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Zinemaking for Greenhorns

An in-depth guide to the practical side of zinemaking

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This is a guide to making zines that actually gets at some of the nitty-gritty stuff. It’s meant to walk you through making your first(ish) zine from start to finish, with the goal of leaving you with a small run of photocopies for you to sell, share, or swap (and a few tips for how to do so, but I’m gonna focus on the making part). I’ll also be sharing my process and some tricks I’ve picked up that might be helpful even if you’re a zine veteran.

The number one rule of zines is don’t let anyone tell you what to do! You’re a badass DIY punk and you don’t have to toe any lines. All of these guidelines are absolutely meant to be thrown in the trash if you don’t like ‘em.

If you have any question, no matter how small, please send me an email at any time and I’ll do my best to help you out (and I won’t even make you feel stupid about it): twentytwozines@gmail.com

And remember, half the fun of zines comes from their copy-streaky, often-cheeky nature. I’m not perfect, you’re not perfect, and luckily, neither are zines!

  • two-second zine history
  • zine culture 101
  • common zine subjects
  • an important decision to make early
  • finding basic direction
  • supplies
  • choosing a size
  • b&w vs. color
  • setting up your master copy

    • two-second zine history

    The common narrative is that the word “zines” is derived from “fanzines”. The word “fanzines” was invented in the 1940s to describe publications made by fans celebrating science fiction and fantasy serials. These fan publications are often considered to be the first zines. I find this narrative to be incorrect!

    We tend to define zines as something like handmade, DIY, small-run pamphlets and booklets made for cheap, quick, and easy distribution, which definitely didn't start in the 40s. True, the word “fanzines” may not have cropped up until the 40s, but based on our definition of them, we’ve been making zines basically since the invention of the printing press!

    But really, trying to find a single point where zines started is like trying to pinpoint the exact moment when homo erectus became homo sapien—kinda impossible and arbitrary since publications, like humans, are ever-evolving. Just know that zines aren’t some new fad, nor a relic of 80s band culture or something. Zines are a consistent part of small press history, and you’re in very good company making your own.

    zine culture 101

    There is an existing culture around zines, and I think it’s very naturally formed by the nature of the medium itself. You've probably already felt it to some extent just exploring zines so far. I think knowing a bit about zine culture, specifically these key components, will really help you get in the right mindset for making zines and interacting with other zinesters.

    Free expression: Zines are a means of intellectual, creative, and personal expression that is not regulated by the particular standards of an existing industry. Go into zines without any rigid expectations about what a zine is, what it will look like, what content it will have or how it’s presented. Zines can be nonsensical and unorganized; the content can be super deep or completely superficial—all zines are welcome.

    DIY Ethics: Zines are meant to be made yourself and made cheaply. Typos, copy quality, physical quality, etc. are usually considered unimportant. In fact, it’s often these very imperfections that make zines enjoyable! So don’t judge a zine by how grungy it looks, and don’t try to force your own zine to be perfect or look professional.

    Creative Exchange: Zines are usually meant to be shared. They are not just about creativity for creativity’s sake, but for expressing oneself around others. You absolutely don’t have to share your zine with others in any capacity. I just mean that you shouldn’t be offended if someone offers to trade zines instead of purchasing zines from you, or if they ask if you have it available to read for free somewhere. You can of course decline a trade, but be nice about it, because creative exchange is a big part of zine culture. And don’t be afraid to ask others to trade--it’s how zinesters make friends!

    Creator Privacy & Self-Description: Zines allow creators a level of privacy and self-identification they may not get from traditional publishers. This anonymity is often an important shield so creators can fully express themselves. If you happen to know information about a zine creator that they haven’t shared in their zines or made available on a zine-centric account, don’t spread that without their consent. And if you would feel more comfortable with a penname or no name at all on your work, that’s totally valid! You can describe yourself however you want and share as much or as little about yourself as you want.

    common zine subjects

    I’ve spent a ridiculous amount of time considering how to categorize zines, as I’m a librarian and I feel that the way things are organized greatly affects how we interact with them. But categories are anathema to zines.

