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Theo331728749dq2
Known Participant
December 27, 2023
Answered

Crop marks and white space around edge of pdf

  • December 27, 2023
  • 3 replies
  • 2133 views

I add crop marks during pdf export.

 

Is there a way to add white space around the edges of a pdf without the actual crop marks?

I may choose to leave some white space around the exterior during cropping because I liked the way it looks

, but with crop marks the actual crop mark lines will be visible if I leave any white around the edges.

This topic has been closed for replies.
Correct answer rob day

Hi @Theo331728749dq2 , You can include the document’s slug, which can be larger than the bleed:

 

3 replies

Peter Spier
Community Expert
Peter SpierCommunity Expert
Community Expert
December 27, 2023

You really have two questions here...

For the white space I would add a Slug allowance in the document setup and include the slug in the xport settings.

If you dont want the crtops to show (and the default crop marks are waay too close to the trim edge) increase the offset. Crop marks shoud ALWAYS have a minimum offset equal to the bleed allowance so they fall outside the bleed area, and more is not a problem.

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Theo331728749dq2Author
Known Participant
December 29, 2023

 I basically wanted the option to print with white space without having crop marks.

Robs' suggestion worked best and was easy to implement.

James Gifford—NitroPress
James Gifford—NitroPress
Legend
December 27, 2023

Why not just add the white margin as bleed in the layout, and then you can export with or without it?

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    Theo331728749dq2Author
    Known Participant
    December 27, 2023

    How would I do this? I tried going to FILE, DOCUMent SETUP, BLEED but this does nothing to the exported pdf?

    James Gifford—NitroPress
    James Gifford—NitroPress
    Legend
    December 27, 2023

    Several ways to do this but I think all will require manual crop marks to get the exact effect desired.

     

    The cropmarks in my example are not manual, I also didn’t add any page items to the document to get the whitespace outside of the PDF’s bleed and crop. See attached document


    Ah, I should have finished my experimenting. Both bleed and slug will create a white margin if nothing else is defined there.

     

    And yes, you can turn the various marks on and off, but the OP seems a bit fussy about exactly where they appear, and the export adjustments may or may not meet those demands. Hence, manual marks may be needed for an exact result.

    Steve Werner
    Community Expert
    Steve WernerCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    December 27, 2023

    I would change to cropping to add the white space around the art. Then create the PDF without crop marks.

     

    If you need the crop marks for the printer, create them manually.

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