As a graphic designer, working in a print shop the first thing I learned, is the importance of setting up bleeds. You may be asking, what’s the importance of bleeds? So let’s do the basics first. A bleed refers to an ink bleed. If you print to the edge of the paper it doesn’t stop like a laser. You have to allow for the ink to seep just a little onto the paper and ” bleed”. So you basically print beyond the paper.
A real-life example would be When I was printing out an 11.5″x8.5″ booklet. The paper that it will be printed on will be much larger so it will need to be cut down. If you want a correct booklet you need to design the brochure slightly larger than its final size. I would say about 1/8′ larger on each side. That little extra room is the bleed. It is not meant to be seen but it allows for the printing/cutting alignment to be slightly off without ending up with white edges around the brochure. The trim is where the cutting is intended to happen. Basically, we want to avoid white borders around our file.
