Bleeds
The bleed is a printing term used to describe a space extending past the cut-line of a print job. When an image is required to extend all the way to the edge, the bleed is required to preserve the finished look and quality of the project.
Most items require a 0.125" bleed, so a 2" x 3.5" business card will have a bleed size of 2.25" x 3.75".
Borders are not recommended due to cutting shifts. If your product is not trimmed exactly on the trimming line, borders may appear uneven especially for small products such like business cards.
Color Mode
We require print-ready digital files in CMYK. Provide all black and white artwork in grayscale color mode. We do not accept any other color mode unless offset printing is required.
CMYK is the only color mode that we accept for digital printing.
If you use Pantone colors in a job that will print CMYK there is a chance that a color shift may occur and you may not be satisfied with your job.
File Formats
While it is not mandatory, we prefer Adobe formats (such as PDF) - if you are using a program outside of Adobe, it will have to be exported as one of the following file types - PDF, JPG, or TIFF prior to uploading and sending it to us.
If customers send the file in the following types jpg, jpeg, tif, tiff, eps, and png they must be formatted to the correct size. We prefer that customer send a PDF with embedded or outlined fonts. PDF files are easier to handle and will likely speed up turn-around.
We only accept 300 dpi files. Low resolution files may be printed as-is but may have unsatisfactory results.
Raster based artwork such as photos, or flattened artwork, are made up of tiny squares (pixels) and depending on the resolution and/or final output size desired, the file could have a low quality end result. Any raster elements a customer wishes to use should have a high enough resolution (DPI) before considering them for a large format product.