5 Tips to Customize Your Prints and Stand Out from the Crowd

There are several fundamental aspects to keep in mind when designing for print. Before you begin a custom-size photo printing project, ensure you have all the necessary information. Unfortunately, not all digital designs created on the computer translate well to the finished product.

Print design covers a wide range of printed pieces. Custom-size art prints include magazines, book covers, business cards, flyers, and other printed products. Printed marketing designs are far more engaging, have a longer shelf life, and produce higher retention results.

Strategies to Customize Your Prints

Print marketing is the better way to achieve a more significant emotional response from potential clients. We’ve compiled a list of 5 Tips to Customize Your Prints and Help You Stand Out From the Crowd.

Account for Bleeding

The bleed of a document is the part on the side that gives your printer that small space to move around paper and any design inconsistencies. Regardless of the guidelines of other websites, a printer will use all the areas provided.

A 3 mm bleed in every direction is the standard for any variations in cutting and printing. This recommendation includes edge-to-edge backgrounds, ensuring that nothing critical is cut off during the printing phase affecting the project’s outcome.

Minimalism Never Goes Out of Style

Sometimes the best approach to design is to keep it simple. Minimalism is the kind of design that never goes out of style. You’re probably right if you think too much is going on in your design. Less can be more; listen to your instincts.

Crisp, clean, and organized design is rarely ever a bad thing. Decide on what is necessary for your design and remove everything else that isn’t. Create visual balance with a few details, such as high-quality fonts, images, and a muted color palette. 

This decision goes for messaging as well as it does colors, fonts, and images. No one wants to be overwhelmed with too many messages. Aim for one idea per page and avoid overwhelming your reader with too much information.

Think of the Color

Continuing the style discussion, color is very important. Both the addition and subtraction of it. Too little color can come off as bland and boring, while too much color can overwhelm the visual senses. You’ll want to strike the right balance by sticking with a central color palette. One color palette for the primary colors and a separate palette for secondary colors will work just fine.

Colored paper is also something to think about when designing custom-sized art prints. Black text on colored paper can help alleviate the need to recreate colors that may not show up well from digital to print. Certain papers can also add texture to the final printed product.

So, while staying color consistent in your design, keep the paper in mind as well. Consider the paper as part of your palette and open up an abundance of new design ideas.

Use High-Quality Images

A full-page, bleed-to-bleed image can significantly impact your custom-size photo printing. However, finding a high-quality image to fill out your print can take time.

Low-quality images can result in a pixelated mess where your print will come off as unprofessional and poorly designed. To avoid lousy brand reflection, when you obtain an image, test it using image editing and manipulation software like Photoshop.

Designers should set the resolution to 300 dpi for standard print production. A higher DPI is critical for successful print design. 72 dpi may look pretty on the screen; however, it will not likely translate well to print.

People often rush to find the “perfect” image for their print to the point that they’re willing to skimp on the quality. It’s not uncommon for those same individuals to use open-source images, mediocre clip art found on the internet, or hire someone from Fiverr to make them something cheap.

Colleagues and potential clients will notice the lack of quality. So always use high-resolution raster (made of tiny pixels) or vector (created from precise calculations) artwork.

Typography is Important

The first piece of advice is to never go with the first font selected. Instead, understand that the font will set the voice for the entire print project. In doing so, you can decide the best way you want your design to communicate with its audience.

Be careful if you are working with another designer or business who will print the design for you. There are many different kinds of fonts from which to choose. Chances are that your printer may not have them all. If you are hoping for a specific font to align with your design dreams, you should embed the font in your project or send the font files directly to the printer.

The printer will substitute a font if it does not have the files for the one you want. This could result in a wholly altered layout from what was originally planned.

It may take time to decide on the perfect font to pull the entire design project together. To discover the font right for your design, choose between three to eight fonts to build it around. You can quickly determine which fonts mix well with others and which should be discarded. Now you have the best fonts to work with on your custom-size art prints.

Different Customization Options

From backlit film and canvas to vinyl banners, photo enlargements, and custom poster printing online, posterprintshop.com offers many services for your custom-size art prints. We offer no minimums, a fast turnaround, and the highest quality using the latest printing technology.

You can place an order for your custom-size art prints in just a few minutes and only three simple steps. Please select the printing media you desire, choose the print size for your project, and then upload your image files or use our online design tool to design it directly on our website.

For questions or inquiries on our services, please refer to our FAQ.