General print preparation and designing envelopes with a business look

Hello and welcome, dear friends of design. My name is Stefan Riedl. We are going to design an envelope - full-size, in DIN long format, with a window. You can see it here. This will be the envelope we are designing. It looks a bit tricky, I admit, but don't worry, it's like so many things in life: If you know what and where to look for, you'll find the solution pretty quickly. And that's exactly how we'll handle this scenario.

But before we get down to the actual design: where do we get such templates? What is the ideal way to work with InDesign? And what do you have to watch out for if you have to deal with a somewhat atypical format? It is therefore necessary to take a few preparatory measures - and we will now tackle these together. I hope you enjoy yourselves. I hope you can take away a lot of learning content for yourselves, a lot of know-how that you may not have known before and things that will help you in your everyday design work. In any case, I hope you have lots of fun and I look forward to tackling this project with you.

Color spaces: CMYK and RGB

A very essential area that every designer will have to deal with is the topic of color - color is something wonderful, because color enriches our lives, color enriches our everyday lives and color naturally also enriches print products. And in order for us to really handle color correctly, it is first important to distinguish between two different color systems, i.e. different color spaces:

One is the RGB color space, in which every digitally created photo, for example, is located. And this RGB color space naturally behaves differently from the opposite CMYK color space, which we will discuss in a moment.

Let's take a look at how an RGB color space works. I have a graphic for you:

The RGB color space describes three core colors: red, green and blue. Now this color space consists of these three core colors. However, the only major difference between RGB and CMYK is not the number of colors, but also the color mixing. How do these colors work together?

In the RGB color space, we have what is known as additive color mixing. This means that if you put these colors on top of each other and add them together, white is created at some point. You can see this here in the middle (1). So red and blue produce this slight magenta hue (2), with a little violet in there too. On the other hand, a mixture of blue and green gives this cyan tone (3). Here below we have a yellow tone (4). And when all these colors are superimposed, the result is white.

This color system is used in all digital media, i.e. on every monitor, on every display, on your smartphone, on your tablet. Wherever colors are reproduced digitally, we have this RGB color space.

However, since we are talking about printed products, i.e. far from any screen display, but actually printed on paper, we have a different color space - and it is called CMYK. Here again we have three colors, namely cyan (1), magenta (2) and yellow (3). There is also a fourth color, and we'll get to that in a moment. But what is definitely a significant difference is the color mixing, i.e. the type of color mixing. We don't have additive color mixing here, but subtractive color mixing. It is clear to common sense and every child who paints white sheets of paper with crayons that additive color mixing cannot work in this case, because three colors painted on top of each other simply do not produce white. The result is more of a dark brown, dark gray, rather dull, but not black either.

That's why this color space was enriched with a fourth color. This is the so-called "key", i.e. the key color black (4). It is important for us as designers to know this: There are essential, different approaches and different processes here. So these two color spaces are two completely different ones. While we need the RGB color space for the screen display, we need the CMYK color space for the printing process. We will come across this more often in the course of this training.

Now the question naturally arises: when does it become difficult for us? And that happens precisely during design.

Let me show you an example of what I mean. On the left, we have an image that is displayed in the RGB color space. Here we have rich, vibrant colors. There's no doubt that this is totally super in terms of appearance. And on the right we also have an image - in principle completely identical - but what's different here? The colors here are dull. The brilliance of the color is clearly diminished. You can tell by the slight shimmer of color that lies over it like smog in the city. You could almost think it's really from all those cars driving around. No - it's not from that. InDesign does this as a so-called soft proof, which simulates what happens when the photo is printed on a very specific paper. In this case: uncoated paper.

What I want to show you with this is simply that the color reproduction depends on many factors. On the one hand, the paper itself, of course. But it goes much further than that: it even varies depending on the time of day. Do you work in the morning, at midday or in the evening? It also varies depending on the viewing angle. The color rendering depends on the quality of the light and the weather conditions outside. You have to imagine that. Depending on the mood of our dear St. Peter, he lets the sun shine or perhaps chases us past thunderclouds, which also change the impression in this case. It goes even further that reflections from the floor or walls deceive the color reproduction. The monitor must be at operating temperature, and it can also contain color casts. As you can see, there are an incredible number of factors that work against color-accurate work.

