Technical information on Card Layouts

Paper Media options

Layout constraints caused by our cutting operation:

Background image on card front to extend to card edge (full bleed):

If you want an image to fill the front of a 4x6 postcard, the layout must extend the background image 0.2" beyond the edge of the card. So use a background sized at: 4.4"x 6.4", knowing we are going to cut the card out centered inside this at 4"x6".

Also all critical parts of the design need to be inside the cutting area by 0.15" .
So for a 4x6 card all critical design items must be inside an area of: 3.7"x5.7.

The following black line box on the image below shows where the cut line is for a layout we did to give a full bleed of a front photo image on a card design:

photo business card with full bleed example layout

Here is another example:

The card image does not fill card shape and cannot be extended for full bleed beyond cut line without extending critical parts of card design to be too close the the cutting edge: (white line shows cut line)

Designer went back and changed design so that the background could extend beyond the cut line: (black line shows cut line)

Another example of a card where the designer wanted full bleed.
The black line on the below image shows how when we cut to the
5x7 size wanted we will most likely cut into the turtles in the top right
and the license plate in the bottom left:

The designer went back and extended the red-white-&blue flag background
without extending any of the other objects in the layout. Therefore, we were
able to fill the 5x7 area without cutting into the critical parts of her design. Results:

Image Resolution

We recommend the final card image resolution of 300 dpi for excellent printing output.

That would be: 1200 pixels by 1600 pixels for a 4x6 card, or 1320 pixels by 1920 pixels for a full bleed background image at 4.4"x6.6" .

( I have seen 150 dpi work well for the different multiple images on a card, but I would not recommend going lower. )

Wedding Cards Party Cards Baby Cards Moving Cards

Thank You Cards Holiday Cards Business Holiday Cards

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11/02/2007