MOVE BEYOND THE EINGERPRINT RUN BUILD TEAMWORK WITH CONTINUOUS REPORTING AND COLLABORATION

摘要

Ever since printers became aware of standards and specifications, press fingerprinting (a.k.a. press characterization) has been the gold standard for printers who care about standards and want to optimize their printing process; most often by using plate curves to match the press to a specified output target such as GRACoL. The trouble is fingerprinting rarely works as expected and may be costing printers a great deal of money with little in return. Here are a few reasons why: 1. Fingerprint runs are expensive. A fingerprint has little meaning unless the press is set to even densities, is warmed up, settled down, and running at actual production speed (and printed on fresh sheets of paper, not the backsides of makeready sheets). That means using thousands of sheets of paper, plus ink and plate costs. Add in hours of time in prep, setup, running, cleanup, and analysis, and you have a cost of several thousand dollars for every fingerprint. Factor that by multiple presses and runs done several times each year, and you have a very substantial investment of time and money in a process of dubious value.