PrePress Digital in collaboration with callas
Excerpt: PrePress Digital has developed a browser-based and user-friendly workflow solution that maps data preparation, color management and print preparation within the printing industry in an intuitive way. In this solution callas pdfToolbox takes over the part of data checking as well as data preparation and correction.
About the author:
The Durst Group of companies is a leading manufacturer of digital printing presses, addressing the wide-format, label, textile, ceramic and packaging printing markets. At the same time, Durst supports its customers in the digitization of industrial production processes. With Durst Workflow , PrePress Digital has developed a browser-based and user-friendly workflow solution that maps data preparation, color management and print preparation within the printing industry in an intuitive way. This enables print shops to efficiently handle all steps from the receipt of data to production under one interface.
To achieve this, PrePress Digital has integrated OEM products from leading technology providers into Durst Workflow. Since they did not want to design the solution from scratch, OEM suppliers which could contribute suitable software products were explored.
“For me, callas turned out to be the best provider of automated PDF processing. The integration of the OEM components was relatively easy due to the open interfaces. A challenge was rather the compilation of the workflows so that they are comprehensible for the user, and above all the simplification of the complex technologies.” –says Hans Peter Schneeberger, Managing Director of PrePress digital – Softwareentwicklung GmbH.
Within Durst Workflow, callas pdfToolbox takes over the part of data checking as well as data preparation and correction. If the incoming file is not a PDF file, pdfToolbox generates one. More than 100 different Checks are then run in the background, which can be customized by the user for his/her workflow. Detected errors are corrected automatically, if desired. The user then receives a meaningful presentation with all production-relevant metadata, including a preview. The view also lists those errors that cannot be corrected automatically but require manual intervention by the user using Fixups. After each correction run, a new version of the PDF file is generated, including an updated preview. In this way, the user can track the changes he has made in the log and also has the option of reproducing previous versions. Up to 7,000 files are currently checked, prepared and made available for production with a single installation per day for larger customers. Automated compilation of production jobs and assembly is handled by the workflow, and subsequent color management and ripping are handled by ColorLogic and Global Graphics respectively.
Prepress Digital also uses callas technology for assembly, such as label printing. In Durst Workflow, the number of print items that fit on one printed sheet are calculated. The result of the assembly is then saved as an HTML file, which is then transferred to callas pdfChip. This solution generates a finished, imposed single- or multi-page printable PDF file in the selected production length, which is transferred either directly to the integrated RIP or to any RIP in the production plants’ existing infrastructure. This means that Durst workflow can be used for automated data preparation regardless of the selected RIP landscape in the production plants, as well as cloud-based transfer of entire impositions to RIP stations (RIP satellites) in the production plants.
In the next development step, Prepress digital plans to use the Process Plans of pdfToolbox in Durst Workflow to map corrections in PDF files even more flexibly.