Print design is known as the subset of graphic design, which is a unique form of visual communication. It is used to send your message to your audience in graphical form. When the final shape is formed by using a stamp or dye to impress the paper’s surface, it can be regarded as printed matter.
As a marketer/developer, you need to learn a few things to create print materials, including creating documents and preparing files for print service providers. In this article, we will discuss the essential tips to ensure a perfect print design.
Back To The Basic
Achieving a keen, neat, and organized design is key to creating visually appealing and harmonious layouts. Focus on more than just individual elements; ensure you use the best-quality assets available. Select high-quality fonts, crisp images, a soft and complementary color palette, and incorporate a baseline grid for precise alignment.
For instance, a well-designed menu layout template uses essential design elements to create an inviting and balanced atmosphere. Experiment with mixing fonts of different sizes to add visual interest and hierarchy to the design. However, ensure that these variations are thoughtfully placed to maintain clarity and avoid clutter.
Templates that skillfully combine multiple fonts while maintaining a cohesive structure serve as excellent examples of effective typography. With careful placement and attention to detail, your designs can achieve a clean, professional, and harmonious appearance, leaving a lasting impression on viewers.
Don't Forget To Apply The Grid System
Whether you are designing a page or a few hundred pages, the grid is essential for creating a layout. You can use the grid to arrange text and images to make the page look neat and clean. The structure consists of intersecting horizontal as well as vertical lines. If you want to make the page complicated, add angles or curves.
Whenever you pursue it in a project, a clean page is created. Even if the lines look like constraints, it depends on your creativity. The grid is open to various options that we can use. For example, the designer sometimes uses the grid just like he uses multiple layers in the document. Create depth and keep the page clean and minimal.
Use Vector Artwork Or High-Resolution Image
Assets are critical to successful print design. People are often eager to find images for their projects and search for open-source images on the Internet, pay for mediocre photos, or hire designers to touch them. This one usually has a resolution of 72 dpi, so what? It looks great on the screen, which means it can print well, doesn’t it? Incorrect.
The 72 dpi screen display is very different from real life, and you want people showing your work to notice. So what is the solution? Always use high-resolution vector or bitmap images. Explain raster and vector.
For print media, the standard is 300 dpi. 100% beautiful, but start to pixelate 125% or more. 72 dpi images for the web will degrade faster and almost always print poorly. The vector image is based on mathematical calculations. There are no pixels here, only numbers. The vector image looks smooth and beautiful in the size of the map. It is on the wall. If you want to place the logo on the side of the space station, you need to use a vector. It is best for solid colors and illustrations, so before you start printing your project, first The things to consider are: Is your work high resolution? Is the logo transparent? Is it clear on postcards or posters? Banners or space stations?
Be Careful About Color
The world of design is full of vibrant colors. While some combinations are visually stunning, others can create challenges. The more colors you incorporate, the greater the risk of clutter and distractions. Excessive use of colors can also make text harder to read, impacting the overall effectiveness of your design. Striking the right balance is essential for creating a visually appealing and user-friendly design.
Let’s face it: if your phone number is hard to read, you might miss valuable calls. Simplifying your design can improve readability and save money, especially when printing. Opting for single-tone or two-tone designs reduces printing costs, whether you use offset or letterpress methods. Adding more colors, such as three, four, or five, can increase costs and complexity. Successful print design is all about clear communication. When in doubt, keep it simple for a more effective and budget-friendly result.
Avoid Borders As Much As Possible
If you are looking for a way to add interest to a simple design, you might think that adding a decorative border around your copy will add a touch of elegance. No doubt, but the edges must be done correctly. Otherwise, you may mess up the document and make the design unattractive. Like other elements in the layout, you want them to stay within 0.25 inches and keep the text safe. If the registry is changed, the jagged edges will stand out like a sore thumb and ruin a successful design.
Also, don’t try to put too many copies in the frame; just add the essentials. You can always add a URL as a call to action in response to an incident or request more details. Another thing to keep in mind: when working on a computer screen, people think this design is excellent, but if the copy is framed in some way, it will look great. After cutting, the frame of the product is natural.
The specific design works: If you pay for the printed proof, you will get more responses than the proof you see on the screen. Perhaps for all of us, eliminating borders is a better choice.
Time To Proofread
Ensuring error-free print designs is critical, as mistakes in physical prints are costly and irreversible. Unlike digital designs, you can’t simply go back and fix errors after printing. Careful proofreading is essential, but relying solely on spell checkers isn’t enough—they catch about 75% of errors but often miss grammatical issues, incorrect company names, and homophones like ‘their,’ ‘there,’ and ‘they’re.’
Beyond spelling, double-check key design elements like kerning and punctuation to ensure professional quality. For example, verify if you’re using the correct hyphen or if your quotation marks are smart quotes instead of straight quotes. Thoroughly reviewing your design for these details before submitting for printing can save time, money, and your design’s credibility. Attention to detail is the key to creating polished, error-free print layouts that leave a lasting impression.
Try To Be Versatile
Things will change: a new boss appears and disrupts your entire workflow, or your designer says it’s time to rebrand. Your needs in one place may not reflect the needs of another: your design and all printing methods. For example, you should not set the primary color of your brand to metallic.
You need fast digital printing, invoice, menu, letterhead, t-shirts, roll-up banners, product packaging, and billboard: it will not appear on the logo. Therefore, in this case, you want the brand’s primary color to have certain recognizability, but it can be reproduced in different environments. Ensure that all printing resources are consistent when NT starts, regardless of a specific process or computer. There are many different ways to print additional business resources and office supplies, and the details are essential.
If you follow our techniques to create high-quality printed materials, we guarantee that they will look great. But this is the bonus tip: don’t wait until the last minute! Our portfolio is used for successfully printed design samples of various products, from business cards to posters, to wedding stationery and brochures.
Conclusion
If you are not familiar with print design, this will confuse you. Do you want to prepare and create a plan that works well on paper (which is a daunting task in itself!), but you also need to make sure that your project is set up correctly for printing because you try to do it in a certain way to avoid many misprinted design minefield often admitted by beginners. You need to consider the color profile, resolution, size, type of black, the application of your choice (such as Photoshop, Illustrator, etc.), and of course cropping. We found that there is not enough information to handle it properly. But, after reading this article hoping that you will get all the relevant information you are seeking. If you love this article, don’t forget to share. Also, you can share the option in the comment section below.