CD artwork

[Goatee]

HI

I'm trying to create artwork to be printed on a CD

The company doing the printing has given a template for the artwork, 118mm diameter with 15mm central hole

I've manage (eventually)to achieve circular artwork but have found it impossible to change the print diameter with any accuracy, all I can do is adjust the dimensions of the layer then measure the diameter of the circular artwork, its all trial and error and is really difficult without a centre spot to measure through, certainly not accurate enough to send to a printer

I really cant believe it is so difficult to create a circle of set diameter, surely there's a better way?

[Ofnuts]

(02-27-2020, 08:56 PM)Goatee Wrote: HI

I'm trying to create artwork to be printed on a CD

The company doing the printing has given a template for the artwork, 118mm diameter with 15mm central hole

I've manage (eventually)to achieve circular artwork but have found it impossible to change the print diameter with any accuracy, all I can do is adjust the dimensions of the layer then measure the diameter of the circular artwork, its all trial and error and is really difficult without a centre spot to measure through, certainly not accurate enough to send to a printer

I really cant believe it is so difficult to create a circle of set diameter, surely there's a better way?

Actually that works fairly well, but:

1) the image on your screen is displayed "dot for dot" (at 100% zoom a pixel of image is one pixel of your screen) so it is displayed at your screen definition. To get the actual size on your display, reset View>Dot for dot and make sure that the display has the right resolution in Edit>Preferences>Display

2) Gimp is not terribly good for accurate printing, but if the final image is exported with a proper print definition, other programs can print it accurately.

[rich2005]

I hope you started off the correct way. Sounds like it might be too late if you made a small image and now have to scale it.

These are the basic dimensions. Note, what is is called full-face printing does not go up to the 'hole' but stops short. https://i.imgur.com/QSnVtoK.jpg

Where did you get the template? Most of these are Adobe ai / cmyk-psd not usable in Gimp so you get a fall-back PDF. Gimp PDF import defaults to 100 ppi. You must set this to 300 ppi. Often looks like this: https://i.imgur.com/VWRY5Km.jpg Give a reference to what is used and get better advice.

Made the background too small? I advise using the unified transform tool with settings like this: https://i.imgur.com/1V2CG9D.jpg That allows you to see the area to fill but do use centerline guides and center the background image first.

Cut out the center hole? (or the excess beyond the disk) Usually not necessary. Even with home printing the software will not print in these areas. If you do need to cut out. Set up some guides, use the template to size a selection. Move to the background layer and cut. (I trust you are using multiple layers ) https://i.imgur.com/trWinSO.jpg