Duotone Template — Complete Guide

Duotone prints your invitation in two inks. You pick a dark ink and a light ink, and everything on the page is made of them: the big poster-style type, the colour blocks, the rules — and your photos, printed as true duotones, with their shadows in the dark ink and their highlights in the light one. The result looks like a risograph poster or a screen-printed flyer: bold, graphic and unmistakably yours.

Duotone is one of Fotify's simpler, modern designs: its look comes from two colours you choose — any two at all — and a heavy poster typeface.

This guide covers how Duotone looks, the options unique to it, how to apply it to your event, and how it lays out each section of your invitation.

Duotone is available on every plan, Free included.

For an overview of the template gallery and the picker, see How to Customize Your RSVP Invitation.

What makes Duotone different

Standard templates change colours and fonts over the same shared layout. Duotone replaces the layout itself: its own poster cover and closing, its own section heads, and its own treatment of the message, countdown, gallery, story and schedule.

Signature design elements

• Two inks, any two — pick a dark ink and a light ink from the suggested swatches or from the colour picker. Every colour on the page comes from those two
• Photos as true duotones — your cover photo, gallery and story photos are printed in your two inks: dark ink in the shadows, light ink in the highlights. You can also print them in a single ink, or keep their original colours
• A poster for a cover — a big block of the light ink holding your event name overprinted very large in the dark ink, your cover photo, the date, time and place, and the reply button
• Heavy rules and registration marks — every section opens under a thick rule in the text ink with the small crosshair printers use to line up their plates
• Print texture — a fine paper grain over the whole page, and the slight misregistration of a real two-colour print on the big titles: a second impression peeking out just beside the letters. One switch turns both off for a perfectly clean page
• Three papers — a pale wash of your light ink, crisp white, or reversed: the dark ink becomes the paper and the light ink the type
• Two typefaces — Archivo, a heavy poster grotesk, or DM Serif Display, a high-contrast serif, for the event name and titles; Archivo for everything guests read
• Always readable — whatever two colours you pick, Duotone adjusts their shade only as far as needed so body text reads at the highest contrast level (WCAG AAA) on the paper and text on the colour blocks stays clearly legible

When to choose Duotone

Duotone suits events that want to look confident and graphic:

• Product launches, brand events and agency parties — print the page in your two brand colours with Grotesk; your photos and logo-coloured blocks make it look like part of the campaign. See corporate events
• Conferences, summits and meetups — the poster cover, the big running order and the clear practical sections read like a festival programme. See conferences
• Company parties, open days and team celebrations — Reversed paper with a bright light ink makes a striking evening invitation
• Modern and city weddings — navy and peach, forest and butter or plum and blush with the Serif typeface give a warm, editorial wedding page, with your engagement photos printed in your wedding colours
• Engagement parties, milestone birthdays and gallery openings — anywhere a bold printed look fits better than florals

If you want a split-screen page in one brand colour, try Meridian. For soft gradient light and frosted cards, try Prism. For a newspaper look with halftone photos, try Gazette.

Applying Duotone to your event

1. Open your event, click Invitation in the sidebar, then the Invitation tab
2. In Design Template, click Change template if the gallery is collapsed, and find Duotone under Designs (it is listed under both the Corporate and Wedding filters)
3. Optional: press Try it on to see Duotone with your own invitation details in the live preview — nothing is saved until you press Use this design
4. Or click the Duotone card to apply it straight away
5. Open Duotone options below the gallery to pick your two inks and the other options described below. Changes save automatically

Duotone works on every plan. On free events a small "Made with Fotify" badge appears in the bottom corner of the invitation; any paid plan or an active subscription removes it.

Switching to another template later is non-destructive: your event content stays exactly as you entered it, and your Duotone options are kept in case you switch back.

Duotone options

Duotone has eight options of its own. They take the place of the standard colour and font controls, which Duotone doesn't use.

