We'll use a US Business Card size for the design.
Set 0.125" equally around as bleed. This will be a one pager, so checking 'Facing Pages' is not needed.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 1 - student project

Set your margins beside the bleed.
This will allow some more movement to the printer and the trimming and your business card won't look crowded. You may set some graphic elements off-margin intentionally, but I don't suggest that for content.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 2 - student project

In this case I'll set a digital rich black for the background and white text.

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Make sure your content fits inside the margins.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 4 - student project

Export your card as a print pdf.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 5 - student project

Set standard PDF/X-1a:2001 with the following settings:

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 6 - student project

Make sure you use high resolution output if you have images in your artwork.

I like using Maximum JPEG conversion, it's almost never visible.
ZIP compression won't harm your designs but your file sizes will dramatically increase.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 7 - student project

Set your bleed settings. You may check Crop Marks, or leave empty, it doesn't matter in this case.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 8 - student project

Make sure your Transparency Flattener is set to High Resolution preset.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 9 - student project

Now in our case the sheet that will be printed will be 12x18". You may set the sheet size based on what your local printing house supports. You may uncheck Facing Pages if you use a one page document.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 10 - student project

Import your pdf without transparency, with the option 'Crop to Bleed' selected.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 11 - student project

Set the Reference Point to top left (see the icon beside the X and Y parameters).
Set the position of the card to X: 0, Y: 0. You can see the size of the card with bleed added next to the position of the card.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 12 - student project

Now select your card and use 'Step and Repeat'.
I'll repeat it twice horizontally using the bleed size.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 13 - student project

Now select all your three cards. You may group them as well.

Use 'Step and Repeat' vertically, as we did above but now with vertical bleed size. (Horizontal set to 0).

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 14 - student project

Select all elements on the sheet, and group them.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 15 - student project

Check the size of the object.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 16 - student project

Set your document to this size, without bleed.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 17 - student project

Select your cards and align them to centre on the new document size.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 18 - student project

Now your document should look like this:

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 19 - student project

With these position and dimensions:

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 20 - student project

Add some bleed for your marks:

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 21 - student project

Zoom in to the top left area.

Use the line tool to create a line that's 0.25pt's (0.3 is ok too).

Set it to process Black (K100)

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Position it to X0.

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You may change the size so it fits your bleed area nicely.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 24 - student project

This is an important step.

Change it's position to your bleed size. 0.125" in our case. This is where they'll trim the sheet with all the cards on it.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 25 - student project

Use Step and Repeat.
Use Horizontal Offset set to our business card's horizontal trim size. This is another place where they will crop the cards.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 26 - student project

Now select the two trim lines.

Use Step and Repeat again, but now with Count set to 2, Horizontal Offset set to your bleed size. (3.75 in our case)

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 27 - student project

Select & group your marks.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 28 - student project

Hold down Alt & Shift, then duplicate them to the bottom bleed area.

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Now do the same with the vertical marks. Draw a new line and position it to your vertical bleed size.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 30 - student project

Duplicate it using Step and Repeat, with Vertical Offset set to your vertical trim size.

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Select the new two marks and duplicate them 6 times. Use your vertical bleed size.

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Select the newly created marks, and group them.

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Duplicate them to the right bleed area.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 34 - student project

You may check your Separations Preview to see if the color values are correct.

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You may also check if your imposition fits the sheet.

12x18" will be printed, so we're good with 11.65x16.15".

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 36 - student project

Now Export your pdf.

Use similar settings as before.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 37 - student project

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 38 - student project

Make sure the bleed will contain your marks.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 39 - student project

Make sure your Color Conversion is correct.

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In our case we'll just use US Swop as a destination profile.

Click Export and enjoy your imposition. :)

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 41 - student project

Now let's work on a folder with die cut and Spot UV varnish applied

Set up a new document with the size of the die cut plus some bleed. You don't have to set the bleed, you can calculate it into the page size as well. I'll only work on a one-sided document for now. My settings will be as follows:

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 42 - student project

Set up three layers in the following order. Name the layers like:

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 43 - student project

Create up two new Spot color swatches. Use the CMYK slider to choose any color that will stand out for you.
Name them to Die Cut and Spot UV Varnish.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 44 - student project

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 45 - student project

Select your layer 'Die Cut'. Paste or draw a vector that'll serve as your die cut. Use the 'Die Cut' swatch as your stroke color. You may use 0.3pt stroke width.

(Note: you may import it as an ai or eps file too, but in that case it's stroke should be either a spot color or 100k black depending on how you'll export the file. See more info on that later.)

