Bleed, imposition and preflight for work that goes on paper.
A Print file has fixed pages rather than an infinite canvas, and the inspector grows the things a press needs.
Page setup
Pick a size from the presets — A0 to A6, US Letter, Legal and Tabloid, business cards in US, EU and JP sizes, tri- and bi-fold brochures, postcards, invitations, posters, and comic and manga pages — or type your own.
Three boxes matter:
- Trim — where the paper is cut
- Bleed — how far art must run past the trim so a slightly off cut doesn't leave a white edge. 3mm is the usual ask.
- Safe margin — how far in text should stay so it isn't cut off
Rulers and guides show all three.
Bleed only works if the art actually bleeds. Stretch a background past the trim edge to the bleed line — an image that stops exactly on the trim has nothing to give.
Printing
Press ⌘P (Ctrl+P), or choose Print from the ⋯ menu, to print straight from PopCraft. The pages are rendered to a PDF first and that is sent to your printer, so what prints is the artwork, not the app around the canvas.
Description
An event poster. Command-P opens Print: what to print (every page), how the pages sit on the paper (single pages), and Full bleed, already on for a print page. Crop marks is turned on; the dialog says what each sheet will be.
- Press ⌘P.
- Pick What to print and how the Pages on the paper sit (single pages, spreads, a booklet…).
- Leave Full bleed on for art that runs to the edge, and turn on Crop marks for a printer that trims.
- Click Print.
Preflight
The Preflight tab in the right panel checks a print file before it leaves, and tells you where each problem is:
| Check | What it catches |
|---|---|
| Safe margin | Something crosses into the margin that gets trimmed |
| Bleed | Art runs off the trim but stops short of the bleed edge |
| Hairlines | A stroke under 0.25 pt, which can vanish on press |
| Image resolution | An image that prints below your minimum dpi |
| Missing fonts | Type in a font that isn't loaded |
| Overflowing text | More text than its box fits |
| GPU-only paint | A shader or effect that has to be rasterised and converted |
Errors are worth fixing; warnings are worth a look.
Imposition
Print… (Mod+P) asks one question — how the pages sit on the paper:
| Arrangement | For |
|---|---|
| Single pages, spreads cut in half | What almost every printer asks for |
| Pages as drawn, spreads kept whole | Printers that cut spreads themselves |
| Reader spreads | How the finished thing opens — for reading, not for a press |
| Booklet | Two pages a sheet in folding order; print double-sided flipping on the short edge, then fold and staple |
| Two per sheet | Sideways, to save paper |
| Four per sheet | Quarter size, to check a whole run at once |
Crop marks, fold marks and color bars are toggles on the same dialog.
PDF export embeds the fonts it uses, or converts type to outlines if you'd rather. You can choose RGB or CMYK, whether to include bleed and marks, and whether to write spreads or single pages.
Bulk create
For anything that is one design and many records — name badges, certificates, a hundred business cards — Bulk create merges a CSV into a template and gives you one page per row.