What Are Bleeds In Printing?
Many of our customer prepare their own files for us to print. Sometimes it can be confusing to understand the terminology that we use in the printing industry. Bleeds are a common term used when printing and are often misunderstood. What are bleeds in printing? A bleed is an area of the document that goes beyond the edge of what will be cut off so that the color runs right to the edge of your project. This blog post will explain why bleeds are important and how to set up your document with a bleed correctly.
What Does A Bleed Do?
A bleed is what gives your printed project the effect of color going from edge to edge. To get this effect, you’ll need to create a bleed or the area of the document that goes beyond the area that will be trimmed during the printing process. We recommend extending the border by a good 1/8” of an inch or more, which allows for any background colors or images to extend all the way to its edges without leaving a white border around them. Without a bleed, this could result in having white borders around your print once it has been trimmed down due to slight variations in cutting from one sheet of paper to another.
Are Crop Marks Enough?
No, crop marks alone are not enough for a successful print with bleeds. Crop marks simply tell where your document should be cut down but they do not actually show any portion of your design past its final trim line. Adding a true bleed extends your design over its trim lines so that you don’t have any white borders at the end of your printed project.
Adding A Bleed To Your Document
Adding a proper bleed depends on what software you use, but generally speaking you will need to adjust some settings before starting work on your file. For example, if you’re creating something 8x10 inches in size then you should set up your document with dimensions 8.25x10.25 inches instead (this extra quarter-inch space allows for 1/8th inch on each side). When setting up bleeds, make sure that any photos or graphics extend all the way out past these boundaries and into their own separate layer as well - this will help prevent any weird gaps or white lines from appearing along their edges during printing and cutting process later on.
This video will show you the difference between having just crop marks in your document and having crop marks AND bleeds.
Conclusion
Understanding bleeds is essential if you want high quality prints with no white borders at the end of them! Make sure when setting up documents for printing that extra steps like adding a proper bleed and adjusting all graphic elements accordingly are taken into consideration beforehand - this will allow us to create beautiful results every time! If you’d like help setting up your file properly, our team at M&M Digital Printing is always here to answer any questions or offer assistance. We hope this blog post was helpful in understanding why bleeds are important and how they can improve your prints!