1. Dark ink

Prints the text, the rules, the buttons and the shadows of your photos. Pick it two ways:

• A suggested swatch — Navy (default), Ink black, Forest, Oxblood, Plum or Teal
• Pick any color — the last chip opens your device's colour picker, so you can use your brand colour or your wedding colour exactly. The colour's code is shown beside the chips

2. Light ink

Prints the colour blocks (the cover poster, the countdown, the cards) and the highlights of your photos. Pick it the same way:

• A suggested swatch — Peach (default), Butter, Sky, Mint, Blush, Lilac or Sand
• Pick any color — any colour from your device's colour picker

Any pair works. If the "dark" ink you pick turns out lighter than the light ink, the two simply swap roles. Duotone then adjusts their shades only as far as legibility needs: the text ink is deepened (or, on reversed paper, lightened) until body text reaches the highest contrast level on the paper, and the light ink gives way just enough for the dark text on the colour blocks to stay clearly readable. If your light ink is as pale as the paper (white on white, for example), a light screen of the dark ink stands in for the blocks so they still read as blocks.

3. Photos

How your photos are printed — the cover photo, the gallery and the story photos:

• Duotone (default) — in both inks: shadows in the dark ink, highlights in the light ink
• Single ink — in the dark ink on the paper colour, like a one-colour print (on reversed paper, in the light ink on the dark paper)
• Original colours — your photos as they are

4. Paper

• Tinted (default) — a pale wash of your light ink, held light enough to read as paper
• White — crisp white paper
• Reversed — the paper is the colour of your dark ink, and the type, rules and blocks are printed in the light ink

5. Typeface

The face of the event name and the section titles. Reading text, labels and buttons are always set in Archivo.

• Grotesk (default) — Archivo at its heaviest weights: a poster sans for launches and conferences
• Serif — DM Serif Display, a high-contrast display serif for weddings and galas; set slightly larger, as it reads lighter

6. Print texture

On by default: a light paper grain over the whole page, and the slight misregistration of a real two-colour print on the big type (the event name, the section titles, the countdown numbers and the closing title). Turn it off for a perfectly clean page.

7. Cover label

The small line above the event name on the poster (up to 60 characters). Leave it blank to use the default ("You're invited"). Try "Launch night", "Save the date" or "Together with their families".

8. Closing title

The big line printed at the end of the page (up to 80 characters). Leave it blank to use the default ("See you there"). Try "See you in Berlin", "Let's celebrate" or "Until June".

Every piece of text Duotone prints on the invitation — the cover label, the Date, Time and Place labels, the Reply buttons, the section labels and titles, the countdown units, the closing title — can also be rewritten directly on the page: switch the live preview into edit mode and double-click the text. Section titles you have already set in their own settings (story, countdown, gifts, where to stay, getting there, FAQs) are edited in place the same way.

How each section is treated

Cover

A poster replaces the standard header: one big block of the light ink, inset slightly from the edges of the screen, holding:

• Cover label (option 7) in small, heavy capitals
• Your event name, overprinted very large in the dark ink. Long names step down a size so they never break mid-word
• Your cover photo, printed as you chose in Photos and keeping the horizontal crop you set. Without a cover photo, a halftone disc of dots printed in the dark ink keeps the poster's composition
• Date, Time and Place — the time follows the Show time setting of your invitation's cover, and every guest sees the date you picked, whatever their time zone
• Reply — a button printed in the dark ink that scrolls to the RSVP form. It only appears when your RSVP section is visible, and never on a save-the-date page

On phones everything stacks in one column. From 960 pixels wide the text sits in one column and the photo in the other, bleeding to the edges of the block, with the event name overprinted across into the photo.

Section heads

Each section opens under a thick rule in the text ink carrying the section's small label and a registration mark, followed by the title set very large and, for the story and gifts, your subtitle or gift message.

Message

A pull quote: a big quotation mark printed on a square of the light ink, beside your invitation message set large in the display typeface. A long letter steps down to a comfortable reading size.

Countdown

Huge numerals on blocks of the light ink, the units separated by rules of the dark ink — days, hours, minutes and (if you switch them on) seconds. With three units on a phone, the days run across the top so a three-digit count always fits. When the countdown ends, your completion message is printed on the light-ink block instead.

Gallery (Carousel)

A contact sheet: your photos printed in your inks in rows of equal height — two columns on a phone, three on wider screens. The first photo (and, for some counts, the last) is widened so every row is filled, whatever the number of photos.

Story

An editorial list: each milestone under a heavy rule, with its number and date in the margin, the title and description beside them, and its photo printed in your inks. Every milestone is laid out the same way; one without a photo lets its text run wider. Your story subtitle appears under the section title.