This is why it is first and foremost important that the monitor you are working with has been calibrated with a special measuring device. Such measuring devices are attached to the front of the monitor, then a program is run and actual measurements are taken: What color does the monitor display when it shows red? Such measuring devices are not that expensive, they cost around 100 euros. I used a Spider for my monitor, and after it had gone through the whole procedure, it simply created an ICC profile for me, which is supposed to guarantee the truest possible color fidelity. This is definitely a better method than trying to ensure color accuracy with some sliders somewhere in the settings of your system. You can forget about that, quite honestly. You're just trying to achieve approximate values somewhere, but there's really no question of color accuracy.

So that you know what is meant, I have called up the graphics properties of my graphics card here. There is a section called Colour optimization (1). I would almost consider "optimization" to be borderline, but you know how it is. Then you see sliders here: red, green, blue, (2) I have no idea what all this means. I'll just set the contrast to high (3) and then move it completely in the other direction. You can't see that in the picture now, but I can promise you: If I move the sliders here, all the rainbow colors will change. It really looks as if the monitor has just fallen into the paint bucket. And then getting back to the original situation is a game of chance anyway - if it weren't for the Restore default button (4), I'd never get it back together. So you see, this is nothing to work with.

Setting the color space in InDesign

Now the first step when working with InDesign is to make small adjustments in the color management. You can do this via Edit>Color settings (1). And this is where the working color spaces (2) are defined. The practical thing about this is that it also works across the board, which means it also applies to Photoshop or Illustrator. In other words, what you enter here can be synchronized so that a uniform procedure is applied when you work with one of these programs.

Here you can see the working color space in RGB mode(1), I have selected the Adobe RGB color space. You can either use this or the sRGB color space(2). This is slightly smaller than the Adobe RGBcolor space (3), but especially in the area of image editing, it makes sense to use the slightly larger color space guaranteed by Adobe.

In the working color space in the CMYK area(1), you can now decide which color space is more important to you. Here you can see a huge list. And there we select ISO Coated v2 (ECI) (2). This is the correct color space for coated paper. And since we often want to print something on coated paper, this is definitely the right one. You can select this in the default settings. It's not included in older versions, but I think it's been on board since CC, i.e. since Adobe Creative Cloud. Let's take a look at where you can find this color profile if you don't have it.

I'll set it to ISO Coated v2 (1) for now. That's the right color space for general work in most cases. You will see that we now have an exceptional example in which we also have to make a few adjustments, but you can use this in any case. Here you still have to specify that embedded profiles are retained (2).

So now we know that there are various profiles that we need, and if they are missing, we have to get them. To do this, I'll open Internet Explorer and call up the appropriate page: eci.org (1). This is the website of the European Color Initiative.

At the bottom of the page, under Downloads (2), there is an "ECI general" section (3). Here we find various profiles.

Let me scroll down to the appropriate section: "ICC-Profiles of the ECI", "ECI_Offset_2009" (1). You can see what's in here: ISO Coated v2 (2), v2 with 300 % (3). PSO Uncoated ISO12647 (4), this is for uncoated paper. Or here even uncoated paper with a yellow tint (5). So there's definitely a big package in there. You can download it with just one click (6).

This is a ZIP file (1) that is packed. The file has been downloaded and can be found in my download folder. You can unzip it (2), then you will see the individual profiles (3), which you can simply add to your system with a double-click. You will definitely need these to continue working on the following.

Download the template for the envelope

That was quite a lot, but these are important steps that you simply have to take. Don't worry, you don't have to do this every time. Now it's time for our envelope. And that raises the question: where do we get a template that provides this letter template already optimized for InDesign?

I'll go to our partner site: diedruckerei.de (1). This is a subdomain of the large Online-Printers GmbH. It is one of the largest online printing companies in Europe and in Germany it operates as diedruckerei.de, but internationally or for our neighbors in German-speaking countries such as Austria or Switzerland, the site is available at online-printers.at or online-printers.ch.