You can download die cut shapes and vectors from all around the internet, but you can use my project files as well.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 46 - student project

Now select your layer called 'Design'. You may lock your 'Die Cut' layer.

Design something as you like. Keep in mind where your folder will be folded, trimmed and if it's a double sided design, where it'll overlap the other sides after folding. In our case I just used something extremely simple. The black is an offset black with two rotated lines going through it. A text with 'Design' was positioned to the bottom right of the front of the folder. It'll be trimmed, and I'll apply a spot UV varnish to it. Make sure your background and all your design elements use the bleed as your print operator requires it.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 47 - student project

Now on layer 'design' select the part that you want to add Spot UV varnish to.

In my case, that'll be the text 'Design'.

Copy that graphic of yours, and select your layer 'Spot UV varnish'.

Use Edit/Paste in Place to place it exactly above the original.

Now lock your layer called 'design' and select your newly created graphic element.

Make sure that it'll use 'Spot UV varnish' spot color as a fill and add 0,5 pt stroke to it using the same spot color. This will serve as our trapping for the varnish now.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 48 - student project

Now we'll export our graphic using two preferred methods.

Method one.

Make sure your die cut and your Spot UV layer's content is set to overprint, using the Attributes panel. In my case the Die Cut is an Overprint Stroke...

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 49 - student project

...and the Spot UV varnish content is both an overprint fill & stroke (due to my trapping method).

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 50 - student project

That's only required because without it, top objects will knock out our design's elements by default. We don't want our die cut shape visible as white on our design, for example.

Now with all layers turned to visible, export it to pdf. We'll use Acrobat layers for this method and due to that, we'll need at least 1.5 (Acrobat 6).

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 51 - student project

You may include registration, or bleed (if you've set up your document like that).

Make sure that your images will export with at least 300dpi resolution, maximum jpeg or zip compression.

You may set up a Preflight setting before exporting to warn you about possible issues with image quality.

In our case, no image was used so it's not needed.

Make sure your Destination Profile is correct and your conversion will preserve numbers with spot colors.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 52 - student project

Export your design.

Now the exported file will use both spot colors and layers but it'll be possible for the press operator to turn on and off each of those as he wants to process the file.

Method two.

In this method, we'll export each layer separately so we'll have three pdf files at the end.

One for design, one for spot uv varnish, and one for die cut.

Start with the first layer, 'design'. Make sure you turn off the other two layers.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 53 - student project

Now you may use pdf/x1-a, since layers won't be needed.

Export your design layer, then turn off it's visibility.

Export your layer 'Die Cut', with even changing it's color to simple black/other process swatch or leaving it as your spot color. If you export it as a spot color make sure that you'll preserve numbers while you export.

Export your layer 'Spot UV varnish' with the other two layers turned off.

Create your own print marks

Create a new document for practicing. I'll use both bleed (0,125") & slug (0,35").

Slug will contain my marks.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 54 - student project

Grab the line tool.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 55 - student project

Draw a continous, vertical line using 100%K, 0,25pt width. Hold down shift for creating a vertical straight line.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 56 - student project

Create seven more trim marks as you can see it here:

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 57 - student project

In the top-left slug area, create two lines (can be same length as your trim marks) and a slightly smaller circle but with the registration color set.

Registration will be as you see it here (c100 m100 y100 k100).

Select these marks and align them to centre (not page centre, the objects should be centred to each other both horizontally and vertically). Group your new mark. Make sure this mark is outside the bleed area.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 58 - student project

You may set it more precisely:

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 59 - student project

Now duplicate them to all four corners of the slug.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 60 - student project

Now we'll create color bars.

Grab your rectangle tool and create a 0,2x0,2" size rectangle that's in the slug.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 61 - student project

Select and duplicate it 10 times using Step and Repeat. These should be aligned vertically so vertical offset will be 0.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 62 - student project

Select your first sign and set it to c100 m0 y0 k0.

Set the stroke to 100k.

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Select the second bar and change it to c90% m0 y0 k0.

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Continue the steps above, until you reach c0 m0 y0 k0, so basically white or paper color.

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 65 - student project

You may put a text box there too, telling your plate's color (and using only it's 100k ink).

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 66 - student project

Now I've changed my document size because the marks didn't fit.

But you should do the same with each remaining plate as you did with the cyan plate.

Create 11 boxes and fill them with a plate's color (magenta, yellow or black) with every 10 steps used. Move or position them as you like in the slug area. (If there's space, you can duplicate them as well.)

Create an imposition for business cards, a folder with die cut, printer's marks. - image 67 - student project

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