What is a booklet? A booklet consists of small sheets of paper bound together to form a “little book”. Mostly, booklets are made up of 1-40 pages, and the dimensions of the booklet are small. There’s an equivocalness regarding book and booklet, but generally, pocket-size or mini-sized guides are considered booklets while hardback or hardcovers are considered books.
Booklet printing is a valuable marketing tool to promote your product(s) or business(s), as it provides detailed and precise information. Brochures, magazines, zines, pamphlet, comic books, newspaper, newsletters, catalogs, and other marketing copies come under booklets’ umbrella.
Kinds of Paper
You’ll find three kinds of booklet printing paper that we use today, including:
Glossy Paper – It’s shiny and give a luxurious look. It is used for high-resolution photography. You’ll find glossy papers in magazine mostly.
Silk Paper – It comes in between glossy and matte with a smooth finish. Silk booklets provide intense visuals and liable text for readers. The best use of silk booklets is for product promotion and business partnerships.
Uncoated Paper – They are made up of rough papers and dull colors, which gives a vintage and antique look.
Lamination
Using lamination is vital because it gives the paper a well-groomed appearance, strength and stability. There are two types of lamination i.e.
Matte lamination – It offers a smooth appearance, and it is primarily laminated on silk paper.
Gloss Lamination – It offers a shiny and glossy appearance, and it mostly laminated on gloss paper.
Note: The uncoated paper should not be laminated. If it is done, the paper will lose its vintage look.
Binding Types
There are three types of binding a booklet i.e.
Saddle Stitch Binding – In this type, staples or wires hold the whole booklet from the center. It is inexpensive and also shows professionalism. It is commonly used in the newsletter, brochure, event programmers, information booklets and catalogues. It is easy to read as it opens flatly on the surface. This binding is best suited for 8-98 pages. If pages are more than 98, perfect or wire binding is preferred.
Perfect Binding – Instead of using staples or wires like in saddle stitch, here glue is used to hold the booklet printing, and the main cover is glued to the spine of paper through the stronger adhesive. You can also print on the spine. The minimum page requirement for perfect binding is 28 pages, and it is somewhat costly than saddle stitch. However, it is commonly used in magazines, newsletter, reports, educational text, and novels, and this reading material does not lay flat when it is opened.
Wire Binding – In this type, loop wires are used to hold the paper through punched holes. It provides an advantage of the flat opening of the booklet. Instructions’ manuals, recipe books, company reports and teaching aid use this type of binding.
Size
It’s always good to rely on standard sizes. However, you can use different orientations for booklet printing. There are three kinds of orientations of booklets that you can use:
Portrait Orientation – The height of the portrait is larger than the width, and this orientation is also called long edge bind because the dimension of the spine is longer than the width and height. The standard size that is most preferred is 8.5 width × 11 height and six width × nine height.
Landscape Orientation – Here, the width is larger than the height, and this orientation is also called short edge bind because the dimension of the spine is more concise. The standard size that is more preferable for landscape orientation is 11 height × 8.5 width and nine width × six height.
Square Orientation – Both dimensions are equal in sizes. It is unique and is not use every so often.
It’s not always essential to use these sizes; you can use any size or customize sizes according to your design.
Bleed Area
The Bleed area is the 3mm zone that extends out from the trim line. If the bleed area is not considered, a line of white paper will be left out after the booklet print is printed.
Trim Line
It is the dotted line that is going to separate your bleed area from the inner space. So, you can say that it is the final size of the booklet.
Quiet Area
The region that comes after the trim line is a quiet area, which is always 5mm. The size of the reserved area varies depending on the type of binding you are using. Its primary purpose is to avoid or remove any designs, text or imagery away from the borders or ends because it looks unpleasant in appearance. If you are using wire binding or perfect binding, it must increase the size of the quiet area.
Colors
In booklet printing, using black ink is economical than using color ink. Black ink is always used for text, imagery and graphics color ink is used. There are two types of the color system, including:
RGB (Red Green Blue) – The computer uses RGB for display.
CMYK (Cyan Magenta Yellow Black) – For printing, CMYK is used.
The color you see on the computer appears differently on paper. So, before you select colors for your final booklet print, convert the colors from RGB to CMYK.
