How should I designed my name card?

[madison]

The skills necessary to design a business card can be easily adapted from those that are required to design a website. Read on for more information about how to design your business cards.

Size and Shape
Standard business cards are 2″ x 3.5″, in either vertical or horizontal orientation. Horizontal is more traditional, but plenty of people and companies now opt for vertical layouts.
There are a few benefits to the standard sizing, the primary one being that it’s generally less expensive because it’s common. The other big benefit is that it is immediately recognizable as a business card, and will fit in standard business card holders.
But just because business cards are traditionally a 2″ x 3.5″ rectangle doesn’t mean you can’t deviate from that size and shape. With modern printing and cutting techniques, virtually any size and shape can be used for your business cards.
Die cut cards are particularly popular. Some opt for a traditional rectable, but with rounded corners or some kind of cutout shape within the card.
Others opt for an entirely custom shape, often reflecting their logo or a company theme or mascot. Just remember that anything too complex is likely to get bent or otherwise misshapen, which may defeat its purpose.
Over-sized and under-sized cards are growing in popularity. Over-sized cards are often die cut custom shapes. Like die-cut cards, over- or under-sized cards can make your business card stand out from those of your competitors.
Folded cards are yet another option. You can choose to have the fold along the long or short side of the card.
The best option generally depends on the purpose of the folding parts and the orientation of the card itself. With a vertical-oriented card, you may want the fold along the short side, and with a horizontal card you may want it on the long side. But again, it depends on the overall design of the card.
Materials and Effects
The vast majority of business cards out there are printed on paper cardstock. Cardstock comes in a variety of weights, textures, and colors. Card stock weights are calculated a bit differently than text-weight paper.
A pound weight of card stock is calculated based on the weight of 500 20″ x 26″ sheets, while text weight paper is calculated based on the weight of 500 25″ x 38″ sheets.
Card stock is any paper with a weight of between 50 and 110lbs. It’s also sometimes referred to by points or mils, which is the thickness of the sheet in thousandths of an inch. So a 12 pt. card stock is .012 inches thick.
In addition to the weight of the paper, you’ll also want to consider paper color. Most business cards are printed on either cream or white paper. But virtually any color can be used. Ask your printer for options as they likely can get better deals from certain manufacturers.
The paper texture is also important. Decide whether you want your paper to be smooth or rough, matte or glossy, or anywhere in between. Your printer can likely give you samples to see what they have available. Alternatively, check out your local office supply store to see what they have on hand.