    That said, I want to share my deliberately broad categories for the sake of idea generating and finding your feet. These categories are not mutually exclusive, and they are not exhaustive! If your zine does not fit in these categories, or fits in many categories, that’s fabulous! (I’ve also listed one of my zines that fits in each category; you can download them for free from itch.io/twentytwozines for an example of each type of zine).

    Instructional zines: Zines with the primary purpose of teaching the reader on how to do something.
    Some things in this category: DIY instructions, workbooks, activist safety, tutorials for navigating life and bureaucracy, & recipe zines
    A zine of mine that fits here: You Should Be Questioning: A guide to questioning your gender

    Informational zines: Zines with the primary purpose of sharing nonfiction information.
    Some things in this category: feminism, fanzines, queer history, mental and sexual health advice, music & bands, reviews, science, & political zines
    A zine of mine that fits here: Take a Rest: A list of restful activities

    Artistic zines: Zines with the primary purpose of creative expression by the author(s).
    Some things in this category: artbooks, illustrations, fanfiction, fictional comics, literary, poetry, & photography zines
    A zine of mine that fits here: Please Pray for Gavin Claiborne and Jimmy Lee: The Comic

    Perzines: Zines with the primary purpose of self-understanding and self-expression by the author(s).
    Some things in this category: diaries (including diary comics), musings, travel zines, queer/identity experience zines, & zines about personal associations with a topic
    A zine of mine that fits here: Unfair Maiden #3

    an important decision to make early

    The very first decision I’d advise you to make as early as possible is: are you planning to print/photocopy this? A zine doesn’t have to be photocopied—it can be scanned and shared digitally, or it can be kept as a single unique original and never shared. But the answer will impact your entire creation process. If you’re gonna do all-digital, for example, you can obviously use stuff like gifs that don’t really work in print. If you’re doing it physical but keeping it as a single original, you’d have an easy time making all the pages different sizes, or gluing on hefty 3D objects.

    But most zines are printed/photocopied, and that’s what I’m focusing on in this guide. Therefore, a lot of your decisions will probably be influenced by what makes your zine easier or cheaper to copy. Color copies, for example, are tremendously more expensive than black and white. That doesn’t mean it’s not worth it, just that it’s something to keep in mind. We’ll get into more specifics as we go on. For now, just decide if you’re gonna photocopy at all (or at least if you want to leave the option open).

    finding basic direction

    Now it's time for the big part--picking a topic for your zine. Zinemaking can be very seat-of-your-pants, which is what makes it fun. But having at least some super-vague idea of the sorts of things you want your zine to be about or what you want to put in it will make your life easier later. This is mostly because your general idea will likely influence practical decisions like size, printing, etc. So it's great to at least have something in the back of your mind as we're going.

    Whatever you usually to do generate your ideas, start there. Check out the resources section for zine prompts and idea generators. If you have any ideas for content, scribble them all out. Think about what topics have been exciting you lately, or just what you’ve been spending all your time on. And be honest with yourself about what topic really excites you! If you’ve been doing nothing but watching anime, a fanzine or a review zine or even just listing out what you’ve been watching are all totally valid zine topics. You don’t need to make something groundbreaking here.

    If you’re totally lost or stuck, it might be helpful to pick one of the broad categories listed above and start from there--informational, instructional, artistic, or perzine. That way, you’ll have a purpose to focus on and help guide your writing and creating. Pick whatever suits you or grabs your attention, and don’t feel limited in medium by the categories (for example, you can make an informational zine about, say, marine life that’s entirely comprised of photographs).

    Speaking of medium, it might be helpful to make a distinction here. Zines are basically a form of mixed media, and the mediums which are used are super varied. When I'm using the term "medium/s" in this guide, I'm referring to the different means one might use to communicate or express themselves within the general zine format. For example (and some idea generating), here's a list of some not-mutually-exclusive mediums you might be inspired to use in some or all parts of your zine:

    And if you're writing, you might like to try:

    I mean, this barely scratches the surface, and I'll probably come back to add more and more to these lists. But you get the idea--there's so many ways you can express yourself in a zine!

    When it comes to a topic, first remember that a zine doesn't have to be on a single topic at all. Perzines in particular (my go-to genre) are often beautifully diverse in topics. That said, having a general theme might be helpful for the sake of idea generation.

