The chapter introduces us to what how printing use to be like before the digital world. There was a lot more handwork involved than there is today.
Before the digital era designing and publishing use to be split up. Designers would first design the intended project. Among the designers there were typesetters. They were responsible for any type of text in the project. It was very skilled so usually sent off to a tradesmen who specialized in that area. If there were pictures involved there would have to be a cameraman set up for the project as well. A proof would be made from all of this. Other tradesmen would come in to make sure color was correct and imposition was right for printing. Proofs would be made from all of the corrections. From there it would be sent to the printers.
From there the printer would make a final proof. Plates would be made from the proof and sent to the printer. After printing was finished cutting the product down to size, folding, or any other type of finishing was done at this time.
Since the invention of the computer and digital camera. The designer can do a lot of the work themselves. Making sure color is correct, trim lines and fold lines are shown and any pictures that can be taken can be done by them as well. Imposition can be done with special software and sent directly to the printers.
The printer will look over things and make corrections and send the product to the press.
When you take a job to the printers you will first be dealing with a customer service/sales rep. They will talk the project over with you, going over details of what you want in your final product. The salary for a customer service rep is 61,000 dollars. From there the project goes to the estimator. They will figure out a price for your project. Their salary is 50,000 dollars. The preflight technician will go over your project to make sure color corrections have been made and all proofs are ready to go. Their salary is 46,000 dollars. The last step involves the prepress operator. He will set up the printer and making sure imposition is right for the project. Their salary is 28,000 dollars.
Imposition involves placing pages of a document in the correct format and postion to make it ready for printing.
RIP is a computer that will make sure all the different softwares used to make the product will be able to print properly.
Die cutting sometimes is used for specialized products that have to be folded or scored specially such as folders with tabs.
When printing, instead of making one single blob of ink on the paper. The printer uses halftone dots to create the image. They are tiny dots of different sizes to create shades of color.
DPI involves the product that is making the dots. It is the set resolution that the printer can handle.
Ipi shows how frequent the dots are made
Ppi is what the resolution of the image is.
CMYK is what the printer uses to make colors and RGB is what the computer uses to create the colors.
Color management is very important because it affects how your overall product will look. Calibrating your screen is very important to make sure colors will look true to how the colors will print. Using pantone colors is a good way to match certain shades.
All of these things combined will create a finished product.