Itinerary

A running order: each day opens with a band of the light ink carrying the date, then each entry with its time set big in the display typeface (AM/PM, or the end time of a range, set small beneath it), the event, the place with a pin and any note.

Location, Gifts, Event Details, Save the Date and RSVP

These five sections share their structure with Fotify's other picker-coloured designs (Meridian, Thread and Prism), printed in Duotone's inks: cards are blocks of the light ink with near-square corners (on reversed paper, a light screen of the light ink over the dark paper), and buttons are printed in the text ink with a paper-coloured label. (The text ink is your dark ink, or your light ink on Reversed paper.)

• Location — a map card beside an address card with your address, your directions and an Open in Maps button. When a map can't be shown, the map card draws a pin with the venue's coordinates; without coordinates the address card spans the row
• Gifts — every registry, payment option, charity and wishlist item is its own card in a grid, grouped under small labels (with a count) when you offer more than one kind. Payment details sit in an inset box with a Copy button, and long account numbers or wallet addresses wrap inside the card. Pay links, scan-to-pay QR codes and wishlist reservations appear as buttons on each card
• Event Details — a card per topic: dress code with your suggested and avoided colours as swatches (in their real colours), where to stay with each hotel as a mini-card (distance, price range, promo code, notes and a Book button), getting there with an icon for each kind of transport, and a full-width FAQ card where each question opens on tap
• Save the Date (Calendar) — one card with the title and the event date on one side, and Google, Apple (downloads the calendar file) and Outlook buttons on the other
• RSVP — the title with your RSVP deadline under it, and the reply form on a light-ink card: fields on the paper colour, the attend / decline choices as two selectable boxes, and a send button printed in the text ink. On a save-the-date page, the card holds the save-the-date note instead of the form

Closing

A solid block of the text ink with the type knocked out in the paper colour: a registration mark, your closing title (option 8) set very large, the date and place, and a final Reply button.

Sections that use the shared layout

These sections keep Fotify's shared layout and are printed in Duotone's style:

• Photo upload, QR code, Table assignment, Playlist, Sub-events, Special treatments and custom sections

Each sits in the same column as the rest of the page on a Duotone card, with titles in your chosen typeface and near-square buttons printed in the text ink. Table numbers appear as chips in the text ink, and photos in custom sections are capped in height so a tall portrait never takes over the page. Photos your guests upload are shown in their own colours.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Can I print the page in my company's two brand colours? A: Yes. Pick each one with Pick any color in the Dark ink and Light ink options. If one of your colours is too close to the paper or to the other ink to read well, Duotone shifts its shade just enough to fix that, keeping the hue.

Q: I picked two colours and they seem swapped. Why? A: Duotone always uses the darker of your two colours for the text and the lighter one for the blocks. If the colour in Dark ink is the lighter of the two, they swap roles automatically, so any pair gives a readable page.

Q: Can I keep my photos in their real colours? A: Yes. Set Photos to Original colours. The rest of the page stays in your two inks.

Q: I don't have a cover photo. Will the poster look empty? A: No. Without a photo, a halftone disc of dots printed in the dark ink fills the photo's place, so the poster keeps its composition.

Q: The titles look slightly doubled. Is that a bug? A: No, that is the misregistration of a two-colour print, part of the Print texture option. Turn Print texture off for perfectly clean titles (it also removes the paper grain).

Q: Does Duotone work in right-to-left languages? A: Yes. In Hebrew and Arabic the layout mirrors: the columns of the cover, the story margin and the itinerary's time column move to the other side. The print effects and the cover photo's crop stay as they are.

Q: Can I use custom RSVP fields with Duotone? A: Yes. Custom fields (dropdowns, dates, checkboxes, file uploads and so on) pick up Duotone's fields and labels automatically.

Next steps

• See How to Customize Your RSVP Invitation for the template gallery and how to try a design on before applying it
• Compare the other picker-coloured designs: Meridian for a split-screen poster in your brand colour, Thread for one line in your colour running down the page, or Prism for soft gradient light and frosted cards
• For other graphic looks, try Gazette for a newspaper front page or Folio for Swiss editorial typography
• Planning a launch or a company event? Read about Fotify for corporate events and digital invitations with RSVP

Need help? Get in touch through the in-dashboard help widget.