Artwork that fits the case.
A case cover or a disc face is only worth sharing if it prints at the right size. These are the sizes, so a picture made once fits every case of that kind and comes out right on any printer.
The numbers are the ones commonly used. Cases differ by a millimetre or two between makers, so measure yours before printing a batch.
What every file needs
A size in millimetres
The file says how big it prints, not the printer. Use the sizes below, plus 3 mm of bleed on every edge of a case cover.
300 dpi or more
A DVD case wrap is about 3224 by 2161 pixels at 300 dpi. Less than that and the print goes soft. More does no harm.
sRGB, as PNG or JPG
Home printers expect sRGB colour. CMYK and PDF are for a print shop, and a print shop will tell you what it wants.
Printed at 100%
Never “fit to page”. Fitting shrinks the picture by a few percent and the cover comes out slightly too small for the case.
Case covers
A DVD case takes one sheet that wraps around it: the back on the left, the spine in the middle, the front on the right. A CD jewel case takes two pieces instead, a square booklet in the lid and a tray card behind the disc whose two thin edges are the spines.
| Case | Piece | Trimmed | With bleed | Pixels at 300 dpi, with bleed |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DVD keep case, 14 mm spine | one wrap | 273 × 183 mm | 279 × 189 mm | 3295 × 2232 |
| Slim DVD case, 7 mm spine | one wrap | 266 × 183 mm | 272 × 189 mm | 3213 × 2232 |
| DVD case for several discs | one wrap | 259 + spine × 183 mm | 265 + spine × 189 mm | depends on the spine |
| CD jewel case | front booklet, one page | 120 × 120 mm | 126 × 126 mm | 1488 × 1488 |
| tray card, two 6.5 mm spines | 151 × 118 mm | 157 × 124 mm | 1854 × 1465 | |
| Slim CD jewel case | front only | 120 × 120 mm | 126 × 126 mm | 1488 × 1488 |
A game that DiscWright splits across two or three discs wants a case for several, and their spines run from about 14 mm for two discs to 33 mm for six. Measure the spine of the one you have and add it to 259 mm. Blu-ray cases are not on this list yet.
The disc face
Every disc is 120 mm across, so the file is always a 120 mm square: 1417 pixels on a side at 300 dpi, and 1500 is a comfortable number to aim for. Fill the square right to its edges. The printer’s own software cuts the circle and the hole out of it, so the picture needs no circle drawn on it and no bleed.
What changes from one blank to the next is how much of it takes ink. Some printable discs print from about 21 mm across the middle, others leave a clear ring up to 46 mm, and the outermost millimetre is never printed.
So keep anything that matters, the title above all, outside the middle 46 mm and inside 114 mm. Then the same file looks right on every blank.
Which printer
The files do not depend on the printer. A file made to these sizes prints the same on any of them, and only how you print it changes.
Covers print on almost anything
A DVD wrap with its bleed fits on A4 paper turned sideways, so any inkjet that takes A4 photo paper will do it. US Letter is the tight one: 279 mm wide, which leaves only a few millimetres a side and wants borderless printing. Every CD piece fits easily on either.
Discs need two things
A printer with a disc tray, which several Epson and Canon models have, and printable blanks with a white top made to take ink. A normal shiny disc will not take a print. Each printer’s own software has a disc template where you set the inner and outer ring for your blanks, and the same square file goes into all of them.
Paper stickers are the other way to label a disc, and they are best avoided. A sticker can unbalance a disc spinning at full speed, and one that lifts can come off inside the drive.
In DiscWright
Choose the cover and the disc face in the artwork step and they go on every disc of
the set, in an ARTWORK folder, exactly as they were given. Nothing is
resized, cropped or redrawn, so a file made to these sizes is still the right size
years later, when the disc is the only copy you have left.
E:\
└─ ARTWORK\
├─ cover.png the case cover, as you chose it
├─ disc face.png the disc face, as you chose it
└─ READ ME.txt which is which, and to print them at their own size