"I"'s "big" printing concept: a variety of processes and common development

Printing is one of the four major inventions in ancient China. Its appearance has played an important role in the dissemination of cultural knowledge. But now many people lack a comprehensive understanding of the concept of printing, only a narrow understanding. What's more, when the author used to do printing business, he encountered a customer from the Academy of Fine Arts and went to the printing industry to find a printing factory. He was not printing in Heidelberg. In his opinion, "Print = Heidelberg", "Heidelberg = Print".

What exactly is printing?

In terms of literal meaning, there are traces of "prints" and smears of "brushes." Rubbing with a brush to make it visible to other objects is called "printing." In short, printing is the industry that produces prints.

From a scientific point of view, there are traces on the object (in the narrow sense of the paper only), and the trace (by a large number of copies) can reflect or absorb the light, through the human eye, and make people The visual nerve identifies the shape and tone of the trace, which is called printing.

From a cultural point of view, printing is a way of expressing and circulating human thought. In ancient China, printing was done with a brush and ink on the printing plate. The paper was overlaid on the plate, and another dry brush was used to lightly brush the back of the paper. Then the reversed text printing ink on the plate was raised. The paper is printed with a positive text ink, which is called printing because it is a brush.

For industrial production, printing is the direct or indirect method of making an image or text document into a printing plate. The printing plate is coated with a color ink, and the ink is transferred to a paper or other substrate by pressurization. On the other hand, an industrial project that is rapidly and massively duplicated.

It can be seen that the original meaning of the word "printing" is quite extensive. However, with the development of printing technology, there have been many branches of printing. Many people who have long been in contact with a printing branch have gradually reduced the meaning of the word “printing”. However, the concept of a "big" printing concept has emerged. There is no clear concept of what is the big printing concept. Everyone has their own different understanding.

With the advancement of technology, there are now a variety of graphic output methods, such as: inkjet, digital printing, copying and so on. Are they counted as printing? The author believes that in understanding the broad concept of printing, they should also belong to the category of printing. Inkjet printing, also known as inkjet printing; copying, also known as electrostatic printing. Printing, digital printing, and copying have now become an indispensable graphic output method in work and life. Therefore, I believe that we should now establish a “big” printing concept.

Kodak originally focused on the imaging industry and had little contact with the printing industry. But now, through a series of mergers and acquisitions, Kodak has transformed itself into a large-scale group integrating digital printing, photo printing, digital printing, and prepress solutions. Since Kodak Graphic and Video Group completed the acquisition of Creo in June 2005, it officially entered a new era of digital imagery and video. The success of M&A marks that the Kodak Graphic and Video Group has basically achieved the transition from the traditional image industry to the digital image and text output industry. The transformation of the Kodak Group has fully explained the reality and urgency of establishing the “big” printing concept.

Of the 17,000 magazines published in this journal, nearly 5,000 were sent to end-users (well-known enterprises outside the graphic arts industry). Nearly 2,000 copies were sent to the hands of advertising and communication companies. "). A large number of end customers demand that our printers provide comprehensive, one-stop services. The market is calling for complex talents. As a printing director of a large company or a person in charge of a printing company, although it is not necessary to have a deep understanding of prepress, printing, and postpress knowledge, it must have a wide range of knowledge. In this sense, we must also establish a “big” printing concept and be a “big” printer.

My "big" printing concept

I will start with the needs of end customers and combine my past practical experience to talk about my own “big” printing concept. Due to the limited space, only a few words can be generalized.

First, a variety of output methods

There are many ways of printing, and the appropriate process should be selected according to the characteristics of the final printed product. For example: general large-volume paper printing offset printing. If there is only one or two hundred copies, you may consider using a digital printing method that is cheap and fast. For quality requirements not too high, not too large print, you can also consider the color copy method. Digital printing is suitable for short-run printing, personalized printing, variable data printing, and on-demand publishing. However, digitally printed pictures are generally not large, and most of them are open to bleeding. If the web size exceeds the maximum size of the digital press, and the number is small, the method of printing and proofing can be used, and the inkjet printing method can also be used. However, printing can only be done on one side, while printing and proofing can be double-sided. In addition, the accuracy of printing proofing is higher than the precision of printing. If the paper is thin (less than 128 grams) and the print number is large (more than 20,000 copies), offset printing is more cost effective. For example, a magazine with a large circulation is suitable for printing using a rotary machine. The paper used for cigarette packs is thick, has a large number of prints, and requires high quality. Gravure printing is usually used. Gravure printing substrates are more extensive, and can be printed on plastic, thin leather, metal foil paper in addition to paper. The gravure printing has the advantages of high quality and high resistance to printing, so it is particularly suitable for long-run printing. The domestic and foreign packaging and decorating industries mostly use gravure printing. However, due to the fact that most of the gravure printing ink used in China today is solvent-based ink, it will cause pollution of the packaging and the environment. Therefore, it is limited by the developed countries when exporting. The use of water-based ink flexo printing, will not pollute the environment, so it is recommended to use, especially for food, drug packaging and printing is particularly suitable. In addition, there is a combination of thermal transfer printing, three-dimensional printing, holographic printing or various printing processes. For example, personalized t-shirts and personalized mugs produced by the “Indo-Japan Trade” for the annual meeting of the Beijing Press Association were all produced by thermal transfer. All in all, we must choose the appropriate printing method according to the characteristics of the job.

