Who should run CTP, Prepress or Pressroom?

[zoran]

There was separate thread with interesting tidbits about Pressroom running CTP plates vs Prepress here : http://printplanet.com/forums/prepress-workflow-discussion/26278-pressmen-platemakers.
What is your opinion?

 

[Alith7]

wanted to qualify my "pressroom only" answer as mainly pressroom does the burning, but prepress helps.

 

[David Milisock]

In my opinion in a ROOM technology shop let the pressman make the plates.

 

[BeauchampT]

I suggest that pressmen be involved in the entire platemaking process for several reasons....

In my plant, we are using plate calibration curves, web growth profiles, etc... all being applied to media files from prepress. It is pressroom that knows its needs for press dot gain curve profiles, how the web is growing and so on. If prepress is the one creating the TIFFs for imaging to plate, we have no control over what they decided to do. And it is somewhat...difficult...to have to constantly communicate between two departments. Really, we could make prepress' life easier by taking over the whole platemaking process.

 

[Cornishpastythighs]

Sorry I have got to disagree, Press guys should stick to running the presses and being the best operators they can be, training their junior press people and managing their crews in a safe and productive manner. Press people need to concentrate 100% of their time on quality and productivity of the press hardware. Making plates to prevent downtime is one thing applying curves and creating files is another, hell I cant even get 2 pressman to agree on the fountain solution dosage without constantly changing it.
my 2 pence worth

 

[David Milisock]

Sorry I have got to disagree, Press guys should stick to running the presses and being the best operators they can be, training their junior press people and managing their crews in a safe and productive manner. Press people need to concentrate 100% of their time on quality and productivity of the press hardware. Making plates to prevent downtime is one thing applying curves and creating files is another, hell I cant even get 2 pressman to agree on the fountain solution dosage without constantly changing it.
my 2 pence worth

I am not for the pressmen screwing with curves, this is within the domain of the calibration which is very time consuming and therefore expensive.

I have no problem with pressmen making plates in a ROOM t4chnology environment, which means point and click for them.

 

[Lukas Engqvist]

Imaging plates is not the same as setting up workflow etc. It is good if pressman knows how to re-image a plate if he crashes it.

 

[Cornishpastythighs]

Our pressmen have enough to do on the press, we trained all of our press feeders and helpers how to point and click to make plates on the off shifts.

 

[Happyprinter]

In this economy with our shop size significantly downsized, we have trained our prepress and press people to run our CTP. That is, our press people can take a file already prepared by graphics, then drag it to the proper place on our RIP and load a plate. It's nice when our graphics dept. is busy and the press dept. is waiting on plates to have the pressman be able to burn plates. As a rule our graphics dept. handles that but in a pinch both departments can do it. I believe to survive and stay lean in this market you have to utilize and cross train everyone in as many departments as possible. This is a practice that we have instituted for over 25 years and it has not hurt nor hindered our operations yet. My humble opinion.

 

[herbert]

The Pressmen should be concentrating on making the presses run as efficiently. as possible, Remember these are the money makers. I agree they should be able to run plates if they crash in case it happens on a early . late shift, with no prepress guys around.

 

[David Milisock]

The Pressmen should be concentrating on making the presses run as efficiently. as possible, Remember these are the money makers. I agree they should be able to run plates if they crash in case it happens on a early . late shift, with no prepress guys around.

The plate room better be a money maker too!! Same for pre-press!!

 

[Alith7]

The plate room better be a money maker too!! Same for pre-press!!

Agreed!! actually, I would put prepress on a level if not above the pressroom. In incompetent prepress can cost you WAY more money VERY quickly. I don't know how it is in other shops, we're more toward the smaller side of commercial, but in our shop, prepress is responsible for making sure that once those files leave prepress, they will be correctly set up for everything from printing, to trimming, to bindery, to finishing. and if there is ANYTHING wrong, we are the first to get yelled at.

can't match the epson proofs?? must be prepress who screwed up the files, cause the press is never out of wack....

sorry...minor rant.

