Visual Pioneers Studio Service 03 of 06
BrochureDesign
Folded, stitched or a single sheet — sequenced so a reader gets your pitch in the order you would say it out loud.
Pick a fold
The fold order is the reading order. On the outside face the front cover is the right-hand panel, with the back cover beside it and the flap that tucks inside on the left. That tucking panel is set about 2 mm narrower so the brochure closes flat instead of bulging at the fold.
It reads like a book: cover, one large inside spread, back. Choose this when you have photographs worth printing big, or a table that will not survive being squeezed into a 99 mm panel.
A concertina. Every panel is the same width and each is revealed in turn as the reader opens it, which suits a sequence — steps, a timeline, a range of four products — better than a roll fold does.
Saddle-stitched — folded sheets nested and stapled through the spine. The page count has to be a multiple of four, because every sheet carries four pages. Ask for fourteen and the binder hands you sixteen with two blanks in it.
What youget
Ready for the press, and ready for the next revision.
- A cover concept, and a grid the inside pages follow
- Every panel laid out in fold order, not in file order
- Your photographs placed, cropped and colour-corrected
- Charts, tables and price lists set to read at arm’s length
- Fold marks and crop marks on the press PDF
- Two PDFs — reader spreads for you, printer spreads for the press
- Text converted to curves so no font goes missing at the press
- Editable source, because there is always a revision
What we need from you
The four things that decide whether this runs smoothly.
- The copy, close to finalLayout follows content. Rewriting after the panels are set means the panels get set twice, and that is the most common reason a brochure runs late.
- Photographs at full sizeStraight off the camera, or from the photographer. Images pulled off WhatsApp or lifted from a website are a quarter of the detail printing needs.
- Your fold, if it is already decidedThe printer may have a die or a stocked size that is cheaper. One phone call to them before we start can save you a reprint.
- The page count, if it is a bookletMultiples of four only. Knowing this at the start shapes how much copy each section gets.
- Trifold flat
- 297 × 210 mm
- Bleed
- 3 mm all round
- Images
- 300 dpi at final size
- Binding
- Saddle-stitch
How a brochure gets built
01
Sequence
What the reader learns first, second and last — mapped panel by panel before anything is designed.
02
Grid
Margins, columns and type sizes settled once, so every panel feels like part of the same document.
03
Layout
Copy and images flowed in, then tightened panel by panel until nothing is fighting for room.
04
Press files
Imposed the way your printer asks for them, with fold marks, crop marks and bleed in place.
Work of this kind
Printed,and out there
Questionswe get asked
Trifold if it goes into a hand or an envelope and the pitch is short. Bifold if you have photographs worth printing large. A stitched booklet once you are past roughly eight panels of content — beyond that a folded sheet becomes unreadable.
We edit, cut and order what you give us so that it fits and reads well. We do not write it from scratch, though we will tell you plainly when a panel has nothing to say and would be better left quiet.
Usually not. Website images are saved small on purpose so pages load quickly. Print needs roughly four times that detail, so send the originals — even phone originals are better than downloads.
It is the panel that tucks inside the other two. We take about 2 mm off it so the brochure closes flat instead of bulging along the fold.
Yes. A compressed screen PDF goes out alongside the press files, sized so it actually sends.
Three panels.One argument.
Send the copy and the photographs; we will sequence it.