Using CTP is faster then film output, right?
Author: admin
The answer is positive if and only if the file submitted has no changes.
Hong Kong’s market already moves in a very high speed. However, people are still not satisfied with the speed and keep investigating on how to improve the turn around time. As soon as they get their hands on the CTP (Computer to Plate) technology, the first thing they come up with is the possibility of shorten the production time in printing.
Before an article can be printed, there is a pre-production step to go through before we have the plates for printing. This is where the CTP and film process different from each other. The pre-production process is already explain in the previous article.
In the pass, when someone wants to print an article, the first step is sending a computer file to output film. Then, the film is used to develop print. Once the client has approved the blue print, the plates will be developed. It is a four steps process: film output, blue print preparation, client verification and plate development.
CTP’s pre-production process has three steps only: CTP blue print preparation, client verification and plate development. The submitted file is used to prepare blue print directly. A lot of time is saved without film output. If a book has 96 full color pages, CTP has about one working day advantage. Plate development is about the same speed for both methods.
Up to now, CTP seems to be faster if everything goes smoothly. Unfortunately, it is very common that clients have to make editorial changes because the submitted files are not checked thoroughly before submitted to printing. Clients have a perception that changing one or two words is just as easy as updating a Microsoft Word file. However, it is not the case for CTP.
First, the correction page has to be submitted to the CTP software again and insert at the right place of the signature that it belongs. The whole signature has to be re-calculated again with blue print output. When we verify the correction, we have to verify if the new page is correct AND if it is placed in the right place. There are a few instances that the corrected page is inserted into the wrong place. This correction process will take about half day normally.
Corrections on film is easy. Just replace or make the correction on a specific page. The rest of the signature is untouched so that we don’t need to re-print blue print. The correction process can be completed within minutes. If there are a few more rounds of correction, CTP will take a lot more time than film because of the long correction cycle.
In conclusion, CTP is faster if the whole process goes smoothly without mistakes. Otherwise, the pre-production process is much slower than film during the long correction-verification cycle.
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