinyl records over and over again is hard on metal stampers, causing them to wear out over the course of a pressing. A set of stampers is usually good for around 1000 to 1500 pressings. As long as they are kept in good condition, you can make multiple stampers from a single mother, and conversely multiple mothers from a father. Once a stamper has been used it will be recycled.

We recommend that you do test pressings, in fact we hardly ever do a vinyl release without them, this is why it is built into our prices as a standard offering.

Test Pressings allow you as an artist, band or label to ensure you are happy with the overall quality of the cut, sound and metalwork used before the full quantity is pressed.

Your test pressings will arrive with our Takt Direct factory labels, unless you request otherwise; and once approved we commence record production.

We have a range of ready to use colours in stock. However if you have a special colour in mind or need to colour-match a particular element of your artwork or want a colour rarely used, you can specify a RAL or Pantone™ reference to match against and we will manufacture the vinyl to your specification. This process can take up to 6 weeks from approval so please consider this as part of your turnaround time requirements.

Naturally we have multiple options and combinations of some of these in our repertoire. Please consult with us about what can be achieved within your budget and timeframe.

Available options are:

• Single colour, either transparent or opaque
• Stock colours or made to order
• Splatter
• Colour-in-Colour
• Half/Half
• Haze & Spray effects
• Tri-Colour
• Premium colours (metallics/glow in the dark)*

*Please note that some special colours contain non-vinyl pigments to create the effect. These colours will negatively affect sound quality.

Please speak to us regarding sound quality on picture discs in general. Picture discs are not real vinyl records, instead pressed on two thin layers of transparent film that cover the two printed labels and a PVC cake "sandwiched" in between. The vinyl cake can be any colour as it is not visible other then on the edge (run-in) of the record. The design of the picture disc label follows the same guidelines as of the other printed parts. You can specify 4 colour CMYK or Pantone™ printing or use special paper as your label material.

We have a selection of older style manual pressing lines that allow us to produce special colour options effects. These presses are from the golden days of vinyl production, but have been upgraded to reflect innovation in production techniques. We mainly use them for short run and colour with special effects productions.

Our automatic pressing lines are work horses that boost our daily capacity and tirelessly create record after record. We mainly use this for higher volume black vinyl and heavy vinyl 12" pressings.

All records are mastered to a standard and this is the same standard for lighter and heavier vinyl. We offer heavier vinyl for 12" (180g vs. 140g) and 7" (70g vs. 40g) as it is less prone to warping and more stable during playback, so many of our clients prefer the thicker, weightier feel of heavy vinyl.

When a record is mastered for heavy vinyl, you can theoretically achieve extra groove depth, which is said to make a difference especially for dynamic and volume rich sound. In reality, when you cut into thicker material you still need to be within the standard for the record to be playable and that is pretty much the same for any weight of 100g plus on a 12", and the sound that you get is eventually more down to the skills of the engineers than the extra thickness.

Types

Our standard sleeves are 3mm spine single LP sleeves for 12" and spineless sleeves for 7". We have cutting forms for any variation to that.

• Single 7" or 12" Sleeve with 3mm Spine
• Double 7" or 12" Sleeve with 5mm Spine
• Gatefold Sleeve for 1 or 2 records, 7" or 12"
• Spineless 7" or 12" Sleeves
• 7" or 12" Discobags
• Printed Inner Sleeves on gloss or matt paper
• White poly-lined sleeves
• Plain white or black paper sleeves
• Microtene Bags
• Square single or double-sided paper inserts
• Poster size or gatefold inserts
• Stitched multi-page Booklets in various sizes

Finishing Options

All our print projects are based on 4 colours CMYK printed on large Heidelberg presses and come with an inline machine varnish to seal the colour in. Naturally you can request a variety of refined finishing options:

• Additional or pure Pantone colours
• Metallic or 'Glow in the Dark' inks
• Gloss or Matt lamination
• Partial/Spot UV varnish
• Embossing (Tooling required)
• Foil blocking (Tooling required)
• Reverse print (print on the coarse side of the material)
• Hand or Machine Numbering
• Cut-outs and shape inserts
• Matched Label & Insert art
• Material up or downgrade options

We are often approached about our non-standard options. Our factory contains a fully-equipped box making and special packaging section. Any type of packaging is only limited by the laws of physics. We produce simple boxsets from limited collector editions to band anthologies, from a hand-made few to multiple thousands.

