Photoshop - DVD Cover Template

DVD Template

The first stage of creating my DVD case was creating a template. It was important I created a guide which would allow me to simply add elements and arrange them to fit within my template. This prevented me from worrying about sizes when creating different elements.

When I began this task it was important to first understand what was needed within my DVD template. It was important that I included a bleed and a safety area. These were two key words which were unknown to me prior to this research. Below are my thoughts and interpretations of the bleed and safety areas.

The bleed area is the perimeter around a piece of work which purposely has little/no important content. It is normally set at around 3mm thick and allows a margin for error when cutting. The edge of an image is taken into this bleed area however there would be nothing which would cause an issue if it was to be cut off. This is important when considering my DVD template as my cover will not fill a whole A4 sheet of paper and will hence have to be trimmed to size. Leaving myself 3mm around the perimeter will retain the quality of my finished piece.

The safety area is another 3mm margin which sits in behind the bleed area. This area acts as a barrier for text and photos. If you were to place a piece of text right up against the bleed line there is potential for this to be cut off or be so close to the edge of the piece of work that it looks unprofessional. The safety area prevents this from happening. This ensures there is at least a 3mm margin between the edge of the piece of work and the start of any text or image. This will allow me to keep my DVD cover professional and all nicely on the page when cut to size.

When looking at creating my DVD case it was important I found accurate dimensions. In order to achieve this I used two methods, one being physical measurements and the second being internet research. Both my research methods tied in together and were accurate within a few millimetres. The dimensions of which I have and will use for my DVD case are as follows: an overall size of 279.00mm x 189.00mm. This includes a spine size of 14.00mm, a 3 mm bleed area and a 3mm safety area. The front of my DVD case will be 129.5mm x 183.0mm.

In order to actually create my DVD template I firstly opened Photoshop and then went to open a new document. This document acts as a layer and the layer would act as my template. I was then given the opportunity to change various factors such as the width, height and resolution. The width of my DVD template was 279.00mm and the height of my DVD template was 189.00mm. I set my resolution to 300 pixels per inch. This is an abnormally high resolution however for quality printing this is required. The average resolution for an image created in Photoshop would be between 70 and 72 pixels per inch. However it is worth noting that the higher the resolution the larger the file size of the item being created.

 The standard settings for the colour mode are RGB. I left this as the standard. I was unsure whether to leave this setting as RGB or change it to CMY. The screen of a laptop is set to RGB, for this reason if this setting was changed to CMYK there would be a difference in colour when printed. Magazines, catalogs and such material use the CMYK colour structure as they cannot generate light. For this reason most printers convert the colours from RGB to CMYK when printing at such a high quality as a standard. This therefore shows no reason for me to need to change my colour spectrum for this piece of work and led me to my decision. The colours used was left at its standard setting of 8bit. This gives me a massive number of colours to choose from when making my DVD case and hence was fine left. The higher the bit the more colours available however a higher bit wasn’t needed for my project this time.

The background content was changed from white to transparent, this was for the ease when using layers. With a transparent background I am more able to add different layers to create different affects without having to worry about a coloured background.

I didn’t change any of the advanced features within this template as I feel it wasn’t needed and would complicate my design too much.

Once I had set these features I needed to add my guides. These allowed me to split my DVD cover into various sections such as the front, back and the spine. I also added guides for my bleed and safety areas to make sure I never placed anything too close to the edge of the cover. To insert these guides I simply went to View and then New Guide. I was then able to enter the position at which I wanted my guides and the table below shows these positions. I was able to set my positions to vertical and horizontal depending on where I wanted to add my guides.

Feature	Vertical or Horizontal?	Position (mm)
Front Cover	Vertical	132.5
Spine (Left from Centre)	Vertical	139.5
Spine (Right from Centre)	Vertical	125.5
Safety Area (Right)	Vertical	273.0
Safety Area (Left)	Vertical	6.0
Safety Area (Top)	Horizontal	6.0
Safety Area (Bottom)	Horizontal	183.0
Bleed Area (Left)	Vertical	3.0
Bleed Area (Right)	Vertical	276.0
Bleed Area (Top)	Horizontal	3.0
Bleed Area (Bottom)	Horizontal	186.0

The screenshots below show the features I changed when creating my new template and also my template when finished.