Have we reached the end of prepress evolution?

[J]

What are your feelings about where prepress is now and prospects for the future. (e.g. Film strippers transitioned to prepress operators, now what?)

regards, J

[Ian Mackenzie]

Sure....prepress will evolve!!

Pagination will be outsourced to India.
Printing will be done in China.
All plates made in China.
All imaging in China.

Outside of that, then perhaps:

1. RGB to CMYK conversion algorithms will improve
2. New color separation technologies will allow better printing with less ink.
3. Remote (hard and soft) proofing will be (truly) integrated with file transmission and submission.
4. Central color management servers will inexpensively manage and drive fleets of digital printers
5. RIPs will just simply be integrated into the printers and managed via the web.

That's just in the next 3 months...!!

[MC_JerryD]

Originally Posted by J

What are your feelings about where prepress is now and prospects for the future. (e.g. Film strippers transitioned to prepress operators, now what?)

regards, J

Prepress operators to workflow managers. New prepress systems are not just RIP, trap and plate. A lot of automation under the hood with these new systems. Getting all the non-complex, repeatable job to be automated though scripting and rules-based software.

Web2print and web submission with online review.

Variable data and PURLS.

Being a prepress operator and not learning these things will be like the days of the film strippers did not accept the change in the 90's with electronic prepress. Printing is going through a change and will never be the same again. Accepting the change and learning where the industry in going is key.

MC JerryD

[jlazerus]

According to US Government sources (o*net and the dept of labor) as well as my own findings from job aggregators like indeed.com and simplyhired, not only are wages going down but you can expect a 25% drop in employment in the next 6-7 years. This at a time when, as mentioned above, the printing that hasn't been moved overseas is becoming more automated every day. Printing as an industry is in big big trouble, and unfortunately, we will NOT be getting any government bailout a la GM.

Prepress Pilgrim ( The Future of Prepress: Expansion of the Virtual Bubble | Prepress Pilgrim ) has written some about this, as have I ( http://www.jefflazerus.com/blog/335 and elsewhere at Regular Guy's Experiments in www ) .

[Lukas Engqvist]

I seem to be spending more time cleaning up clients jobs, because more and more people are working outside their realm of expertise. Find that even the people teaching design are those that used to teach Office, and have very little understanding of considerations for print, and that would include typography.
Finding my role to move from tedious mechanics to coaching, consulting, troubleshooting and fixing.

A nice example of what happens when people move out of their area of expertise in this case design, is shown in a clip I found on the net…Â*about how a Stop sign would be redesigned YouTube - Redesigning the Stop sign

[Tech]

From publishers' perspective... it's all about enterprise content management. Publishing will be less about physical items and more about re-purposing existing and new products to different medias. I'm sure you guys have been hearing about ebooks as much as I have. I don't like it much myself but I think a lot of people are seeing this new media as a replacement for books/magazines/newspaper, any printed material...IMHO, they couldn't be more wrong. It's very much like music/movie industry, it's a growing pain. Going from physical forms to digital is a brave new world and a race against digital piracy...of which, printed material in many ways were a better deterrent.

From printer's perspective, I think you guys have to think about how to grab a piece of that pie instead of just thinking about changing workflow and automation...you can make prepress and printing more efficient, cost effective and more competitive against oversea printers but you can't even get a job when publishers are going straight to digital/web or simply less print quantity. IMHO, perhaps it's time to re-think printing business model.

[louis@jetline.co.za]

Within our organisation, the evolution goes something like store assistant in one of many franchises, dtp people/prepress operators, becoming a franchisee or parterning with franchisees, but very, VERY few operators get that far... I can think of 5 out of possibly 150 in the last 7 years that went from prepress/dtp to anything near workflow or store management.

[Deprive]

Its going to be just a press operator within the next 5 years.

[John W]

[QUOTE=Lukas Engqvist;119133]I seem to be spending more time cleaning up clients jobs, because more and more people are working outside their realm of expertise. Find that even the people teaching design are those that used to teach Office, and have very little understanding of considerations for print, and that would include typography.

That is my point also. In folding carton work, the percentage of files that arrive anywhere close to useful is zero, period. Every single carton we receive must be torn down completely and rebuild completely from native files. Issues such as substrate caliper effect the amount of 'wrap' required at the fold corners of the face panels. No designer I know understands that this wrap amount must be a variable based on the thickness of the cardboard to be printed on (this varies based on weight of product, style of carton design etc) and must be also adjusted for each and every plant's equipment. Few designers I know understand that a carton has a back side and a front side because of the glue seam. In a bilingual country, the main language must be on the face panel away from that seam. Sometimes a version for an alternate language must be on that main panel to satisfy a region of the country. Files may be built in spot colors that outnumber the press capabilities so a decision must be made (re-quoted) to alter the job colors which may require a rebuild or some specialized trap technique. And now we have Braille to introduce to the designers with all its rules. Do you know any designers coming out of school that have any clue about this stuff! Not bloody likely is what I say!
These issues are looming larger each year since no one (or very damn few) train the designers in production issues and techniques associated with folding carton print. And forget China and India; half of them don't get it either or won't spend the time ($$) to repair the files appropriately. IMHO, skilled prepress people are going to be in more demand as we move forward; they'll be able to write their own ticket and no amount of automation can replace what I am talking about.

John W

[RUsure]

Originally Posted by MC_JerryD

Prepress operators to workflow managers. New prepress systems are not just RIP, trap and plate. A lot of automation under the hood with these new systems. Getting all the non-complex, repeatable job to be automated though scripting and rules-based software.

Web2print and web submission with online review.

Variable data and PURLS.

Being a prepress operator and not learning these things will be like the days of the film strippers did not accept the change in the 90's with electronic prepress. Printing is going through a change and will never be the same again. Accepting the change and learning where the industry in going is key.

MC JerryD

The pre-requisite for learning is being able to enter the classroom. That "classroom" is extremely difficult to realize, simply because companies want people experienced in their existing systems. Those opportunities are scarce due to the economic downturn/downsizing realities PLUS the experience paths are mutually exclusive. ApogeeX operators aren't learning Rampage, and Rampage folks aren't learning PrintReady, and on and on and on . . .
So, the pool of "experienced" people have to be present in the workflow that's being replaced/optimised with the "latest & greatest" automation (whatever) tools. And, of course, the viability of the "hosting" commercial printer is under pressure because of the necessary synergy between Sales, Prepress & Output (offset, variable data, web, etc.) to take the "latest & greatest" workflow from client requests to final delivery . . .
If there's a career pathway for those of us who do desire to be educated (& apply that education), please let us (me) know - we're starving out here . . .