The great thing about this is that we can find the right template we need on the website. We don't create something like this manually.

Here we have envelopes (2), I click on them once.

Full-surface envelopes (1). And then it asks us which envelopes - we naturally want the classic DIN-long format(2) for business letters or invoices or whatever else we want to send.

We can already see the first indications there: "four-color on both sides" (1). We have already discussed four-color, CMYK. "Please refer to the detailed view for window size and position" (2), "with window on the right only in C5 format" (3), this does not apply to us.

"Inner surface imprint in gray" (4), "Closure flap on the long side (adhesive strip)" (5). That's what it looks like. Very nicely done by them, but we'll make our own now.

Let's go to the Details tab (1). There we can see, for example, the final formats if we were to create it manually, and also additional information under Data note (2). The most important thing on this page is the color mode (3). We do not have to use coated paper here, but we need "CMYK according to FOGRA47", namely the profile "PSO Uncoated ISO12647".

Let's take a look at the data sheet (3) in the details (1) - "with window on the left" (2).

Here we can see exactly the format of what such an envelope actually looks like. It doesn't really have much in common with the final envelope, you might think, but here we have the flaps that are not printed (1) because they contain the adhesive strips, for example, also down here in this area (2). Here we can see the formats again, including the fact that we should keep a safety margin (3), for example, towards the edge of the final format, "this prevents unwanted bleed".

Looks pretty tricky, but no problem, because we know how to help ourselves here too. Let's go back to Details (1), where we have the templates (2). We are working with InDesign, so we will simply download this INDD, the file format of InDesign (3). Confirm once and save.

Then I'll take a look at the whole thing in my browser. I've already unzipped it. So now it says: "Envelope template".

I open InDesign and drag in the file. Isn't that great? Do you know how much work we save because the entire template has already been defined here? You can see the cutting edge everywhere, so we don't have to worry about anything. It's child's play, I tell you, to design something like this. It's great that our printing partner provides a template like this, because it definitely makes designers' hearts beat faster.

If you're wondering whether you've got a kink in your look - no, you haven't. This is in fact simply rotated by 90 degrees. We will now straighten it once via View>Rotate print sheet>90° against UZS.

Then it will look like this. Now we can get started quite comfortably.

Let's take another look at the layers (1). There we can also see that this red punching contour is blocked (2). You can see this from the crossed-out pen tip and the lock, which means that nothing can be done here. We are therefore working on the layout level (3).

Loading color fields

Such envelopes are traditionally used for sending letters or invoices or who knows what else, but certainly always in the company's branding. They have their corporate colors, as you know - the colors that have been written down in the corporate design manual. In other words, these are really specifically defined colors that are used. So in our example, we won't start by looking for suitable colors. No, we will now load color fields. This is very practical in InDesign - you can click on the color swatches at the top here (1), then press this small, inconspicuous button (2), then click on Load color swatches... (3).

Then you can load this ASE file (1) or the one from your company that contains the color swatches. Voila: The appropriate CMYK values are already stored here (2). We can now continue working with these colors and start designing.

Create color areas

First of all, I would like to color this flap at the top, the one to be glued shut. It's not rocket science ... I can zoom in precisely by holding down the Alt keyand using the mouse wheel. The fold will be at this point (1) at the end.

Once we've seen that, go back once, select the rectangle and the color red. And off we go. Simply draw a rectangle up to the edge. Now I'll reduce the opacity as an example so that you can see what I mean: You should definitely draw the rectangle out to the frame, even if you know that it will be cut at the edge. It's better to take a little more than a little too little, at least in this particular case.

At the top, I think we can even go a bit further out. I'll push that a little bit bigger. Then you have to be careful that this is right on the edge (1). So we can go a little deeper here. Increase the opacity to 100 % again (2).

And now the flap is colored in our wonderfully beautiful 4eck Media red. That wasn't rocket science so far.

Let's continue with the back (1). Of course, we also want this to be colored, so I use the rectangle again (2), this time in blue (3), with this very delicate shade of blue. I start at the bottom, go to the bleed and draw it up to the dividing line at "15 mm" (4), i.e. below the address field or address window. Again, be careful that you are really on the fold. We now have the reverse side in blue and the flap in red (5).