 

[chevalier]

Not to throw press operators under the bus but most (not all) of the press operators I've dealt with in multiple shops seem to have a problem maintaining their own machines. The excuse is usually 'I don't have enough time' or 'I didn't know I had to check or maintain that (auxiliary equipment such as chillers)'. Perhaps this is a reality but from a prepress perspective we always find time to maintain our equipment even if we are slammed. Bringing them into prepress to deal with plates sounds like a terrible idea.

I have worked in one shop with completely lights-out plating (literally the lights were out in the room unless they sensed motion). The plating equipment was in another room with closed doors and dedicated AC/humidification control. There was a walkthrough check daily by a prepress operator at 8am and 5pm. We monitored the equipment via a screen showing the queue and its status in prepress. The equipment sent an e-mail alert when it was thirsty or hungry. The press operators were responsible for retrieving the plates from the post-processor stacks. When it came time for cleaning one prepress person and one press operator cleaned the equipment as scheduled (personnel rotated). It worked absolutely great and last I heard it is still operating like a dream.

 

[jpgarcia@stjudeconsulting]

on my opinion i think its much better if both,, because pressmen always blaming pre-press if there's a problem, if both of them has a knowledge how to operate and troubleshoot minor problems on ctp and after processing it will be good, and the pressmen will understand all their problems regards on ctp..

 

[giant1958]

agreed!! Actually, i would put prepress on a level if not above the pressroom. In incompetent prepress can cost you way more money very quickly. I don't know how it is in other shops, we're more toward the smaller side of commercial, but in our shop, prepress is responsible for making sure that once those files leave prepress, they will be correctly set up for everything from printing, to trimming, to bindery, to finishing. And if there is anything wrong, we are the first to get yelled at.

Can't match the epson proofs?? Must be prepress who screwed up the files, cause the press is never out of wack....

Sorry...minor rant.

so so true!!!!!!

 

[Cornishpastythighs]

We make money by selling folding cartons to our customers, we do not sell pre-press,plates,proofs or any other type of Digital media. Prepress is a very important component of our packaging system as is ink,maintenance and all the other Non value added (see 5s lean production for this definition) activities. The customer does not pay for anything other than the carton, having the correct files,proofs,ink,plates and all the other components that we use allow us to produce the carton faster,cheaper and with better quality than our competition but they are not money makers as we have to charge the same as the competition(or less), sorry to offend any prepress people who I love dearly but the presses,die cutters and gluers make the money in our facility.

 

[David Milisock]

so so true!!!!!!

I'll jump in, I've been in graphics since 1975 and HAVE NEVER SEEN A PROOF MATCH THE PRESS.

 

[dabob]

We make money by selling folding cartons to our customers, we do not sell pre-press,plates,proofs or any other type of Digital media. Prepress is a very important component of our packaging system as is ink,maintenance and all the other Non value added (see 5s lean production for this definition) activities. The customer does not pay for anything other than the carton, having the correct files,proofs,ink,plates and all the other components that we use allow us to produce the carton faster,cheaper and with better quality than our competition but they are not money makers as we have to charge the same as the competition(or less), sorry to offend any prepress people who I love dearly but the presses,die cutters and gluers make the money in our facility.

This is true . . but if pre-press sends out a bad file you don't make any money . . . we also have a saying here that goes, "we don't sell the marks . . we sell the job!"

 

[giant1958]

I'll jump in, I've been in graphics since 1975 and HAVE NEVER SEEN A PROOF MATCH THE PRESS.

ours do.......maybe you need a new proofer?

 

[David Milisock]

ours do.......maybe you need a new proofer?

The only proof that matches the printing press is a press proof. Let's put our money on the table. I'll send you my test file you proof it and send it back to me. I'll leave it sealed. Then we'll print on your printing press. Not an ink jet or a digital printer a press like a Heidelberg or something. Then we'l meet and look at the proof verses the print in a 5,000K environment. If it matches I'll pay travel and all. If I find 5 differences you pay travel and all. Is that fair? I've been doing this a long time, I've been in hunreds of shops all over the world, G7, SWOP certified Bull Crap and what ever.