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The 30-second quote form — or the instant calculator for 1–20 copies. Your price lands the same day.
Rough or ready. A real person checks your file and offers clear advice on making it ready to print. Free and fast.
Your preview to sign off before we print the run. Until approval you can still make changes to the artwork.
Stapled booklets with you in 3 days, perfect bound books in 5 and hardbacks in 7 days. Free UK tracked delivery.
Hi, we're Ex Why Zed! We are the creative print company you have been looking for. Day in, day out, we help transform people’s ideas in to print!
So, what does that mean? Well, from the first contact with us we will give you a wealth of resources, knowledge and friendly advice to broaden your understanding of the print process. We help everyone from the complete novice to the print rockstar.
We don’t believe that you should have to settle for the bare minimum from your print company. You have spent hours, weeks and months preparing your stunning artwork so why would you now go and give it to a printer where you can get an instant price, upload a pdf, then the files disappear and you have to keep your fingers crossed that what turns up is what you expected?
Choose from a large selection of paper, size and binding options.
What sizes can we print?
The largest portrait size we can print is an impressive A3 (420mm high x 297mm wide). Our maximum square size is 297x297mm. The maximum landscape size is 210mm high x 297mm wide (A4 Landscape). For cost-effective sizes keep your catalogue within A4 portrait, A5 landscape or 210x210mm square - these are the cheapest sizes to print but do choose the size that best fits your publication.
Not sure about which paper will work best for your project?
Check out video guide here and we’ll talk you through the options with examples printed on each of the finishes. Still uncertain? Jump on our sample pack form and we’ll get some paper choices in the post asap.
For engaging video guides on how to style a booklet for print, do spend a few minutes enjoying these:
A standout portfolio does far more than gather your best work in one place; it tells a clear, persuasive story about your creative thinking, your process and the value you bring. In our guide on how to create a design portfolio, we explore how designers, illustrators, photographers and self-publishers can shape a sharper, more memorable showcase by curating only their strongest projects, adding concise case studies, revealing sketches and iterations, and building a consistent layout that feels polished from first page to last. We explain how different disciplines need different portfolio rhythms, from branding and UX to interiors and fashion, while keeping the same golden thread: clarity, relevance and confident presentation. It also looks at why a professionally printed portfolio can add real weight to interviews, pitches and client meetings, turning digital work into something tactile, considered and easier to remember. At Ex Why Zed, we help creatives move from PDF to finished piece with human file checks, expert guidance on size, paper and binding, free sample packs and print options that suit both concise booklets and more substantial perfect-bound showcases. For anyone researching professional portfolio printing, this guide offers practical direction on what to include, what to leave out, how to make each project earn its place, and how to present your work with the kind of focus that opens doors.
Get inspired by the solutions we have printed for our talented previous customers.
Take a flip-through of Rikki Ward's photography portfolio, issue 01 - an A5 perfect bound leave-behind built for studio visits and postal drops.
This is commercial still life at its most playful: fragrance, drinks, grooming, food and a few characters that have no business being this good. We printed 44 pages on 170gsm gloss with a 4pp cover on 250gsm silk and gloss lamination to the outer, four colour throughout, perfect bound with a 4mm square spine.
Stapled, perfect bound (glued, like a paperback) or hardback? Your page count has already decided — the whole rule in one picture.
Read the full Binding Styles guide →Silk, gloss or uncoated — what each looks and feels like, and the insider hack that saves you money.
Read the full Paper Choices guide →Bleed, page sizes, cover files and the 3 common mistakes — plus we check (or rebuild) your file for FREE.
Read the full Artwork Hub guide →Browse hundreds of real projects we've actually printed — proper inspiration, not a single AI mockup.
Real people who've been printing books since 2006 — friendly, genuinely knowledgeable, and usually replying within minutes.
Design in whatever program you love, save it as a PDF, send it over. Never done it before? A real person checks it for free.
No minimum means you can print a single copy, check the paper and layout in your own hands, then run the full batch with total confidence.
Silk, gloss, uncoated, kraft — we'll post you the real thing so you're never guessing colour and feel off a screen.
Degree hand-in, launch day, a fair this weekend? Tell us your date up front — we'll say straight away if it's doable, then build the whole job around it.
