PHOTO ID BADGING > Summary Guidelines Review the following Summary Guidelines prior to designing your project.

Design

• Use horizontal layout for cards carried in wallets or badge holders. Vertical layout is best used for cards carried on a lanyard or badge reel.
• When designing the layout, keep a 1/8” border on all four sides clear of text and graphics.
• Use white space as a design element to make the card as easy to read as possible. If the card front becomes too busy, move text to the back of the card.
• Design cards with light backgrounds, as dark ones make printed text difficult to read.
• Avoid using fluorescent colors such as yellow, orange, pink and lime. These colors are difficult to read and fade over time.

Photographs

• Use a white/light, rather than dark, background when shooting photographs. A light background enhances the photograph and makes editing easier.
• Crop photographs using a consistent aspect ratio. In other words, all photographs should have consitent horizontal and vertical dimensions.
• Size photographs no smaller than 200 pixels x 200 pixels.
• Save photographs in .jpg rather than in .tif or .gif. file formats.

Printing

• When supplying card blanks, confirm that the cards are compatible with our printing equipment.

Slot Punching

• During the design process, make allowances for the location of the slot. This will help minimize punch-through of text or graphics.