Software - Web-to-print

Is a digital proofer on your shopping list? Which digital proofing devices will you buy this year? What will be the improved range of spot colors accurately produced by these devices? Who's talking stochastic? Find out—today. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO Happy new year. Need a new digital proofer? What an interesting time to shop for proofing expertise. (Sorry. No after-Christmas clearance on these items!) Expanding color gamuts, open front ends, new media selections, pigment-based inks, digital halftone and ink-jet devices, multi-setting proofers, spot color surprises—it seems every flavor of digital proofer is pushing to better mimic press conditions, deliver stable, accurate color and provide

Well, now that we've gotten over the millennium bug, or at least the hangover that accompanies the usual New Year's Eve festivities, we can hopefully focus our attention on the coming year. What will the new year/decade/century/millennium bring? Probably a lot of the same headaches the preceding one(s) bestowed upon us. That is, we can still expect to receive files that are missing fonts, images and other elements that are necessary to print. Of course, pricing and turnaround will continue to be the two legs of the stool expected to flex, while demands on quality remain as rigid as ever. Last year was

The Internet's rapid adoption as a vehicle for business communication broke new ground in '99 with the emergence of a variety of e-commerce services targeting commercial printers. With 2000 in sight, it is imperative to know the Internet players that want to know YOU. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO Interested in using the Internet for winning print bids and for collaborative discussions with print buyers? Curious about using the Web to get the best prices on paper, or to take part in an equipment auction? If so, there are suddenly, it seems, an aggressive variety of e-commerce companies positioning to be the shopping platform of

If I asked you "Is printing a product or a service?" I'd likely get a variety of answers, such as "Product," "Service," "Yes and No," "Both" and "In some cases . . . " Does it make any difference? Yes. It's the business "model" for our printing companies. The difference is the intensity of relationship to the customer, isn't it? Marketing, we often say, is finding and filling a need. What's the "need" we're filling? Is it for a "shelf" item—a product—a commodity? Then the customer relationship is impersonal. If it's for a "service," then it's personal, up close. In most commercial printing, there's

Expanded color gamuts, strategic digital halftone proofing launches, imposition proofers and multi-setting thermal devices highlighted the digital proofing component of GRAPH EXPO 99. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO What were the digital proofing flares shot out at GRAPH EXPO 99? One glaring signal: Digital halftone proofing is still riding a high. Equally hot for the contract proofmakers were new devices offering expanded color gamuts, two-sided imposition proofers, new multi-purpose thermal proofsetters and refined remote proofing promises—all of which captured the attention and scrutiny of show attendees, who are looking to purchase the next contract proofer and want to know . . . Who joined

Need a new workstation? Just look in the latest Mac Warehouse catalog or local computer shopper. Software upgrade? Check out the developer's Website. Given the commodity nature of the computer industry, who needs an integrator? And what is a systems integrator anyway? What value do they bring to the party? Integrators are the back-room folks who make all that "stuff" work together. Perhaps more important, they are the ones who fix it when it doesn't. Can't get Color Central to print correctly? Of course, you know that you can only use specific drivers—or nothing will print. Installing a server running Windows NT 4.0 and can't get

The call for open, device-independent color management is driving more and more prepress workflows. Are closely woven color management tools on the way out? Is ICC compliance the best route for color control? BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO An overall ease of use and a simplification of the process; these may be the two strongest desires driving color management for any prepress professional advocating some sort of consistent, cross-platform, color management standard. Is International Color Consortium (ICC) compliance the answer? Are new, device-independent color management software solutions the key to unlocking color bottlenecks? Recently, Printing Impressions posed these and other questions to a sampling of

Preflighting via the Internet. Emulating RIPs to ensure accurate digital files. Automating workflow-critical checks for font usage in PDF documents. A variety of fresh innovations are signaling a new dawn for preflighting. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO Preflighiting is experiencing a renaissance, of sorts, with the Internet, PDF and the pressing demand for more intensive automation, which is pushing technology providers to deliver more interactive file checkers. Markzware is moving its preflighting efforts onto the Internet—proof being the company's recently introduced MarkzNet, a Web-based preflighting application that uses drag-and-drop tools to preflight digital files. Extensis, also moving to the Internet, has launched Preflight

The latest digital imposition tools are object-independent, page rotating, PDF imposing signature refiners—automating even further the territory once governed by the meticulous manual stripper. BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO Manual stripping. One day—perhaps today—the task of manual stripping will seem as foreign a concept to the seasoned graphic arts professional as does the nearly lost art of photo engraving. Current imposition tools perform a flexible and varied set of clever tasks: Digitally imposing signatures that can be output on a variety of PostScript-compatible devices, from the digital press to a platesetter to an imagesetter; Rotating and viewing any object on any signature; Creating complete, precise impositions in

Lake County Press, a $38 million sheetfed printer, pulled beta duty for Prinergy—a new Adobe PDF, PostScript Extreme digital workflow. The results? BY MARIE RANOIA ALONSO The mission statement of Lake County Press, a three-decade-old, $38 million high-end commercial printer based in Waukegan, IL, says it all: Lake County Press (LCP) is committed to the pursuit of excellence and fairness, and will fulfill its customers' graphic communication needs by being an innovative resource relying on the expertise of dedicated, highly skilled employees, utilizing the finest equipment and the latest technology. The latest technology. Most recently, LCP served as a beta site for Prinergy, the new workflow