Getting the perfect print every time doesn’t happen by accident. There are a number of important aspects for designers to consider in order end up with that amazing flyer or business card design – ready for print. So, we have created an easy to follow guide that will set you up for success with you next print project.

Each of our products has a ‘document size’ provided under the Get Your File Ready tab on the product details page. When you setup the height and width dimensions of you design using your design software make sure you set them to the provided ‘document size’ dimensions provided from the product page you are looking to order. Our system checks that uploaded designs meet these dimensions precisely.

The document size includes 5mm of ‘bleed’ to allow for a margin of error when trimming your final print. Be sure that you extend all background images out to the full document size. This will ensure your print comes out looking perfect.

Provide designs as 1-up - i.e one page per side

All of our print products expect your design to contain one page per side. Even if you are looking to print four pages per side (4-up), you still need to provide your document as one page per side – we’ll create the desired layout you wish to have your document printed in based on the options you’ve selected online or discussed with a team member in store.

If your design contains multiple pages, the first page is always considered the front page of your print, and the last page is always considered to be the back page. So spend a moment to get the order of your document correct before uploading, and be sure to remove any pages you don’t want printed.

Do not supply crop marks, trim lines or registration marks in your design

Many professional graphic and print designers apply crop marks, trim lines or registration marks to their final design as they know most printers require them. At Print & Create we prefer designs submitted online to be completely free of these marks as our systems are designed to apply the appropriate guides for printing on our printers. We only require that your artwork is the correct dimensions, resolution and has appropriate bleed (image content that goes to the edges of your design). Designs that have these markings can mean re-work for our team to remove these guides and potential delays in getting your print project ready on time. So, if you’re working with a designer be sure to let them know that they need to supply you with artwork that does not have these markings in the final design file you intend to print with us.

Keep your important content within the safe area

Most of our print products specify a safe area for the designs content to sit neatly within. The Safe area ensures that you don’t end up with text or important image content right on the edge of your final printed document. So take the time to review the safe areas while designing your next print project to ensure you end up with a perfect print.

Proof read and spell check your document

Before you save your design as a PDF print ready file, perform a spell check over your file and do a final proof read. It can help to get a friend or colleague unfamiliar with your project to do a spot check over the grammar, as spell checks don’t always pick up on grammatical errors. It’s best to get your file as perfect and print ready as possible before you upload it for print.

Set the resolution of your design to 300dpi before you start designing.

We want your print to look razor sharp, and we want you to be 100% happy with our products. So it’s important that before you begin designing your print project that you set your design to 300dpi. That way you know you’re going to get a crystal clear final print that you’ll really want to show off.

What is DPI?

DPI stands for Dots Per Inch and determines how sharp image looks on printed materials. The higher the dpi, the sharper the image. 300dpi is considered the benchmark standard in the print industry for a superior print. Using a resolution higher than 300dpi provides very little improvement that is visible to the human eye.

Scaling the resolution of your design after you’ve finalised designing to 300dpi will result in inferior quality artwork that will appear blurry when printed. So, it is important to set your design resolution up front to 300dpi before you start designing

Printing machines are specifically made to print using the CMYK colour mode. This colour mode produces the most consistent colour results across a wide spectrum of printing devices. We recommend your designs are made using the same colour mode for best results.

The RGB colour mode is designed for images on screens, like TVs and computer monitors. Although advances in digital print technology has made printing with RGB colour mode designs possible, colour consistency issues can arise when using them with a CMYK printing process. The colours will often appear different and undesirable compared with the design intent. 

• The simple rule of thumb is; if your design is in colour then use the CMYK colour mode otherwise set your colour mode to Greyscale. 
• The colour mode of your document is set by your graphic design software. Typically the default is RGB, and you will need to set it to CMYK for print.
  

What does RGB and CMYK Stand for?

RGB Stands for Red, Green & Blue, while CMYK stands for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Key (otherwise known as Black). Each represents the primary colours used

What is the difference between RGB and CMYK?

Simply put, RGB and CMYK are two opposite ways of representing colour. RGB is known as an additive colour model – meaning the more colour you add, the lighter the colour becomes. So if you combine together Red, Green and Blue at their brightest levels you will end up with white! CMYK is known as a subtractive colour model, and works in the complete opposite. This is because the paper being printed on is assumed to be white already. So, with CMYK the reverse is true, when you start increasing the colour levels of (Cyan, Magenta & Yellow) to the maximum you end up with black! If you reduce the colour levels then the print will appear lighter. To achieve a pure black with CMYK the Key colour (black) is used since Cyan, Magenta & Yellow don’t produce a pitch black, hence the inclusion of the 4th colour in CMYK.

When should I use the Greyscale colour mode for my design?

If you intend to create a design that is solely Black & White – no colour, then set your document colour mode to Greyscale colour mode for best results.

What are Spot Colours?

Spot colours are pre-defined, single tone colours, that a designer wishes to accentuate in their print project. The advantage of using a spot colour over a standard CMYK colour, is that they are mixed separately from the other CMYK colours. This means that they are always mixed in the same proportions, producing a full bodied consistent colour output. Offset print presses are required to take full advantage of Spot colours.
**While Officeworks will print spot colours, they are presently not mixed as a seperate colour as described in the section above

Save your design as a PDF file with embedded fonts

For the best printing results, it is recommended that you save your final design file as a PDF (Portable Document Format) before sending to us for printing. PDF provides a secure, read only format that has been developed over time for the safe exchange of documents between organisations and individuals, and are universally accepted (and preferred) by printers.