Working with InDesign libraries

What I'm missing now is an eye-catcher on the front, and I'm going to position it now. It's very simple: in this case I'm working with so-called libraries - something great, because they're neither dusty nor do they have old books in them, no, with libraries in InDesign you can really work extremely comfortably, and with objects that are always recurring.

I now have my libraries here on the side in my control panels. A click on it opens what I have in there so far. You can simply drag and drop things in there or drag them out again.

If you want to create your own library, you can do this easily via File>New>Library (1). You can even synchronize them via the Creative Cloud (2). This means that they end up in the cloud and you can then access them anywhere or even share them with your employees. I'll break this off, but you know you can create such libraries and then give them a name and use such objects very conveniently.

I'll just do that now. I'll pull out our logo or our large tile design. It's still rotated, of course, because we rotated the print sheet. But that's no big deal - I'll just rotate it and move it over here.

Now I use a key combination: I go to a corner of the square, hold down the left mouse button and press the Shift keyto enlarge it proportionally and the Alt keyto enlarge it in all directions, and even the Ctrl keyon top of that. So I have to press three keys with my left hand, but then everything is enlarged proportionally. This is what it looks like.

So this is just a square in 4eck Media red (1), with an outline around it, which is currently at 11 pt (2) because it also enlarges proportionally, and a text field above it with the name of our company. Then I select the whole object again. By holding down the Shift keyand using the arrow keys, I can easily jump upwards in steps of 10 ... I position it like this (1).

Now you'll be thinking: "That's right above the bleed" (1), and I'll tell you: Yes, that's exactly how I want it. This means that once this envelope is in its final splendor, i.e. folded and glued, we will have exactly this corner here on the back (2). And why am I doing this? - Things or objects that you position in the bleed always create a certain dynamic, there's a certain tension, it just looks exciting. You take a closer look and think: "Oh, oops, that's cut off." You might not even notice it consciously, but I promise you: Things, objects, graphics, whatever - if you position something like that in the crop and it fits, then it definitely looks more exciting than if everything is always visible.

I would like it to be a bit wider, something like that. And for my taste it could even be a little bigger, so Ctrl and Shift again ... So, a little to the right, then it goes over the glued area here (1). That's exactly how I like it.

So that our company's branding really burns itself into the viewer's mind, I'd like to position our web address here at the top of the back, where everyone will look (1), because everyone who receives an envelope like this will touch this place, because they have to open the letter.

I zoom in and use the text tool (1). I'll open a text field (2). Our house font is Aller (3). It's available in different weights, I'll choose Bold (4). Color white (5). Here I enter the web address www.4eck-media.de. A little larger (6).

But: Bold is too bold for me, I prefer Regular (1). I like that much better. Let's take a look at this. In terms of size, that's fine (2). If I now double-click on this handle in the bottom corner (3), the text field will be reduced to exactly the size required to fit all the letters in it (4).

Now we need to center it. You could try moving it manually. But that's not so easy. But there are also tools for this: I select the text field first (1). Holding down the Shift key, I select the object behind it (2). And now I use a pretty cool tool, namely the Align tool(3). You can find it at the top of your toolbar. Here you can align it once to this axis (4) and to this one (5). It is now exactly centered.

But now we have another error. Already recognized it? Sure - if the envelope is taped shut, the address will of course be upside down. And that doesn't really suit us. So mark once, rotate, enter a rotation of 180 degrees up here, then the whole web address is upside down, but exactly right for us.

Export

Now we have designed the envelope. Now it's time for the final export. We have to take something else into account. To do this, select File>Export... Set name and save.

This is the export dialog - and it is essential when it comes to transferring the data to the print shop in a print-compliant manner. That's why we also take a look at what the print shop wants from us.

At the top, for example, we have the Adobe PDF specification. You can choose different things. PDF/X-1a:2001, PDF/X-3:2002 and so on and so forth. What is the right one?

It's like this: Well-known standards are actually PDF/X-1a:2001 and PDF/X-3:2002, which have even been elevated to ISO standards. For European prepress, the PDF/X-3:2002 formathas largely established itself.

