PrintNinja - online printing made easy for creators

Our customer service team has helped deliver more than seven million pieces to happy customers around the world. Lean more about that team and quote your printing project today!

Artwork Recommendations

Here are our recommendations for creating your custom game artwork.

Artwork Recommendations

Offset games can be printed in full color (CMYK) or greyscale/black and white. Full-color printing is created by blending four colors of ink: cyan, magenta, yellow and black – also known as key for K.

Black and white or greyscale uses just one color of ink, black, lending itself to be more cost-effective. When designing your custom game artwork, keep in mind games printed with just black will not be as deep as rich black, which is the outcome of using all four colors of CMYK.

If your game contains pre-made components (pawns, meeples, card stands) we have an inventory of stocked colors. However, for an additional fee, you can request specific colors.

Cards and Packaging Artwork

Whether you choose full color or black and white is your creative choice. However, we cannot print on foil booster packs. The most noteworthy tip for your cards and packaging artwork is to keep in mind that bleed applies. To avoid white lines showing around your edges follow this bleed guideline.

Punch Tokens Artwork

We offer CMYK and black and white one-sided or two-sided printing. The cheaper option, one-sided tokens, will have a grey board back visible. Two-sided tokens will have printing and finishes on both sides of the token. This is a great option for reversible tokens that need different images on each side or if your game calls for a more polished look.

Instructions Artwork

Most instructions are printed in black and white since they are heavy in text. If you choose to print your instructions in full color, we recommend submitting your files with your text profile set in greyscale to avoid ghosting. The rest of your file can be submitted as CMYK.

Booklets are often printed with full color covers and black and white interiors. If this is what you prefer please choose the black & white option on our card quote form. Then write a brief explanation in the additional notes box.

File Design Considerations

Read through our Printing Color Guide to avoid the most common pitfalls when printing in offset.

Freshly updated customer reviews from TrustPilot