A comic that looks perfect on screen can come back from the printer with fuzzy art, cut-off panels, or muddy colors. Print has its own rules, and they are worth learning before you send a file off. Here is what actually matters.
Resolution: export at 300 DPI
DPI (dots per inch) is the density of detail in your file at print size. Screens are happy at 72–150 DPI, but professional printing needs 300 DPI — below that, line art looks soft and jagged in print. For fine detail or very crisp black-and-white line work, some artists export at 600 DPI. When you export from Striply, choose 150 for screen sharing, 300 for standard print, and 600 for the highest-quality print jobs.
Bleed: extend art past the edge
Printers cannot cut paper with perfect precision, so any art meant to run to the very edge of the page must extend past where the page will be trimmed. That extra margin is the bleed, typically about 1/8 inch (3 mm) on every side. Without bleed, a slightly misaligned cut leaves a thin white sliver along the edge. If your panels or backgrounds are supposed to reach the paper's edge, make sure they run all the way into the bleed area.
Safe margins: keep the important stuff inside
The mirror image of bleed is the safe area (or safe margin): a smaller boundary inside the trim line. Because the cut can drift, keep anything you cannot afford to lose — dialogue, faces, page numbers — comfortably inside the safe margin, away from the edge. The rule of thumb: bleed for what should run off the page, safe margin for what must never be cut.
A note on color: RGB vs CMYK
Screens display color in RGB (red, green, blue), while most printing presses use CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow, black) inks. Some bright RGB colors — especially vivid blues and greens — simply cannot be reproduced in CMYK and will shift or dull in print. If you are printing professionally, ask your printer whether they want a CMYK file, and avoid relying on the most saturated screen colors for anything critical. For home printing and digital reading, RGB is fine.
Choose the right page size
Decide your final trim size before you lay out pages, because it affects everything from panel proportions to margins. Common choices are US Letter, A4, and manga B5 — all available as presets in Striply. If your printer expects a specific size, set it up front so you are not rescaling finished artwork later. Page size also shapes your layout decisions.
Export a print-ready PDF
PDF is the standard delivery format for print because it preserves layout, resolution, and vector text reliably across machines. When your pages are finished, export each one to PDF at 300 DPI at your chosen page size. It is also worth keeping a working copy of your project — Striply lets you export your layout as JSON so you can reopen and revise a page later without starting over.
When you are ready, open the editor, set your page size and DPI, and export a test PDF. Print one page at home first — proofing on paper catches problems no screen will show you.