Folded Leaflets

Folded Leaflets

Introduction

This article goes through file setup protocol for folded leaflet products as well as our most common fold types.

Templates
To help you set your files up, download the latest InDesign templates here.


Folded Leaflets

Artwork for folded leaflets is the same as a regular flat product. The artwork is to be designed ‘flat’, showing more than one panel per designed page, with essential elements avoiding the folds and edges. You don’t need to supply folding guides for standard folds, as these can be selected in the product.

Please contact design support if you are designing a file that has custom folding and you would like help on where to indicate your ‘folds’.

Ensuring you design correctly

Check panel sizes: A mistake commonly made with Folded Leaflets is to design incorrectly sized panels for the product’s fold type, resulting in the product looking unusual, e.g. short front panels, panels missing their folding line, front-to-back misalignment, and even mixed-up panels.

Keep essential elements away from edges and folds: Respect the Quiet Zone by keeping text at least 5mm away from the folds.

Front Cover Panel backgrounds: When designing folded leaflets with a front panel background that is close to the fold, ensure that the picture overlaps the fold by 1 mm. This allows for production tolerances when folding, and prevents a contrasting stripe (from the reverse panel) from showing on the front face of the finished folded leaflet.

File Supply: The outside design should be supplied as page 1 and the inside design as page 2.

Create a physical mock-up: It’s always recommended that you produce a working mock-up of the design yourself. This often gives an indication of what makes a well-balanced layout, and might also catch layout/panel errors.

How to Indicate Folding

If your product requires folding that is not standard we need you to indicate where this folding is going to be. 

You will need to indicate this via a Fold swatch.

  1. Create a new swatch, and name the swatch Fold (exactly like this).
  2. Select the colour type from the drop-down as Spot.
  3. Ensure the colour mode is CMYK.
  4. In the colour percentages make sure they are:
    1. Cyan - 0%, 
    2. Magenta - 50%
    3. Yellow - 100%
    4. Black - 0%.

  1. Press OK. Now you have created your Fold swatch to use.
  2. You will need to indicate the folds via lines (strokes). Place your lines above your artwork using the colour swatch (We recommend creating a finishing layer within your artwork, to maintain a neat and tidy file). These swatches must remain as spot colours and must not be adjusted in any way. 
  3. All lines must be at 1pt stroke width.
  4. Now that the objects are in the correct swatch, the final step is to make sure they are set to overprint. To do this, select the object and navigate to your Attributes panel (Window > Output > Attributes). Then select Overprint Fill and/or Overprint Stroke.
  5. Only place lines on the front page of your artwork. (You may do so on the reverse to help with your design, but this must be removed prior to sending your file to print).

Our Most Common Folds

Download a PDF of the below images at the bottom of this article.







Questions?
If you have any questions, please contact your account manager.


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