Wire and Spiral Bound Project Setup Guide

Traditional wire and spiral bound projects are unique in that we will need the artwork provided to us as individual pages with added bleed on all four sides. This goes for the cover AND interior page artwork (unlike all other binding types). Below are guides for setting up your covers and interior pages!

InDesign Setup Guide

• Select File > New > Document
• Choose Print as your Intent.
• Make sure Facing Pages is NOT selected.
• For the number of pages, enter your interior page count plus four additional pages for your front and back outside and inside covers. E.g. if your book has 24 interior pages, enter 28 as the number of pages in your document.
• Your Start Page # will be 1.
• Enter your page size (this is the final trim size of your book).
• The margins will be used to show the safe area. We recommend keeping all crucial text and artwork at least 10mm (0.40”) inside the trime line on the bound sides of the page to ensure it won’t be obscured by the hole punches for the wire/spiral coil. For the other three sides of the page, we recommend a 0.125” margin.
• Enter 0.125” for the bleed on all sides.
• If you don’t use InDesign often, your set unit of measurement may default to picas. To change this, go to InDesign > Preferences > Units & Increments and choose Inches for Horizontal and Vertical.
• Click OK to create your project document. Your front cover will be the first page, your inside front cover will be the second page, and your interior pages will follow in reader order. Your inside back cover will be the penultimate page and your back cover will be the last page.

File Export Settings

Adobe InDesign – Follow the “Export Settings” as highlighted on this page.

Photoshop Setup Guide

• In Photoshop, select File > New.
• Make sure to include the page number in the file name as you will need to create a different file for each page.
• For the page size enter your final trim size plus 0.125” bleed on all four sides, or 0.25” to the total page size. For example, if you are printing a 6.625” x 10.25” book, you would enter 6.875” x 10.5”.
• We recommend keeping all crucial text and artwork at least 0.525” inside the bound edge of the canvas (10mm or 0.4” inside the trim line)  to enure it won’t be oscured by the hole punches for the wire/spiral coil. For the other three sides of the page, we recommend keeping all crucial text and artwork at least .25” away from the edges of the canvas (0.125” inside the trim line).
• Ensure that the image resolution is 300 pixels per inch.
• Choose CMYK as your color mode.
• In the Advanced section select Don’t Color Manage This Document and Square Pixels.
• Click OK to create your page, then repeat the process as many times as you need to cover all of your pages.

File Export Settings

Adobe Photoshop –  Follow the “Export Settings” as highlighted on this page.

Illustrator Setup Guide

• Go to File -> New
• The Number of Artboards will be your interior page count plus four additional pages for your front and back outside and inside covers. E.g. if your book has 24 interior pages, enter 28 as the number of pages in your document..
• Enter your page size (this is the final trim size of your book) and 0.125” bleed to all four sides.
• We recommend keeping all crucial text and artwork at least 10mm (0.4”) inside the trim line on the bound edge of the page to enure it won’t be oscured by the hole punches for the wire/spiral coil. For the other three sides of the page, we recommend keeping all crucial text and artwork at least 0.125” inside the trim line.
• In the Advanced section choose CMYK as your color mode and 300 ppi as your resolution under Raster Effects.
• Click OK to create your project document. Your front cover will be the first artboard, your inside front cover will be the second artboard, and your interior pages will follow in reader order. Your inside back cover will be your penulitmate artboard and your back cover will be the last artboard.
• NOTE: Keep in mind that Illustrator has a limited canvas size, which means the total width of each row of pages and total height of each column of pages cannot exceed 227.5” (including bleed). If you are working on a long book then you may need to rearrange your artboards and/or split your project up into multiple files..

File Export Settings

Adobe Illustrator –  Follow the “Export Settings” as highlighted on this page.