    If you are writing an instructional (guide) or informational (nonfic) zine, you probably have a topic in mind, but just in case, you can always consider writing about something you know about (even just a bit), something you feel the world/your community needs to know about, and/or something you want to learn about (a zine documenting your learning process could be really cool!).

    If you are writing a perzine, you might consider writing about your past/present/future, your identity, your opinions, and/or your joys and sorrows.

    And remember, all of these topics/categories/mediums can and do overlap! I don't mean this as a self-promo, but as an example, my first perzine Unfair Maiden #1 contains, in part:

    All of this was loosely united under the theme of "Summoning", and so most of this was somehow related to goth-ness, demons, Satanism, etc. That definitely made it easier to come up with stuff ("draw a 3-panel comic" = not inspiring; "draw a 3-panel comic about summoning demons" = now we're talking). Try making some lists of things you like or find inspiring, freewrite/make and see where it takes you, or try a random theme generator if you're really stuck.

    The most important thing is not to let thinking & planning get in the way of actually making, especially if this is your first zine. You want just enough to be inspired--and how much you need is up to you.

    supplies

    A zine truism: the best supplies are ones you already have or can steal from work!

    Really, don't bother buying stuff unless you know it would make zinemaking more accessible for you. Just save your money for photocopying (we'll get to how to do that for free/cheap later). For tips on digital zinemaking tools, resources for backgrounds/images, and other online shit, check out the digital zinemaking section. With that in mind, here is a list of things you might want to explore for physical zinemaking, including what they're used for and a free/stealable alternative. And if you think of another alternative that'll work better for you, go for it!

    Surfaces

    Markmaking Binding supplies Other assembly/creation supplies

    choosing a size

    The content of your zine can inform your size, and the size of your zine will likely inform your content. But we've gotta get one of those more or less nailed down, and unless you already have a bunch of content you're just trying to arrange for printing, you'll probably want to pick your size first. Note that you don't necessarily have to know what length your zine will be yet, unless you're going for a particular folding method!

    Before we go further, here's a few general common standards:

    I've split up zine sizes into two general categories. One is the "standard sizes", which are zines whose pages are sized based on a "doubled"* number of folds of a piece of paper. (You'll see what I mean here). (*Technically it's a "geometric sequence with a factor of 2", apparently? But nobody's gonna know what the fuck that means). The other is "nonstandard sizes", which is, well, everything else. Here are a few zine sizes in each category:

    When picking a size, my primary consideration is how much page space I'll need. Personally, I’m a fan of the half-size. It leaves you a lot of room to play on, it’s relatively easy to arrange and it means you don’t have to do any trimming at all. Minizines are popular for first-timers because there’s not too many pages to get overwhelmed with, it’s single-sided printing so it’s easy to arrange, and they’re interesting to fold. But if you're working with a minizine, you will pretty much have to stick to those 8 little pages exactly, because there's not an easy way to add more pages unless you're going to cut them out and staple them in!

    b&w vs. color

    this is a decision I like to make now because if you plan to print in black and white, it will look better if you work with that in mind. blah blah blah color saturations stuff.

    setting up your master copy

    Okay, you've made it this far, and now I'm going to share my number one, saved-my-ass, best-tip-I-can-ever-give tip for simplifying your zinemaking life. That tip is: save arranging for print until later. Cut individual pages out of your master copy paper to size, then work single-sided directly onto those pages.

