Foil Stamping Preparation

The maximum area we can stamp with one die is approximately 5" x 12", but this is affected by cover material and foil color, and the complexity of the stamp design.

We will let you know if your design requires multiple dies to achieve the desired effect.

There are several things to keep in mind when planning a foil stamp design for your book cover.

Traditional hot foil stamping is part art and part science, and knowing which design elements can be challenging to stamp can help you produce a successful foil stamp design.

The basics

We require a PDF of your foil stamp design, and all elements must be text (fonts) or vector format. See more about the specific file requirements

• Keep foil elements a minimum of 0.875" from the top, bottom, and outside edge of the cover (top and bottom of spine).
• The cover material wraps around the cover boards, causing a slight difference in thickness that can affect the quality of some stamps.
• You can use multiple foil colors on the same part of your book (front cover, spine, etc) but each color must be stamped separately with its own die.
  

Maximum size

• The maximum area we can stamp with one die is approximately 5" x 12", but this is affected by cover material and foil color, and the complexity of the stamp design.
• We will let you know if your design requires multiple dies to achieve the desired effect.
  

Fine detail

• Very thin lines may not show up well when stamped. We suggest a minimum stroke thickness of 1 pt, although for certain designs thinner strokes may be possible.
• Small elements 'reversed out' of stamped areas (i.e., white areas within black sections of your stamp art) can sometimes fill in when stamped.
• Tiny dots, similar to a halftone or silkscreen appearance, are not possible with traditional foil stamping.
  

Text size Foil stamping

• Tends to work well for headline or display text that is large or medium in size, with letterforms that are not exceptionally thin.
• Small text can present challenges, and we recommend that the smallest character (lowercase or uppercase) be about 0.15" tall for legible results when stamped.
• We generally suggest avoiding fonts that have a mix of thick slabs and thin serifs or curves in the same letterforms. Classic sans serif and serif fonts with less exaggerated width variation in the characters tend to get good results when stamped.
  

Space between design elements

• Foil stamped designs often feature the title in the vertical center of the front cover panel, while the author or subtitle is placed towards the bottom edge. Another option is to have an inset image in the middle with stamped text above and below.
• Both designs work, but using multiple stamping dies may be necessary due to the significant gap between the lines of text. This leads to higher book costs and additional setup and die fees on your order invoice.
• The maximum vertical gap that still allows use of one die varies based on book dimensions, cover material and foil color, and the stamp design itself. A very rough rule of thumb is to keep the distance under 4 inches.
  

Density and coverage

• Stamping large solid areas is difficult, and can sometimes result in tiny 'pinholes' of incomplete coverage.
• Another challenge is when a foil stamp design includes both thick/bold areas and thin/delicate details. Each of those elements requires a different amount of pressure and finesse when stamping, and may need to be split across multiple dies if the design allows.
• These are just some of the many factors we take into account when evaluating foil stamp designs, it's a complex and finicky medium. Feel free to show us a preview of your intended foil design before you place your order, and we'll be happy to let you know if edits are needed, how many dies are required, and so on.

Your foil stamp design is part of your cover layout, which you'll provide to us as a PDF.

To create the stamping die, we require your foil stamp art in vector format.

It cannot be a raster image made up of tiny dots (e.g. a photograph, or a graphic edited in Photoshop). Vector art is typically created in programs like Adobe Illustrator or Adobe InDesign. Text can be left as a font, or converted to paths/outlines.

Depending on your book type, we may need multiple variations of your cover file. Please see the breakdown below:

Linen wrap hardcover

• Stamp placement layout only
  

Printed wrap and printed linen wrap hardcover

• Printed cover design by itself, without foil stamp; Stamp placement layout by itself, without printed background; Mockup showing the stamp and printed background together
  

Printed softcover

• Printed cover design by itself, without foil stamp; Stamp placement layout by itself, without printed background; Mockup showing the stamp and printed background together.
  

Classic softcover

• If there is no printing on the cover, we just need a stamp placement file.
• If there is printing along with your foil stamp, then we need the same files required for a printed softcover.
• For the stamp placement file, all graphic elements in the layout must be black (100% K) on a white background and at actual size.
  

Don't make an effort to represent a foil color or linen material color when creating your stamp placement file. See our file preparation guidelines for more information.

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We require a vector-based PDF file for any foil stamping you'd like done. All graphic elements in the file need to be black on a white background and actual size.

To accommodate a spine foil stamp, your book should have a minimum of 60 pages. Keep in mind that the size of the spine text will be rather small for books with fewer than roughly 100 pages.

The maximum foil stamp height should be the height of the book minus 0.875" on the top and bottom.

The foil stamp width will be determined by your overall page count, and should have a minimum margin of 0.1" on either side of the stamp.