The development of modern printing technologies does not mean that printing is withering, weakening, or “dying out. Rather, on the contrary. But nevertheless, it is necessary to follow market trends.
Above we talked about the focus of modern printing industry on target groups. Today it is clear that the development of our information society, taking into account this orientation in the context of globalization and internationalization of markets, requires increasing the quality of publications (this is ensured by technological development), increasing their colorfulness (black and white publications are no longer needed), reducing print runs (target consumer groups are not unlimited) and reducing publishing deadlines (punctuality and observance of agreed short deadlines have always been valued, but now especially so).
Numerous international fairs, congresses, conferences, symposiums, round tables and many other events abroad and in our country are a reflection of the achievements of the printing industry that we are witnessing. Based on the results of their work, we can quite clearly see what stage of development the printing industry is at today.
It seems that the time when we talked more about specific developments of leading companies and less about general trends has already passed. Now the printing industry has reached the level of system solutions, the creation of systems that cover the management of the entire production process of printing production.
It should be noted that modern polygraph technologies do not exist in isolation, but are closely interconnected and have a significant impact on each other.
Among these systems, an important place is occupied by the systems for the management of digital equipment, formation and transmission of information, for example via the Internet, called Digital-Asset-Management. Such systems provide full “transparency” of production, i.e. enable the customer to follow his order at all stages.
They work together with production planning applications, such as the vendor-independent JDF (Job Definition Format), an initiative by Adobe, Agfa, Heidelberg and MAN Roland that allows for full integration and automation of all production processes and phases, including commercial industry software. It is a vendor- and system-independent format designed to work internationally. Its purpose is to integrate technically and organizationally the Workflow data flows and to bridge the gap between customers, printers and bookbinders and binders or departments.
In terms of enhancing the colorfulness of publications, it should be noted that the role of Color Management systems, which have been in existence for several years, has increased considerably. In their new versions, or, better to say, in their new solutions, the focus is not so much on the equipment, but on the color information itself.
Workflow, an end-to-end production flow management system that has been known for several years, is focused on digital information processing. Now some firms have already created several digital Workflow systems that use new tools such as the JDF data format mentioned above. They are designed to process digital information at all stages of print production and provide integration with digital Workflow of CtP (Computer to Plate) systems as well as with color proofing systems. They include data reception, production, memory storage, in-house and customer proofing, color management, trapping (adjusting the overlap of two color boundary surfaces or eliminating gaps between them), color separation, strip down and their output. Digital Workflow also includes the interface with the customer, the acceptance of the production order by the company, the overall work routing through all production steps, the collection of production information, the accounting, all calculations and finally the archiving of the information.
