Cut lines, kiss-cut and bleed

The cut line is the line the blade follows. Studio draws it round every piece on the sheet, and it is the same line the cutter gets.

Where the line comes from

Select a piece and open the Cut tab. The Cut line section at the top says where this piece's line came from, in words:

• Traced from the artwork. Studio traced round the picture's shape, where the artwork has one.
• Round the edge of the file. The picture's own rectangle. A PDF or a JPEG has no transparency, so there is no shape to trace, and Studio uses the rectangle unless you pick a shape on the Design tab.
• From the file. A cut path your designer drew in their own PDF.
• A shape you picked, or Drawn by hand.

A line nobody has touched is traced again whenever the artwork changes, so it always follows. A line you moved by hand, or one from the file, is kept, because a line somebody moved by hand is never redrawn behind their back. See Shape a cut line by hand.

Kiss-cut and cut through

Under the sheet Studio says what the cutter will do:

• Kiss cut round each sticker. The blade cuts the sticker and stops at the backing, so the stickers peel off the liner.
• Cut through along the sheet's edge, so it comes off the roll. The blade cuts the whole sheet free.

A kiss-cut needs a liner for the blade to stop at. A stock with no liner is never offered a kiss-cut product, and if you ask a stock with no liner for one the preflight stops it.

Bleed

Artwork runs past the blade by a thirty-second of an inch, so a cutter that wanders leaves colour, not a white sliver. There is no separate bleed setting for stickers: the gap between pieces covers it. To see it, press Bleed on the bar, then To the bleed on the zoom control at the bottom right: you will see the cut line and the artwork running past it. See Add designs and set the gap.

Registration marks

Registration marks are small printed marks the cutter's sensor reads to find where the print really is. The press lays the ink and the material then moves: it stretches, it skews, it is loaded by hand. The cutter cuts against where the artwork is.

Studio keeps every piece out of the clear band round each mark. A piece in that band is a stop, because the sensor hunts for the mark and gives up with the material already printed. Studio shows the sheet three ways:

• Stickers: the view you lay a job out in. It does not draw the marks, so they are not in your way.
• The cut: draws the marks and their clear bands.
• Proof: a look at how the print will appear. It is not the customer's proof link. See Send a customer a proof link for that.

Will it weed?

Weeding is pulling the waste away from the stickers. A narrow neck tears when the waste is pulled. Studio measures the cut line and, under 1.6 mm (a sixteenth of an inch) at the narrowest, shows a look, never a stop. The number is ours, taken from the trade rather than measured on your stock. It is a look because one shop weeds a thin neck with a hook and another reprints. Print the design bigger, thicken that part of the artwork, or weed that sheet by hand, knowing where it will go.

Why it matters for your shop

• The line is the line the cutter gets. One line, drawn once, not a layout and a separate cut file checked by eye.
• Your hand-edits are safe. A line you moved by hand is never redrawn behind your back.
• A kiss-cut is only offered where it can work. The preflight stops one asked of a stock with no liner.
• Problems are flagged before you cut. A narrow neck is a look, and a piece in a registration mark's clear band is a stop.

How to use it

1. Add a design. Its cut line is drawn.
2. Select a piece and open the Cut tab. Read where the line came from.
3. To change it, press Shape the cut line or Shape the cut line…, and Use this line to keep your edit. See Shape a cut line by hand.
4. To keep a shape for next time, press Save this shape…. It is listed in Templates under Saved shapes.

Check the name of your cut line

A RIP decides what to do with a separation by its name. A cut line called CutContour Kiss on a Quick Set that knows Cut Contour Kiss prints as a thin black outline round every sticker, with no warning. The hand-over lists every separation, so read the cut names against what your RIP expects before the first sheet of a new job.