Cell and Tissue Research - CTR-Specific Artwork Guidelines

CTR-SPECIFIC ARTWORK GUIDELINES

Figures should be restricted in number to the minimum needed to clarify the text. All figures must be numbered consecutively with Arabic numerals in the order in which they are cited in the text. The file name should include the figure number. Figure legends have to be included in the text and not in the figure file.

Magnification should be indicated always by a scale bar.

Electronic Figure Submission

• For vector graphics, the preferred format is EPS; for halftones, please use TIFF format. MS office files ( (word/doc or docx, Excel/xls or xlsx, PowerPoint/ppt or pptx) and PDF's are not acceptable.
• It is not permitted to use PowerPoint as software to create final figure files because  the export of figure files generated in PowerPoint and converted into an acceptable file format (such as TIFF) always leads to a high loss of figure quality and resolution. Such low quality figures cannot be accepted. For the generation of figure files for print, please use suitable graphics software, e.g. Adobe Illustrator.
• Vector graphics containing fonts must have the fonts embedded in the files.

Line Art

• Definition: Black and white graphic with no shading.
• Do not use faint lines and/or lettering and check that all lines and lettering within the figures are legible at final size.
• All lines should be at least 0.1 mm (0.3 pt.) wide.
• Line drawings should have a minimum resolution of 1200 dpi.
• Vector graphics containing fonts must have the fonts embedded in the files.

Halftone Art

• Definition: Photographs or paintings with fine shading.
• If any magnification is used in the photographs, indicate this by using scale bars within the figures themselves (without lettering).
• Halftones should have a minimum resolution of 300 dpi.

Combination Art

• Definition: a combination of halftone and line art, e.g., halftone plus line drawing, halftone with extensive lettering, color diagrams.
• Combination artwork should have a minimum resolution of 600 dpi.

Color Art

• Color illustrations are free of charge.
• Color illustrations should be submitted as RGB (8 bits per channel).

Figure Lettering

• To add lettering, we request to use Arial or Helvetica.
• Keep lettering consistently sized throughout your final-sized artwork, usually about 12 -15 pt.
• Variance of type size within an illustration should be minimal, e.g., do not use 8-pt type on an axis and 20-pt type for the axis label.
• Avoid effects such as shading, outline letters, etc.
• Do not include titles or captions into your illustrations.

Figure Numbering

• All figures are to be numbered using Arabic numerals.
• Figures must always be cited in text in consecutive numerical order.
• Figure parts must be denoted by lowercase roman letters (a, b, c, or a, a’, a’’, a’’’, etc.) Please use always letters of the same size for the principal lettering inside your figures.
• If an appendix appears in your article and it contains one or more figures, continue the consecutive numbering of the main text (e.g. Fig.1). 

Figure Captions

• Each figure should have a caption describing accurately what the figure depicts.
• Figure captions begin with the term Fig. in bold type, followed by the figure number, also in bold type.
• No punctuation is to be included after the number, nor is any punctuation to be placed at the end of the caption.
• Identify all elements found in the figure in the figure caption; and frames, circles, etc., as coordinate points in graphs.
• Identify previously published material by giving the original source in the form of a reference citation at the end of the figure caption.

Figure Placement and Size

• Figure files should have a maximum of 30 MB file size each.
• Authors must prepare their illustrations to match following sizes:
  • 1 sub-column width (3.9 cm)
  • 1 column width (8.4 cm)
  • 1.5 column width (12.9 cm)
  • the whole page width (17.4 cm)
  • length can vary, but must not exceed 23.4 cm

When submitting a complex illustration, all parts should be arranged as one figure (e.g., block panel) and saved in a single file. Panels should not be boxed by borderlines. The vertical and horizontal white space between the individual parts of a figure should be consistently 1 mm.

Figure Samples 
Please see three drafted samples for CTR figure designs. Figure 1, 2, 3 represent possible panel organizations, showing the important requirements for lettering, size and placement. Figure 4 and 5 display two original figures taken from Y. Kocagöz et al. (2022), Cell and Tissue Research 388:331-358. These figures (Fig.2 and Fig.11 in the original CTR manuscript) have been kindly provided by S.H. Fuss and coworkers.

Figure 1:

Figure 2:

Figure 3:

Figure 4:

Figure 5:

(Y. Kocagöz et al. (2022), Cell and Tissue Research 388:331-358).
 
Permissions
If you include figures that have already been published elsewhere, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner(s) for both the print and online format. Please be aware that some publishers do not grant electronic rights for free and that Springer will not be able to refund any costs that may have occurred to receive these permissions. In such cases, material from other sources should be used.

Cover figures
Cover figures are chosen by the Coordinating Editor. Suggestions for cover illustrations are welcome (the author must own copyright to the image). The image must be sharp enough to allow magnification to the size of 13 cm (length) x 18 cm (width) and provided in the color format CMYK.