0

I cannot believe that I am the first person struggling with this, maybe I am missing out on something obvious here but I searched thorougly and can't seem to find any info on this.

I have designed Business cards measuring 54x85mm (back1v3n.pdf in my document) and want to get them printed professionally. I arranged them on an A4 page 2x5 using pdfpages. By using the crop package I have added crop marks in the corners and center axes. What I want to do is to (re)move the horizontally centered crop marks (because they don't fit) and add more crop marks to separate the cards horizontally. Centered crop marks vertically work fine as the 2x5 layout centers them.

They are filled with a solid color, thus I have used pagecolor for bleed, in case you wonder. For color proof, Color marks were added.

So my question is: Is there any way to add more crop marks horizontally and (re)move the horizontal ones while keeping the verticals? I want to have three vertical crop marks and six vertical on each side including corners.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[paperwidth=170mm, paperheight=270mm]{geometry}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage[table,cmyk]{xcolor}
\usepackage[a4,cam,center,axes,info]{crop}
\usepackage{pagecolor}
\usepackage{pdfpages}
\usepackage{background}

\definecolor{company-blue}{cmyk}{1,0.15,0,0}

\newcommand{\colorbar}{%
{%
  \setlength{\tabcolsep}{0pt}%
  \abovedisplayskip=0pt%
  \belowdisplayskip=0pt%
  \begin{tabular}{*{4}{@{}p{0.4cm}@{}}}
    \cellcolor{cyan} & \cellcolor{magenta} & \cellcolor{yellow} & \cellcolor{black} \tabularnewline
  \end{tabular}%
}%
}

\backgroundsetup{opacity=1,angle=0,scale=1,placement=top,vshift=0.8cm,hshift=6cm,contents={\colorbar}}

\begin{document}
\pagecolor{company-blue}
\includepdf[pages={1-10}, delta=0 0, column, noautoscale, nup=2x5]{back1v3n.pdf}
\end{document}
1
  • I meant to say "I want to have three vertical crop marks and six horizontal on each side including corners."
    – supaeasy
    Oct 16, 2020 at 9:07

1 Answer 1

0

Section 2.7 of the crop manual gives an example how to define your own crop marks. It uses a picture environment but any other LaTeX stuff will do as well. But note, that width and height of whatever you define as your crop marks must be zero.

Crop gives you four predefined position (top left, top right, bottom left, bottom right) where you can put your crop marks. But these are just anchors for positioning your crop marks and you can use them to draw anywhere on the page.

The following example uses a tikzpicture environment for drawing crop marks.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[paperwidth=170mm, paperheight=270mm]{geometry}
\usepackage[a4,center,axes,info]{crop}
\usepackage{pdfpages}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usepackage{mwe}

\newcommand\mm{1.5}

\newcommand\myupmark[1][]{%
  \begin{scope}[#1]
    \draw (0,\mm) -- (0,12);
    \draw (0,10) circle(2);
    \draw (-2,10) -- (2,10);
  \end{scope}}

\newcommand\mydownmark[1][]{%
  \myupmark[y=-1mm, #1]}

\newcommand\myleftmark[1][]{%
  \begin{scope}[#1]
    \draw (-10,-2) -- (-10,2);
    \draw (-10,0) circle(2);
    \draw (-12,0) -- (-\mm,0);
  \end{scope}}

\newcommand\myrightmark[1][]{%
  \myleftmark[y=-1mm, #1]}

\newcommand\myleftmarks[1][]{%
  \begin{tikzpicture}[x=1mm, y=1mm, overlay, #1]
    \myupmark
    \foreach \i in {0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5}{%
      \myleftmark[yshift=\number\numexpr-54*\i mm]}%
    \mydownmark[yshift=\number\numexpr-54*5 mm]
  \end{tikzpicture}}

\newcommand\myrightmarks[1][]{%
  \myleftmarks[x=-1mm, #1]}

\newcommand\mycentertopmark{%
  \begin{tikzpicture}[x=1mm, y=1mm, overlay]
    \myupmark
  \end{tikzpicture}}

\newcommand\mycenterbottommark{%
  \begin{tikzpicture}[x=1mm, y=1mm, overlay]
    \mydownmark
  \end{tikzpicture}}

\makeatletter
% new crop style
\cropdef[\CROP@@info]\myleftmarks\myrightmarks\relax\relax{mycropmarks}
% redefinition of option `axes'
\let\CROP@upedge\mycentertopmark
\let\CROP@loedge\mycenterbottommark
\let\CROP@ledge\relax
\let\CROP@redge\relax
\makeatother

\begin{document}
\crop[mycropmarks]

\includepdf[
  pages={1-10}, delta=0 0, column, nup=2x5,
  templatesize={85mm}{54mm}
]{example-image-a4-numbered.pdf}
\end{document}

enter image description here

3
  • Wow thank you. This is close to perfect. There is just one more thing: could you please also add marks in the center at top and bottom? Sorry I am completely clueless when it comes to tikz.
    – supaeasy
    Oct 16, 2020 at 12:50
  • @supaeasy With option axes you already get those simple tick marks provided by crop. Anyway, I've revised my example using the other crop marks. Oct 16, 2020 at 14:58
  • This is great, Thank you so much! The Axes option also adds the horizontally centered ones wich I don't want. This solution is perfect, thank you!
    – supaeasy
    Oct 19, 2020 at 5:38

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .