What is a Dieline?
The dieline is the template for a package. It’s a flattened outline of the cutlines and folds. You cannot create a product package design without one – so don’t even try.If you took apart a cereal box and flattened it out, you’d be looking at the dieline. The edges of the box are the cutlines and all the seams and creases are the folds and overlaps. It’s basically supermarket origami that must also be sturdy, functional and do a darn good job of attracting the consumer’s interest.
Your dieline must be perfect. You’ll be creating an extremely tight layout, a pixel perfect balancing act between competing design elements, so even loosing an eighth of an inch will often require a reworking of the entire package. This is why I never start a package design without a finalized dieline. Otherwise I’m just guessing and ultimately wasting my time and giving my client a false sense of accomplishment.
So How Do You Create a Dieline?
If you get a finalized dieline straight from the printer (the most likely scenario), it will have the bleed requirements and all the manufacturing notes already on it. This is ideal and if you have that you don’t need this tutorial.However, sometimes you’ll be working with a client in the early stages. Perhaps they’ll send you a box from another product and direct you to make one just like it. Maybe they’ll FedEx you a bottle or jar and ask you to make a label that maximizes the container’s real estate. Or maybe they’ll send you the product itself and ask you to design a box, clamshell or blister pack to hold it. If this is the case then this tutorial is for you.
Labels and other two dimensional package designs are easy and you can generate perfect dielines for these on your own. However, unless you are reproducing an existing box, working from an existing dieline, or you have extensive experience in CAD applications, you can’t realistically create a perfect three dimensional package dieline on your own. However, you can start the ball rolling and then turn over your dielines, notes, and a sample of the product to a printer or manufacturer and they can use it as the basis for creating a working dieline.
Dieline in Packmage
For begginers, packmage predefined dieline in the box struture, you can check the photoes as follow:http://packmage.blog.com/files/2011/05/ZW001-buttomlocktray.jpg
Since Packmage predefined dielines and box shapes, it’s much more convenient for new user.