    printing

    –A zine may be imposed or screen-readable. When a zine is imposed for printing, it means the pages are arranged so they’ll be in the right order when printed and assembled. This means that when the sheets are looked at separately, they’ll appear out of order. When a zine is screen-readable, it means the pages are in the order you’ll read them, but when folded they would be out of order. We’ll talk more about how to do this later, but that’s the terminology. –What type of paper –You do not need any type of special paper at all. If it can be scanned and printed, you’re fine. And you don’t need to print it on special paper unless you want to. –Generally your options are basic white copy paper, colored copy paper, and cardstock. Colored copy paper is nice to add color to your zine while still keeping printing cheap and black and white. And cardstock makes for nice covers if you feel like it, but zines hold up fine without cardstock covers. And it’s harder to fold, so there’s that. –Master copy –The master copy is the one you’re going to use as your base, and all photocopies will come from this. –A master copy may be entirely digital, or it may involve printing out text and pasting it. If your zine is really text-heavy with few images, it’s probably easier to keep it digital. It’s possible to keep it digital if you’re comfortable arranging stuff on a digital program. I just use Pages for mine, and it is doable. But personally, I think it’s a lot more fun do to it on paper, as it makes it easier for me to be spontaneous, try different arrangements, and I get a better sense of what it will look like. So it’s up to you… but my examples will be mostly zines done physically. –It’s usually better to use a sturdier paper for a master copy that will stand up to glue, etc. Regular cardstock usually works fine. Doesn’t have a problem with bleed any more than any other paper would, it stands up to glue and lots of layers, and it’s cheap and easy. –[show off master copies] –Imposing for printing –It’s easiest to do this from the beginning of your master copy. This means determining how many pages your zine is going to be, folding it, labeling the pages by number, and unfolding it, then making the pages straight on that paper. That way, when you go to scan it, the zine will already be ready for printing. –But there are a few things that can make this tricky. For one, when you’re starting a zine, you might not know how long you want it to be. Or you might not know what order you want the pages to be in, if you have different sections, for example.  –There are a few ways around this. One is to trim your paper to the size of your page–so if you’re doing a half size, cut your paper in half–and make the pages one at a time, single-sided. Then, when you’re ready to print, tape them together in the order that’s right for imposed printing. –Or, you can arrange the pages in post. Some programs have an option for you to print as a booklet, which will do the arranging for you–Adobe Acrobat, Word, and Pages do. The issue with this is they will often add extra borders, and they don’t always get it exactly right. So although it’s time consuming, it’s usually more reliable to arrange the pages as images in the right order for printing on Word or Pages. This is a pain in the ass. This is why, when possible, I find it much easier to arrange them for printing in meatspace. –For your first zine, I think the easiest thing is to make your pages single-sided, one at a time, and then you can get a feel for how to scan and arrange them when you’re done. –Scanning –Scan in whatever format you like. PDF is standard if you’re doing it all in one go, PNG has a good balance between file size and quality if you’re going to need to move around individual images, like when you’re imposing digitally. –Printing –Print imposed. If you’re folding in half, flip on the short side. I mess this up every single time anyway, so always do a single test sheet before committing to your whole run. –Printing margins are usually like a quarter inch all around. But chances are these days you’re scanning and then printing, so it doesn’t matter because you can select “size to fit”. Trim off the whitespace if you want, or don’t bother. –How many to print at once? Well, how much money do you have? If it’s easy enough for you to get to a printer, you can print them one at a time on-demand. But it’s also rad to print a bunch at once and have them ready to sell or give out. Really, it will depend on the way in which you plan to share them. So for now just trust your gut. –You can fiddle with settings like contrast, etc. But really, it’s easiest and cheapest to do this all when you’re making the master copy. –Getting it sent to a printer. Pros: time and money. Cons: time and money. The true spirit of zines is DIY, so don’t be afraid to do it yourself. That said, if doing all the printing and assembly yourself makes zinemaking prohibitive for you in any way, then send it out. Or get a friend to help. Zine folding parties are really fun. –I send my photocopies to Best Value Copy. It’s less than 3 cents per black and white copy, 10 cents for color, which is way cheaper than anything I’d find out here. I care a lot about keeping my zines cheap because I frequently give them away for free and always have them as pay-what-you-want, so I’m trying to stay out of the hole. It’s usually shipping that’s the expensive part, but their shipping is free for orders over $125. And I have enough zines to print that I can usually hit that pretty easily if I’m printing in batches. Then when they arrive, I assemble them myself. –Working with full-service printers is a video unto itself, and it’s something I’ve never done, so I can’t help much there! –Assembly –Staples–the standard. Saddle-stitch stapler makes your life easier. It’s better than a longarm stapler and I will die on this hill. Or you can use a regular stapler that flips open and staple it on something hard. –String–sewing or wrapping around. –I mean, there’s tons of options for fasteners. –One-of-a-kind items I say this not to suggest that they aren’t replicable, but basically to describe stuff that’s gonna take more work to assemble a bunch of zines. –Zine with a sandpaper cover, weird materials, zine with brass fasteners.
  • b&w vs. color
  • prepping master copy pages
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