Part 1

Perhaps at some point you've had your printing company send back your artwork, telling you they need the "bleeds pulled" before they can print the piece. Perhaps you scratched your head a bit at how to do that, or did a bunch of Google searches and came up with all sorts of answers. Hopefully, however, your experience with "pulling bleeds" didn't leave you bloodied.

Bleed Defined

Simply put, a bleed is printing that goes to the edge of the sheet after trimming. (This and many more printing terms are defined at our Glossary page.)

Bleed can consist of any graphic element that runs to the edge of a page - photos, logos, blocks of color, lines, etc. Sometimes a printer might refer to full bleed. This simply means printing goes to all four edges of the page. In the Texas Land Conservancy newsletter signature above, the yellow "The Landowner Issue" banner bleeds on two sides. 

An important thing to note is the part of the definition that says after trimming. Any printed piece with a bleed will need to be run on an oversized sheet and trimmed down to achieve the bleed. This is because almost no printing device – not even our state-of-the-art Heidelberg PM52 press – can print color to the edge of a sheet. So the effect is simulated by printing a little more of the photo, logo, block of color, etc. than is needed – past the printed piece's trim size. In other words, a piece that finishes to 11" X 17" would be printed on 12" X 18" paper and cut down to 11" X 17" afterward. 

More on how to pull bleeds in Part 2.

Thank you to Texas Land Conservancy for giving us permission to display their newsletter. You can download this newsletter, and more, at Texas Land Conservancy –> Newsletters