Most CD and DVD replicators have artwork templates in Adobe Photoshop or Quark. These are the most commonly used graphics editing software available on the market. You should try to use templates supplied by the replicators because they would have the dimensions and resolution preset for you. If you prefer to build the artwork from the scratch without using the template, remember these attributes: 300 dpi and CMYK mode. Don’t try to digitally increase the resolution by entering 300 dpi into the program unless your original artwork resolution is higher than 300 dpi. The concept is similar to buying a digital camera or camcorder. Usually the user’s manual for the digital camera or camcorder will explain the difference between optical zoom and digital zoom. Digital zoom is like making the pixels bigger than they should be. In doing so the picture looks bigger but the quality is low.
To get a true 300 dpi picture, you should get a picture with enough pixels. The dpi of the picture is not really important. You can have a 72 dpi picture but 2000 pixels across. When this picture is scaled down onto the CD artwork template, the result will be very good. On the other hand, if you have a 300 dpi picture but with only 200 pixels across, then when the picture is scaled up onto the CD artwork template, it will look blurry.
Once you have your artwork designed, you should burn it onto a blank CD and send it with your content master CDs to your replicator. . CMYK is the standard color model used in offset printing for full-color documents. Because such printing uses inks of these four basic colors, it is often called four-color printing.
In the CD Replication process and also DVD Replication process the above information is relative.