Inner bleed for master-spreads in Publisher

[EEvgeniy]

Good day to you!

I'm making a photobook right now and I use master-spreads for that. For technical reasons for future brochure-process, an inner bleed for photos should be used — with it photos that take a spread looks more seamless. You can check where there is an inner bleed just by stiching two pages of one spread side-by-side:

 

But now I'm stuck with some layouts that does have inner bleed, but do not extend a picture to it:

 

I thing the problem is that you always should extend picture (I use picture frames) to cover full bleed, but in some layouts the border of a picture frame is limited by inner side of the page, so I just do not know how to extend it!

 

Could you please help with that? Thanks!

[thomaso]

39 minutes ago, EEvgeniy said:

For technical reasons for future brochure-process, an inner bleed for photos should be used — with it photos that take a spread looks more seamless.

I think it's a misunderstanding. The inner bleed of a left page would show contents of the right page and vice versa. Only the centre spread prints in fact two consecutive pages (all other page orders will change with the imposition process). Therefore usually the inner bleed for a brochure gets set to 0.

Inner bleed may be useful when single pages (not spreads) get printed, e.g. for spiral binding.

[EEvgeniy]

Just now, thomaso said:

Inner bleed may be useful when single pages (not spreads) get printed, e.g. for spiral binding.

That's not a spiral binding, but still single pages should be printed, not spreads.

[EEvgeniy]

6 minutes ago, thomaso said:

The inner bleed of a left page would show contents of the right page and vice versa

Well, that's make sense for me now. I didn't think of it as you described.

And this picture shows that pretty well, and know I understand that

 

But now I'm not sure that inner bleed for this type of layout will give more seamless view for the spread... Maybe you have any suggestions to improve that?

[thomaso]

Vor 2 Minuten sagte EEvgeniy:

That's not a spiral binding, but still single pages should be printed, not spreads.

If I understand your picture correctly, when turning the pages they get folded along the groove, so that the inner edge of the pages will not be visible to the reader... and therefore no inner bleed is required or helpful.

Vor 3 Minuten sagte EEvgeniy:

But now I'm not sure that inner bleed for this type of layout will give more seamless view for the spread... Maybe you have any suggestions to improve that?

Inner bleed would only be possible if you setup & layout the document as separate, single pages to achieve the possibility to increase page content in the spine (inner edges) but without touching the opposite page. Note, the bleed area is designed to be cut off after binding, while a spread with two facing pages gets folded at the spine/middle.

I would rather say with the binding shown in your photo, you would need to consider & respect the hidden area* to achieve or get close to a seamless look of double page images – because about 1-2 cm* of the inner edge of each page will not become visible after binding.
* between the fold/groove and the spine

[EEvgeniy]

1 hour ago, thomaso said:

If I understand your picture correctly, when turning the pages they get folded along the groove, so that the inner edge of the pages will not be visible to the reader... and therefore no inner bleed is required or helpful.

Correct — and that's why I need something to add area, that will be hidden — as you mentioned in your comment. I see two ways here: either to increase page width or to add inner bleed. It seems to me that inner bleed is more practical because changing it will not affect any layout. But you're right, the logic of the inner bleed is not to "extend" current page, but to add small piece of an opposite one.

Anyway, I really appreciate your help!

[thomaso]

On 1/17/2025 at 7:21 AM, EEvgeniy said:

I see two ways here: either to increase page width or to add inner bleed. It seems to me that inner bleed is more practical because changing it will not affect any layout.

This part is a misunderstanding. If you layout spreads of two facing pages then inner bleed is not available for the layout process. You can't increase a placed image by its inner bleed because anything that exceeds the page will appear on the opposite page, which may only work for the middle spread, where left and right page are in production identical with left and right page in the layout document. All other pages get re-ordered for printing and not printed as the spreads as those they were layout. (<- "imposition") – The centre spread excepted any left page will get printed next to a right page of another layout spread and accordingly any appearing bleed will confuse. Nevertheless, you can easily notice the conflict when you imagine a layout spread with only one image (or even two different images) that reach the spine and would need inner bleed. (I guess this logical paradox was your initial question)

Therefore increasing page width is a better solution even though it requires workarounds in the layout process. If you place an image across an entire spread then this certain area in the middle (between fold + spine) will become hidden after binding. Accordingly it is more helpful to keep this area as an extra kind of margin ('safety area') in mind and use it only for the layout like a bleed area, while content across the spine gets placed twice + split.