Let's check the diedruckerei.de website to see if this is correct. Under Print data>Tips (1) for data creation: We can have the PDF version (2) processed with "PDF 1.3 to PDF 1.7". "Export the PDF file from a professional layout program" - we have "Please select PDF/X-3, PDF/X-1a or PDF/X-4 as export settings". (3)

So I select X-3 (1), which is standard. In the Acrobat default (2) it says 1.3 to 1.7, so I also select a representative standard, namely PDF 1.3. pages: Here we want to print everything we have created (3).

Then we go one tab further to Compression (1). Compression is particularly important when defining how placed images are to be handled. Default settings are already defined here by the format. Bicubic recalculation to 300 pixels per inch, i.e. ppi, for images with more than 450 ppi. What does this mean? You have to imagine it like this: You have a document with images in it. They are available in an incredibly large resolution, but have not actually been prepared in the document in such a large size and are therefore not output in such a large size. This default setting now determines the following: Images are actually downsampled, and if the effective resolution exceeds 450 ppi, they are reduced to 300 ppi. What does this mean? An image that has now been defined with 300 ppi in Photoshop and reduced by 50 percent in InDesign would effectively result in a resolution of 600 ppi. This is no longer necessary, which is why we can allow ourselves exactly this option: 450 (2) and more is reduced to 300 (3). Compression automatically in JPEG (4) - some people will raise their index finger and say: "JPEG is not really good, we'll lose data." I see it a little differently, because it's not that serious in this area as long as the image quality is set to maximum (5).

Continue to Marks and Bleed (1). You usually create a checkbox here: Use document bleed settings (2). In this document there is no bleed at all (3), it has been integrated into the workspace, which is okay. But please activate this checkbox in general. This is important when we create a bleed manually. You can find out exactly what this means in another tutorial.

Let's move on to the output (1). Incidentally, we are going through this dialog in such detail because we save it once and then call it up again each time so that we don't have to go through the procedure from the beginning every time. So in general, as already mentioned, most of the print products we create are printed on coated paper. In this case, we have an exception, but we will leave this exception aside for now. We'll come back to it later. Don't forget. I'm going to do something here that doesn't necessarily fit on the envelope, but you'll see why I'm doing it this way.

For the color conversion (2), it's actually most practical to choose Convert to Target Profile (Keep Values) from the drop-down menu. And when it asks us which working color space we should convert to, then please convert to the CMYK working color space ISO Coated v2 (3).

Now I'll go to the Advanced dialog(1). Here comes something very familiar, namely fonts. You have probably already read this at your print shop: fonts should be 100 percent embedded. This is exactly what we define here. Partially load fonts if the proportion of characters used is less than 100 %. Means: "All fonts with corresponding embedding bits are embedded." (2)

You can leave the transparency reduction at High resolution (3) and we can ignore deviating settings on print sheets (4).

Let's go to security (1). We don't need to pay attention to anything else.

Overview (1) would summarize everything again. I will now save this default (2), namely: "diedruckerei.de ISO coated".

And now we come back to this point that I just mentioned earlier in issue (1): I have saved the profile because we will use it again and again in other training courses. But in this case, we need a different profile. So we will adapt it.

In the output, we do not use the target CMYK working color space - ISO Coated, but our printing partner wants this for uncoated paper. In this drop-down menu there is PSO Uncoated ISO12647 (2), and this is what we will use now. The default has now also changed up here (3). That's all right. I also save this default: "diedruckerei.de ISO uncoated" (4).

Now we can go to Export (5).

This is our PDF, which actually looks quite simple, but in the end will have exactly the beautiful design we had in mind. And you can also see the following: All these punch marks have disappeared, even though we didn't hide them manually.

This is because the punching outline has already been marked as not printable in the template when you double-click on it. So the checkbox is missing for Print layer, which is why the layer is not output.

And now that we have the print-ready template, we can start uploading the order, because we will of course check afterwards whether it has worked exactly as we imagined. When the goods we ordered arrive here, we'll unpack them together and see if they really look as great as we thought they would. I'm looking forward to it - it's time to upload it to the print shop.