Material choices are predominantely paper or card based, but we offer much more from wood to composite or multi-core material, fabric & leather, acryllics, metal or any combination of these. Alternative materials also allow for extended and highly specialised and exclusive finishing options, in addition to above:

• Special Varnishes
• Screen prints & stamping
• CAD based routing ad CNC relief cutting
• Forming and transparency effects
• Laser etching and branding
• Reverse Material print
• Mechanically movable parts

Nearly every record we produce ships with download card. We produce any type, any material from any source file. You choose if you host yourself, and simply supply us the codes and artwork or if you want us to do everything for you or a mixture of the two.

We have a GS1 barcode licence and can supply you with a GTIN-13 (formerly EAN-13) retail compatible barcode for your product. You will need a unique separate barcode for each SKU you intend to put into distribution. Simply let us know at the point of order that you require one or more barcodes and we supply and incorporate the barcode into your design or supply you the barcode image for your own use.

With CD & DVD manufacturing being around for 30+ years, the packaging options are plentiful. We have keylines and templates for virtually every packaging solution you expect to see in a retail environment. And quite frankly, with any finishing you can imagine.

And if it is not already here, we'll make it for you.

• Jewel Case (Standard, Slimline or Multi-Tray)
• DVD & Blu-Ray Cases
• Multi-Panel Digi-Paks
• Lancing Packs
• Teddy Packs
• Single or Multi panel Card Wallets
• Case-bound Books with Pouch
• Case-bound Books with Digi-Tray
• Paper over board packaging
• Slipcases and binders
• Serialisation/Numbering
• Retail Barcode generation

All turnaround times depend on the type of packaging and quantities ordered. Our standard minimum turnaround for Audio CD in retail packaging is 10-12 working days.

We calculate turnaround time from the date all assets are received and approved by you. If you have a specific release date in mind you can also book capacity in advance.

Contact us to discuss options.

IPR

All records, CDs or DVDs that we produce are assessed for their Intellectual Property Rights Status. As Audio & Video as well as certain other content is protected under applicable copyright law or statute, we require all our customers to declare the copyright information in order to reproduce this content.

This could be that...

• the copyright holder as given permission or licence to you to reproduce the content
• you are the copyright holder or owner/author/creator of the content
• the copyright has expired and the content is free to distribute

To ascertain the exact status we will ask you to complete a IPR Declaration when you submit your order. You must complete and return this to us before we start your order. If we provide you with a turnaround time, any delay in submitting the IPR Declaration will also delay your delivery.

CMYK or Spot colours

All artwork must be set to CMYK and if you are using spot or PantoneTM colours make sure you define these as separate colour channels. Whilst RGB colours can be converted to CMYK before printing, this can produce unpredictable results and colour matching cannot be guaranteed.

Keep artwork clear from edges

We have indicated a safe area, which you should observe when laying out your artwork. Provide 3mm bleed, where shown. Having bleed ensures that your artwork goes all the way to the edge of the material, rather than plain material showing through after cutting.

Check the resolution

All images must be 300dpi or higher. When line art is used, vector based images are generally good to go. Images with lower resolution may result in blocky or pixelated print.

Fonts embedded or outlined

The most common issue encountered in printing is font substitution. This happens when fonts are used in a document that are not present on the pre-press system. To avoid any font issues either embed the fonts in your artwork file, or if the application allows it, convert all text to outlines.

Total Ink levels

Caution is advised when CMYK is converted from RGB or when colours are made up of high percentage ink levels. To avoid over-inking, which results in poor quality print and smudged appearance due to increased drying time, total ink levels shouldn’t exceed 280% for all 4 channels. Overprint & Transparency Settings Items set to overprint or relying on transparency settings display on screen but disappear or overlap when printed. Check your overprint settings, flatten your artwork and adjust or switch off overprint if necessary.

Correct Pagination

If your artwork is for print parts with multiple pages, you should observe our pagination guides to make sure your pages run in sequence when printed.

Creating Source Files

When you provide files for production these need to be uncompressed 24-bit (32-bit float) audio files either in AIFF, FLAC or WAV format. If you leave this to your studio to prepare the files, you should specify "must be mastered for vinyl" to receive the correct audio files. CD quality files are 16-bit and not suitable for vinyl production without compromising on sound quality.

Please note! Compressed audio formats such as MP3 or MP4 cannot be used.

Sending your files to us

You will be required to complete an Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) form for each record. We also provide you with a pre-mastering instruction form, with which you can instruct us of any special requirements for the cut as well as any other important information. Make sure you include this with your file submission.

Thoroughly check and label master files before sending them - the number of tracks, their sequence, titles and times must be the same as you have instructed us in order to not delay production.

All files for a single record should be in their own folder in a ZIP file. If you submit multiple records please ensure these are in their own ZIP file.

