A customer is insisting we use a scan of a poor quality bar code for their job. We have told the customer that the scan of the bar code would not be of sufficient quality to ensure readability. Do you have any information on quality for printing barcodes?

Bar codes should be created with software that generates vector files. A vector file is a mathematical formula, which is interpreted by the RIP and creates a high-quality image at the RIP's resolution. Scanning an existing bar to a bitmap file is not going to provide the same quality as a vector generated bar code. If a bar code is scanned, it should be scanned as if it were line art, at least 1200 dpi and saved as a bitmap. Saving the file as a grayscale will result in an image with pixilated soft (not sharp) edges on the bar code bars.