What’s New in Printing

Are you in the printing business?

Then you know that it is changing while we speak!

I started out selling business cards and stationery out of a catalog in 1982. Before I’d ever heard of a “bleed” or “camera-ready” artwork, I was told by the print broker who had just hired me to sell printing on a commission basis to get out there and get that all-important first order.

In the nineteen eighties, Mergenthalers and other typesetting machines were “state of the art,” and strictly the province of professionals. With the introduction of Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop, around 1990, the game changed significantly. They were considerably less costly than then the recently outmoded wave of equipment, and anyone who owned a desktop computer could set up a graphic design and typesetting business in the comfort of his or her own home.
Today these wondrous drawing and photo editing programs are so well known that “to Photoshop” has entered the English (and other languages as well) language as a verb.

Fast forward to the next decade. The volume of digitally-submitted artwork exceeded that of mechanically-created files for the first time in 1993. Other problems arose, as a direct result of this sweeping technological change. Chief among them was the need to “preflight” artwork.
Since artwork was no longer presented in a format as obvious and direct as that of the recently supplanted “mechanical,” When a client or graphic designer had given you artwork in this form, you could plainly and immediately see if it was “up to snuff”
and ready to print. All that was required for this inspection was the keen and natural eye of a trained and experienced observer.
Now one had to open up and inspect all print files on his computer to make sure that they were press-ready and without defect. For all the advantages offered by electronic art, there were yet other problems to deal with.
Were all fonts bundled with the artwork?
Was the disk or diskette (remember them?) file corrupted?
Had all platform- and software-related compatibility factors been considered?

The scope of the changes that have taken place in the printing and graphics industries in the last thirty years is nothing short of incredible.

Can you relate to this?

Have you had similar experiences as a graphic designer, press operator, paper salesperson, estimator, post-press or bindery operator, or just a student and observer of print and graphics technology?

Then please let us know what you think.

This is an ongoing post about the past, present and future of printing…commercial, offset, digital, letterpress, post-press, Photoshop, Illustrator and  everything / anything else that is either directly or indirectly related to printing.

Are you a “newbie” who wants advice about getting something printed?

Please post!

Are you just thinking about the future of printing and/or communication and want to exchange viewpoints with others?

Hope to hear from you soon!

Are you a diehard non-reader by choice and feel that books are…at best…odorous, tree-wasting remnants of a bygone or almost bygone age?

Feel free to rant and rave. Just try to spell something correctly (LOL)!

Are you in the business of printing, publishing, writing, editing, bookselling, or bookstore browsing for fun or profit?

The way we process conventional alphabets and glyphs is changing while we speak, so if you have a thing for printing, books, semantics, communications or anything remotely related to these topics, please share your thoughts with like-minded people.

Thank you!