Zing Tip #1: Stay Away from the Edge

When designing a piece to be printed, do not run your words or any important graphic element too close to the border. After being printed, the item then has to be trimmed to final size. It is not always an exact science so something may get cut off if placed too close to the edge.

Additionally, copiers and printing presses handle paper differently. A printing press uses guides and suction cups to pull the paper through the press very precisely. A copier uses guides but less accurate than those on a printing press. So paper going through a copier can shift up to an eighth of an inch. Turn it over and imprint on the second side and more shifting can take place.

With a lot of small quantity pieces being produced these days, many of those projects are run on copiers. So create forgiving designs that will take into account those possible shifts. With a trifold pamphlet, for example, if run on a copier, you don’t want to create design elements intended to land precisely on the fold.