Full Bleed, Trim Size and Safe Zone – What is that for?

One of the most commonly print job problem is setting up artboard without bleed and placing essential information too close to the trim size.

So what exactly is bleed and safe zone? Why do we need that in the first place? The reason of requiring bleed is due to imperfection of digital and litho offset printing machine. Regardless of printing method, there will be small variation in the position of paper when printing. Also, the cutting (trimming) process will never be accurate to the millimetre. Placing information too close to the trim line might cause vital information to be cut off.

In the following example, we will use our standard name card to illustrate the above scenario.

Assuming your name card should look like this, ideally. There should not have any white border (obviously it shouldn’t be any) and all information, e.g, phone number, email address etc must not be cut off.

Now, let us show you what if there is no proper bleed. Here, we will assume your name card has background design such as the above example. It is a must to extend background design beyond the full bleed line. If background design is not fully extend beyond the full bleed line, this could be the result.

This is caused by imperfection of trimming process. Slight variation of machine will cause the above problem.

As a result, your name card will have white border.

Now let us show you what if vital elements are placed too near to the trimming line. It is always very risky to do so as vital elements might be trimmed away.

Again, this is caused by imperfection of trimming process. Slight variation of machine will cause the above problem. As a result, vital elements might be trimmed off.  

Therefore, please do the following when preparing artwork to be printed:

1. Always set a proper full bleed to avoid white border after trimming. (Please download our product size templates as we have set proper full bleed, trim size and safe zone for your usage).
2. Always keep all your important information within safe zone.

You can read more about our artwork specifications here.