Please do not include artwork or print files with Audio Zip files. Our art department is different from our Mastering Studio.

You can use Dropbox, WeTransfer or other cloud storage and send us a link or request FTP site access.

In any case you must provide us with a MD5 checksum for your zip files so we can verify that no data corruption happened during transfer. Ask us for details and further information on how to create MD5 checksums, if you are unsure what this means.

Naturally you can send your files by post on USB or recordable media, please contact your representative for address details and labelling requirements.

Sending us your own Lacquers

Please speak to us before submitting your own lacquers. We need to verify the age of the lacquers and provide you with appropriate instructions for sending. We receive 100s of packages every day so we do not want fragile lacquers arriving only to be misrouted or delayed due to missing information.

Artwork Approval

Once we have checked your artwork for compliance we will proof the finished files back to you. We will send you PDFs of your artwork impositioned on the correct template to show how the final printed product will look.

You need to check the proofs carefully to ensure every element of your design is still present, unaltered and in the right position. If you asked us to embed a barcode you should verify that the number is correct.

Test Pressings

You will receive test pressing from us, on black vinyl. The test pressings are labelled, and usually one will have been cleaned using a Keith Monk cleaning machine to remove any surface residue from pressing.

Please listen to each side, track by track to determine that the track order as well as sound quality correspond with your expectations.

Approve or Request Changes

Once you are satisfied that everything is as it should be please sign and return the accompanying approval form.

Sometimes artwork requires alterations or test pressings will need to be redone. You can use the forms to inform us of any changes you need to make or if anything is not as it should be.

We will discuss with you the available options and any impact these may have on timescales.

Shipping within the EU

Shipping to anywhere in the EU is part of our standard delivery. In most cases shipping to one location is included with your price. We will work with you on your exact distribution requirements and advise you on the most economic yet reliable options to meet your deadlines.

The majority of our shipments are UPS next or 3 days services, but we also ship pallets via freight forwarders for bulk orders.

Shipping anywhere else

For destinations outside the EU or overseas we can handle the export on your behalf. We happily advise and arrange the best forwarding option for you or work with your own shipping agents.

VAT

Most supplies we make to you are zero rated for VAT purposes as long as you are a VAT registered business within the EU and you are not based in Austria, otherwise the prevailing rate of VAT will apply and be added to your invoice.

Customs

If your goods are deemed for export outside the EU, you may not be liable for VAT but your goods may be subject to the equivalent import VAT in the destination country and customs duty or other charges.

If we handle the export on your behalf, you will be responsible for supplying us with the necessary export documentation as required and you will be liable for any costs in relation to customs or import charges.

First month

For a period of 30 days from the date of invoice we will store your goods free of charge and fully insured.

You can decide if you want us to distribute your products to your end users or ask us to ship all to you at a later date. If you want us to distribute your goods on your behalf, please talk to us about options and pricing.

After the first month

We store your products for you for a price. We normally charge a rate per pallet per week subject to volumes and measurements.

As options vary, please speak to us about a tailored fulfilment and storage solution.

United Kingdom
2 The Valley Centre
Gordon Road
High Wycombe
HP13 6EQ

Poland
ul. Wyzwolenia 2
32-329 Bolesław

USA & Canada
We will be opening a hub in North America very soon, please contact us for more information.

CD & Booklet in 4p Digipak with Slot
This pack contains templates for Disc Onbody, Booklet and 4 Panel Digipack with Right Hand Tray and Left Hand Slot:

• TD-18 CD-DVD Onbody Print Standard.pdf
• TD-19 Booklet for Standard Jewel Cases.pdf
• TD-44 CD DigiPak 4 Panel 1 Tray & 1 Slot.pdf

All templates are also available for individual download from the list below.

   DOWNLOAD ZIP

CD & Booklet in 4p Digipak
This pack contains templates for Disc Onbody and 4 Panel Digipak with Right Hand Tray:

• TD-18 CD-DVD Onbody Print Standard.pdf
• TD-24 CD Digipak 4 Panel 1 Tray.pdf

All templates are also available for individual download from the list below.

   DOWNLOAD ZIP

CD, Booklet & Tray Inserts in Jewel Case
This pack contains templates for Disc Onbody, Booklet and Jewel Case Trayliner & Inlay:

• TD-18 CD-DVD Onbody Print Standard.pdf
• TD-19 CD Booklet for Standard Jewel Cases.pdf
• TD-20 CD Jewel Case Back Inlay.pdf

All templates are also available for individual download from the list below.

   DOWNLOAD ZIP