15 Printing Mistakes You Need to Avoid

Here’s an illustrated list of the top 15 printing mistakes and errors you should avoid. This article is aimed mainly at inexperienced designers, but there’s also a few tips and further resources in it for seasoned designers, too. We all make mistakes, so here’s a resource that should aid everyone who wants to expand their knowledge. Here goes…

1. Inadequate Bleed on Artwork

If you don’t put in place a decent bleed in your artwork, you’re asking for trouble. Basically, “bleed” refers to artwork that extends beyond the document boundaries. This is necessary because the guillotines that will slice-and-dice your prints aren’t that accurate. Some behave better than others, but a safe bet is to have 3mm of bleed (or 1/8 of an inch) for most print jobs that are ‘hand-held’, such as posters, letterheads and business cards, etc. Large format prints may require more bleed, so always ask your printer first.

Resource: For a tutorial on this, read Designing for Print – Setting Up Crops and Bleed over on Spoon Graphics.

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