Printing can also be counted as a way of printing. Printing is suitable for making larger advertisements. The spray painting face is colorful, free from limitations of format and batch, the production method is diversified, the cost is low, and the production cycle is short. The inkjet printer is essentially a large inkjet printer, usually using roll material. According to the difference between indoor and outdoor use environments, inkjet printing is generally divided into two types: inkjet printers used indoors are generally smaller in format and higher in printing accuracy, and are often referred to as “indoor photo” inkjet printers; inkjet printers used in outdoor printers are larger in size. The low precision of printing is commonly referred to as "outdoor spray." The application fields of inkjet printing are very extensive, such as light box advertising, large-scale street sign advertising screens, roll-ups, X-type racks, and exhibition boards commonly used in exhibitions.

Outdoor light box advertising screen (standard size: 1.5 meters × 3.5 meters), in the past often used inkjet production. However, in recent years, with the development of large-format screen four-color printing technology, the proportion of lightbox advertisements made using screen printing has become higher and higher. Screen-printed screens are more vivid and can last longer. If the number is small, for example, less than ten, then the use of inkjet printing is relatively cheap; if the number is large, such as one hundred, the use of screen printing will save more money. In the past, when I was a production manager for an advertising and graphic production company, I often encountered similar jobs. This company also owns the HP5500 pictorial inkjet printer, Witt VUTEK outdoor inkjet printer, and a large screen printing machine of 1.5m × 3.5m format. Screen printing, also known as "universal printing," claims that except air and water can not be printed, all other materials, such as paper, plastic, leather, glass, metal, wood, cloth, silk, etc., can be printed. In addition, screen printing can not only print on flat objects, but also print on convex, concave, or spherical objects.

Caipai is also one of the output methods of images. Caipen is also known as “printing” or “printing” and there is also a “print”. Its principle is similar to that of printing. It requires a bottom “version” (negative film), and the bottom plate can be used to print the photos. So I also included it in the scope of the big printing concept. However, the past can only be limited to photo printing. Since the digital minilab has appeared on the market, any advertisement screens and graphic mixed-text pages created through computer design can be output by digital minilabs. The author once contacted a graphic and fast print output company. The company owns the Fuji Xerox 2060 digital press and a giant digital minilab with a value of nearly 4 million yuan. The output width is 1.27 meters and the length is unlimited.

It can output giant photos, suitable for making huge wedding photos, portraits, etc. Many street small color expansion shops are its customers; it can also output large format reversal films, absolute continuous tone, suitable for making high-end light boxes in high-end shopping malls. . Now all street digital multiplication stores can produce business cards with colorful photos, personalized desk calendars, personalized albums, etc., which have become their new business to attract customers. The Digital Color Expansion Store has entered the graphic production output field. Can you exclude it from the "large" printing circle?

Second, before and after a dragon

Print output is only one part of production. It must be organically linked with the prepress and postpress technologies to produce perfect works. Therefore, as a "big" printer, all prepress links such as scanning, color separation, typesetting, imposition, filming, proofing (traditional proofing and digital proofing), and CTP must be understood. With the continuous progress of the times, the needs of printing customers have also been greatly changed. As a "big" printer, you'd better understand the creative aspects of advertising and graphic design.

In addition, "big" printers must also understand the post-press processing technology. Post-press processing technology can be described as varied. The post-press processing of paper-based prints includes: hot stamping, laminating, glazing, embossing, embossing, embossing, die-cutting, and folding; the books are bound by: saddle-stitching, glue-binding, lock-line, and hardcover Etc.; post-processing of inkjet products are: film, splicing, sampan, border, etc.; digital printing is generally more simple bookbinding, mainly punch ring, saddle stitching, glue binding and so on. Different output technologies and materials, and later processing methods are also different.

Third, improve quality and reduce costs

As a "big" printer, we must also find ways to improve quality and reduce costs. The cost, quality of printing and the number of printing colors are very much related. Therefore, we must make appropriate choices according to the demand characteristics of printed materials. If you can print in monochrome, you don't need to print in two colors. You can print in two colors without four-color printing. In addition, “big” printers should also learn to use spot colors. Some jobs, using spot color printing, will have better results than four-color printing. For the colorful, high-quality job, you can also apply the "four-color + spot color" approach. When the author used to do gravure platemaking, he often encountered six-color and seven-color jobs. All in all, the number of print colors should be designed according to the characteristics of the job.

Science and technology are advancing at a rapid pace. Being “big” printers, we must also pay close attention to high-tech applications in printing in order to further improve quality or reduce costs. In recent years, high-definition printing technology has emerged, which is mainly aimed at improving the clarity of printed matter, mainly referring to a printing technology of 250 lines or more. At last year's CHINA PRINT 2005 printing exhibition, the author saw 300 lines of prints that were barely visible to the naked eye. In addition, there are now some large manufacturers, such as Agfa, Screen, Creo, etc., have all introduced their own AM FM hybrid screening technology. The works printed with this technology have a high definition and the naked eye can not see the dots and are very close to the photos. In addition, there are high-fidelity color printing technology, mainly to expand the printing color gamut as a means to make printing color with visible light color effects as the goal of regulation. High-fidelity color printing technology has broken through the original four-color separation technology and is now able to achieve six-color, seven-color color separation and printing. Epson's latest printers have achieved eight-color printing. The increase in the number of multi-color machines in developed countries over the past two years shows this trend. However, in China, due to the constraints of economic conditions, multi-color printing has not yet been favored by people. However, our "big" printers must always pay attention to high technology.

Although there is specialization in the surgical industry, the market needs expert talents, but at the same time it also needs complex talents and talents.