Photo Book Display | Understanding Photo Book

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Trim:
Trim size is the actual size of your pages after they are trimmed. Pay close attention to these. Some printers use a slightly different from their actual description. For example Shutterfly's 12x12 photo books actually have a trim size of 11.75"x11.75".

LIVE MATTERS:
This measurement is basically the SAFE ZONE. This is the area you want your photos and journaling to fall in to make sure it is seen this book. In general, this area is 1/4" to 1/2" inside the trim area. In some cases, especially perfect-bound, glued books, about 1/4" of the side of the layout is the center field of the book will not be seen. It is hidden in the fold of the book. Similarly, with saddle-stitched, stapled books, the more pages you include, the more of the margin near the fold that can be hidden. So pay8 attention to these

measurements to make sure our photos and journaling can be seen. !Now that you understand the terminology, let's  take a look at Shutterfly's 12" x 12' photo book and deconstruct their specifications.

SPECIFICATION:
Shutterfly's bleed size is 11.95" x 11.95". That means that your canvas size should be 11.95" x 11.95".The trim size is 11.75" x 11.75". That means that anything on your page that is in between the 11.75" x 11.75" and 11.95" x 11.95" are (the bleed area) will be trimmed off of y9our book. BUT, lyou still need to make sure that your background paper, ribbons, flowers, or other items that fall off the edge of the page extend into that bleed area. Your canvas should not show any white around the edges.

Shutterfly's LIVE AREA is 11.25" x 11.75". Keep your photos and journaling inside that area and your page will bring as you expected.

One more tip....
When it comes to designing your cover. Pay special attention to the specifications. In Shutterfly's case. they wrap a significant amount of the page around the cover into the inside cover the book. That means that your photos will need to be off-center on the canvas to appear centered on the final book.

Once you've narrowed down your photo book size, chosen your printer and familiarized yourself with the specifications, it's time to get your pages in order. If you are starting from scratch, I recommend scrapping your pages on the template from the printer. Many offer downloads from their site, or you can purchase ready-to-use templates from digital designers such as myself. (Shutterfly's templates only indicate the trim line with a guide rule, whereas my templates indicate the trim line and live areas with trim lines as well as multiple layers from programs that do not support guide rules.) Starting your pages on the correct size means you won't have to make any adjustments later.

If, however, you have already scrapped your pages and now want to make adjustments, it's not too late. I suggest opening your layered file, resizing down to the live matter area, then adjust the canvas back out to the bleed size. Finally, select the layers that need to be enlarged to the canvas edge and blow them up until they reach the canvas edge. So in the case of the 12" x 12" Shutterfly book,  open your file, change your image size to be approximately 11.25", then change your canvas size to 11.95". Now select your background layers and enlarge them to fill the canvas. These tasks can be repetitive, so I have created actions to do exactly this. They will adjust the file size, the allow you to select your background layers before enlarging. At this time, I offer actions for Shutterfly and MyPicTales. However, I do offer custom action services if you choose another photo book printer.


Below are some of my templates and actions. Click to bring you directly to my store.
 

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