Here we are on the site. I've already logged in with my customer details. We go back to Envelopes (1), select Envelopes full-size (2), DIN long (3). That's what we've created.

Now let's scroll down. It asks us about the product configurations: First of all, of course, the grammage is crucial here. 80 g/m² (1), that's perfectly fine. And you can also display small info boxes (2), which provide further information. We would like to have the whole thing with a window on the left (3) and a print run of 500 (4).

Now to the data check (1). What is this? Let's click on this (2): This gives us the opportunity to check our document once again. What exactly is being checked? We can see that here below:

For example, the resolution (3) is checked and the bleed (4). Folding lines, running direction, color application, color mode and color space are not checked. Fortunately, we did all this beforehand. Format, deviations (5) are also checked ...

A data check like this is perhaps quite practical if you're really not sure: Have I done it right? Have I not done it right? Before we print 500 envelopes, it might well be worth activating this data check. In our case, we don't need it. We can actually go straight on.

Incidentally, there is also a very practical currency converter (1). For example, if you say: "Okay, 50 euros, but I'm from Switzerland and would like to know how much that costs in Swiss francs", then click on this (2). And then it spits out how much that would be. This doesn't mean that the invoice will be issued in Swiss francs, but I think it's a very practical gimmick for information purposes. Let's go to the order (3).

Here we can see our shopping cart again, which clearly breaks down what we want to order. Subtotal (1) so and so much, German VAT of 19% on top (2), so that the good Father State also earns something. And we can even see how much the whole thing will weigh. Just under two and a half kilos (3). And we even have a delivery handover (4). Good. I go to Next (5).

Then it would ask for login details, but I've already entered them, so let's go one step further.

Payment and shipping. We pay by prepayment, bank transfer, there are also many others, you see: Sofort-Überweisung, you can also pay by credit card, Giropay and PayPal are available.

Then you can also use the Trusted Shop buyer protection (1), but I don't need it at this point. And I go to Continue (2).

Of course, we still have to accept the terms and conditions and the withdrawal policy, which is perfectly clear, as with any order. And now that the order is complete, we can upload the data to the server. To do this, we need the order number, which is given with the order confirmation. We can then use this order number to assign our PDF to our order.

To summarize once again. Now we just click on Buy at the bottom.

Now we have an order number, which is this one (1). I'll copy it to the clipboard right now. Then we can continue to upload our print files (2).

Now I drag and drop the files into this area (1). Now we can see the preview here again. "Please select a purpose". This is the outside (2). Sometimes it is also very important to send up info or view files, for example (3). Here we get another quick check (4) - green light: "The print data can be produced". Fits perfectly. Another check at "I have uploaded all files for this job" (5) and then we go to Complete.

There is another summary that no further uploads are possible. We have completed the data upload. "Thank you very much!" And now we can go back to the start page. That's how easy it is to order and design an envelope like this. I hope you've learned something.

Unboxing

It's time for the moment of truth: our envelopes should be in here. I open the box once and remove the filling material.

It's packed in another box, which is good.

And here we have our envelopes. Wow! Cool!

Let's take a detailed look at what they all look like. I already mentioned in the training that we definitely need to make fine adjustments to the monitor brightness, because you can see it very clearly here: the colors are much less saturated than our monitor made them out to be, and the color brilliance is also lower on uncoated paper. What I'm trying to tell you: please make sure you turn down the brightness on your monitor, because no sheet of paper, like this one, shines as brightly as the festive lighting emanating from your monitor. But apart from that, I think it's a pretty cool look. I like it, this angled arrangement really looks good, even now in multiple clone format.

Now let's turn the whole thing around - it looks pretty cool. We've turned our web address upside down here.

Then we have the automatic gluing on the inside, which actually fits perfectly. And something like this definitely looks better in the letterbox than the standard envelopes that are used everywhere else.

Finally, a test with a letter from the tax office, so it should fit as far as standardization is concerned. I put it in - you can see - it fits perfectly. We've done everything right. I am satisfied. Have fun. Your Stefan