What are stencils, templates and documents in Produce?

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Produce is built on four building blocks: stencils, templates, documents and assets. Once you know how they connect, it is easy to find your way around. This article explains what each one is and who works with which.

How it fits together

Everything in Produce follows the same chain:

Stencil or design file: the foundation, with your brand's design, layouts and rules.
Template: built from a stencil or a design file by an admin. This is what end users pick to start from.
Document: what a user saves after filling in a template.
Assets: the files a document produces, such as a PDF or an MP4, ready to download.

Most users only work with templates, documents and assets. Stencils and design files are for admins.

Stencils

A stencil is the blueprint behind a template. It holds the design, the layouts, the elements that can be edited and the rules that keep the result on brand. One stencil can be the base for many templates.

Admins see the stencils available to them when they create a template. Each stencil shows its type above its name.

Select Stencil window in Produce with the type shown above each stencil name

Stencil types

The type decides what kind of material a stencil makes. Every template and document made from it has the same type.

Print: flyers, posters, brochures and other printed material, downloaded as PDF files.
Graphic: social media posts and other images, downloaded as PNG, JPEG or WEBP.
Banner: digital banner ads for websites and online campaigns.
Video: short branded videos, downloaded as MP4.
Email: newsletters and other emails.

Which types you have depends on how Produce is set up for your organisation.

How a stencil is made

There are three ways to create the foundation for your templates. Produce does not label which one a stencil uses, so ask your Customer Success Manager if you are unsure.

Pro (previously called Fixed): Papirfly builds the complete design for you, including logic such as elements that resize and move on their own. Templates made from a Pro stencil always stay on brand. Changes to the stencil are made by Papirfly.
Flexible: Papirfly builds your brand's elements, such as text blocks, shapes and image frames. When using these stencils to create templates your admins can place these elements on the page to create their own layouts and sizes. This gives admins more freedom, with fewer automatic brand rules.
Design file: an admin exports a design from Adobe InDesign or Figma with the Papirfly plugin and uploads it to Produce. Papirfly does not build anything. The InDesign import is enabled by Papirfly, and the Figma plugin is in Beta.

In a Flexible stencil, admins add elements from Drag in element while they customise a template.

Produce editor for a Flexible stencil with the Drag in element section in the Frame panel

Templates

A template is the starting point users create documents from. A template admin builds it from a stencil or a design file and then sets it up: its name, thumbnail, who can use it, the approval workflow, folders, tags and categories. Template admins can also lock parts of the design so users cannot change them.

When creating a template, the template admin first chooses what it is based on: Stencil or Design file.

New Template window in Produce with the choice between Stencil and Design file

A template can be saved as a draft while the template admin works on it. Users cannot create documents from a draft template.

For the full steps, see Creating a new template in Produce.

Documents

A document is your own piece of work, made from a template. When you fill in a template and save it, Produce saves your work as a new document. The template itself does not change, so everyone else still starts from the same template.

You can open a saved document again later to keep working on it. For the steps, see How do I create a new document in Produce?

Assets

The files a document produces are its assets. Click a document to open its panel. The panel lists each file with its own download button. A print document, for example, gives you a PDF in draft quality and a PDF in print quality.

Document panel in Produce listing the files you can download

Who does what

Papirfly builds Pro and Flexible stencils for your organisation.
Template Admins create templates from stencils or design files, decide who can use them and lock what must not change.
End users create documents from the templates they have access to and download the assets.