Stapled zines and booklets are with you in 3 working days, perfect bound books in 5 and hardbacks in 7, counted from approval of your print-ready artwork, with free tracked UK delivery. Lead times depend on run length and print spec — longer litho runs and premium cover finishes take longer — so if you're working to a hard deadline, tell us the date and we'll confirm we can hit it before you commit. On runs of 1–20 stapled or perfect bound copies we check your artwork thoroughly and send it straight to print; 21 copies and over, and every hardback, get a PDF proof to approve first.
Ready to place an order? Brilliant, you'll need to upload the files using www.wetransfer.com sending them to hello@exwhyzed.com and in the comments box let us know the number of copies you're going for and the best address for delivery. We'll then give your artwork a free preflight check to highlight any potential issues and will email with any advice or recommendations before going to production.
Once we receive your print ready artwork, we'll aim to deliver in 5/6 working days (we do get busy at degree show time). If you are working to a crucial deadline PLEASE allow more time - there's no harm in getting the artwork to us early so we can deliver a few days before the show starts 🙂
https://www.exwhyzed.com/resources/setting-3mm-bleed-on-artwork-for-print/
We will need 3mm bleed on all the edges, you'll notice at the moment that the artwork stops at the crop marks - it needs to extend 3mm beyond this to avoid any chance of a white border.
The following page includes illustrated and video guides on how to set up bleed correctly:
https://www.exwhyzed.com/resources/setting-3mm-bleed-on-artwork-for-print/
You might have set this up correctly in InDesign but when you export to PDF just make sure that in the 'Marks and Bleeds' menu you not only tick 'Crop Marks' but you also add '3mm' in to the four bleed boxes - top, bottom, inside and outside. This will add the bleed to the exported PDF.
BLEED FIX
It's one of two things:
Have you dragged the background image out 3mm beyond the black line on your Indesign file into the bleed area? Try that then export again.
OR you have done the above but then when you're exporting you need to click the Marks and Bleeds menu, then type '3mm' into the four bleed boxes. This will add the bleed to the pdf.
We will aim to deliver the finished books in 4/5 working days after receiving your print-ready artwork. If you are working to a crucial hand in deadline then we strongly advise leaving more time in case there are any artwork issues with your files or courier problems with delivery.
Additionally there can be a day or two of amends required to the artwork before it's print ready which we're more than happy to help with but you'll need to factor that in to timings.
Remember, we’ll need a hi res pdf file with 3mm bleed and crop marks on each edge to go ahead please. Sending it over correctly first time means we can go straight to print. Do have a last check through our file set up guides to make sure all the boxes are ticked. <link>
For the purposes of our quoting, we call a page one side of content. So, a sheet of paper has two pages - a front and a back. If you ask for a quote for 40 inside pages, that will be 40 pages of content, 40 pages in your artwork file / pdf and in the book 20 leaves printed on both sides.
Yes, ‘text’ pages is our common term for the inside pages of your publication. They can be filled with illustrations, photography, full colour artwork…or just text if it’s a poetry book.
Lamination is a thin layer of protection which prevents the ink cracking.
Matt Lamination works best with silk and uncoated covers. We would suggest using gloss lamination if you are aiming for a super shiny, high impact cover. Soft-touch has a velvet, illustrious feel but does attract finger marks REALLY quickly so best not eat your lunch before reading
The short answer: when paper is printed, the ink sits on the surface. When it is then folded to make your cover the ink can crack. While you should never judge a book by it’s cover, this cracking will look unprofessional. It comes in matt, gloss, soft-touch or anti-scuff.
Wire stitching is a little bit of print jargon for ‘stapling’. If you have an A5 booklet then we print it onto A4 sheets, fold them in and put staples along the left-hand edge to bind the sheet together. In some quarters, this is also known as ‘saddle stitching’. Let’s stick with stapling though if that’s easier 🙂
Needs to be a multiple of four pages to work as a stapled booklet. Why? Because when you fold a printed sheet in half, you get four pages of content - try it there and you’ll see what we mean 🙂
The perfect bound method of binding will give your publication a square spine and professional looking finish.
For further advice follow our perfect binding set up guides.
