Hey all - I thought I had seen most everything but have today come upon an Illustrator CC file with a 'Mixed Ink Image'. What the heck is that? It's the total background of a file and separation only shows shades of gray and at only 107ppi. It's for a large folding carton, image area is approx 17" x 27", so it SHOULD be rather large. I've asked for the image to relink to but curious as to what it is.

Hey all -
We are printing a one color job on 80# Coated Litho Label stock. It's pretty much a side to side, front to back paint job over the sheet. The pressmen are having issues with the sheets sticking through the press and tearing. We first tried a 75% and 50% screen of process colors but that left holes in the ink no matter what angles we used. It's a one color job, Pantone 477, but they want to use 2 plates. We are a folding carton plant and don't print 80 stock that often.
What we are now attempting to do is print with 2 plates as tints of the solid in hopes it will go through with more success. So now trying tints of the spot ink. to get away from the screening issue.
It's a dumb question but how much ink is too much ink? 2 plates with a 50% tint? Does 50% plus 50% equal 100%? Not thinking so.
Does any of this make sense?

Good Tuesday - for the past 2 years I have had the 12 ink HP Designjet Z3200ps as my proofing machine and it has performed wonderfully on the stock available from HP and a couple of other roll vendors. I use a satin gloss stock and the colors are accurate proof material. Our lease is coming to the end on the printer and what I'm really looking for now is a wide format printer that can also print directly on CCNB, SBS, and folding carton materials in a weight from 14-24pt. I have attempted on the HP but the ink never sets, even smearing during printing.


Now in the real world of prepress and workflow, the proofer would be set up in line with the RIP and platemaking. But in my world, (small company), we are fragmented. I produce the proof, the customer signs off on the proof, and the pressmen match the proof. All from the same PDF I generate. I keep the HP calibrated really well to match both CMYK and spot colors. Sounds archaic but it works. I've been told many a times that we really need to proof through the RIP but that ain't happening here...maybe someday but not in the near future.

So bottom line what I'm looking for is info on wide format printers that can print on sheets of folding carton material.

Now that Apple is telling me to upgrade my home MacPro QuadCore Intel Xeon to El Capitan, I'm wondering which one I can safely upgrade to. I'm not ready to go to El Capitan. But what am I read for? Lion, Mountain Lion, Mavericks?
I'm running mostly CS5 and Final Cut Pro 7.
Good?
Bad?
Ugly?
Thoughts?

Anyone with experience printing something Hot Pink? We have a new client that I am designing donut boxes and he wants the lid to be hot pink. Is there a floeurescent ink in offset printing? Does he need to go to a silk screener?

We have a print job that is just black and white, literally. The stock is a recycled kraft 22pt chipboard, final product is a gable top folding carton. We did a test run last week with a double bump on the opaque white and it just doesn't pop. With some fairly small detail, the pressmen are shying away from another hit of opaque white, but to make the client happy, my opinion is try 3 or 4 hits - it can't hurt (says the prepress guy ), other than the time to get the units all clean to run that many hits of white. Personnaly, to get a white white, I say we should print the 'kraft look' background on a white stock but the client still wants to go with the kraft. I've seen suggestions to put a layer of silver down first but our ink guy at the supply house doesn't like that option (he's the ink guy and not sure if he even knows what recycled kraft is).
ANy tips?

Hey all -
I currently run, and am most familiar with the Harlequin RIP Workflow system. There is an auction next week at a large print shop that has unfortunately gone the way of a lot of printers. The boss sent me a picture of the Nexus ver 8 manual, supposedly thinking this is something we can incorporate into our business. (He doesn't know Word from InDesign).We are a folding carton plant, not a glitzy coffee table book printer. We have a Komori 6 color press. That's it. I don't know enough about Nexus but don't believe it would do us any good to purchase.
Thoughts?
Thanks!

Gotta love transparency issues. Aren't there enough things to keep prepress busy?
I am attempting to output a 6 color proof on our HP-Z3200PS. Color has always been better than acceptable. However, today I have a 4 color psd file placed on top of an Illustrator spot color background (all CS4, sorry). I'm getting a bounding box from the image.
The file path is layered psd file into illy, placed into Indesign for imposition, export out as pdf 1.6 to rip. I've tried to save the Illy file as eps before imposing in Indy. One thing I have yet to try is to eliminate Indy altogether?

I've been messing around, trying to get a PDF file (created in InDesign) that takes 30 minutes to RIP, to RIP faster. I don't know, kinda quiet this week, time on my hands. So I found that if I take the same file that I have made PDF and create an in-rip separation .ps file, the file rips in 3 minutes, rather than 30. The preview on the Xitron Navigator appears identical to the PDF file. It seems that after doing this for 25 years, I should have the answer, but...
In a PDF workflow, why can't I just postscript the file using the XitronRIP.ppd and save the steps of compressing, interpreting and de-interpreting? Am I missing something?

We're starting to get more and more requests for mock ups of packaging and folding cartons. Typically we call our corrugated partner and have them cut out samples on their sample table using 12pt stock. Then I print the artwork on our HP Z3200 and we glue them to the samples and then cut them out with an xacto. That's a lot of work when someone requests 20 or 30 mock-ups. The boss wants to check into vinyl cutters but I'm not entirely certain he knows what he wants. Any ideas?

Hey all -
There has to be something buried in here but I'm in a time crunch and thought it is easier to ask than search - sorry.
Using Illustrator CS4 -
I am manually trapping a 6 color job that has a placed 4 color Photoshop image on top of a solid spot color. Trapping has been really easy - overprint black, add an overprint stroke here and there - with one exception. I want to create a knockout behind the image and then go in and create a choke with the background color. The image has a clipping path and I tried to edit path and then add an overprinting stroke but can't get it to work.
Help please (upgrading Adobe isn't an option right now).

I have to spin my hat around for this one.
We just put in a small conference room (another different hat) that the boss wants to put a 42" flat screen TV on one wall. This so that when clients come into the plant, he can show them video of how the folders and gluing machines work without actually having to walk 30 feet to the plant and view first person. Anyway, the rest of us in the office get a 42" flat panel for whatever.
Anyone with experience using a flat panel TV as a monitor, probably using WiFi? I'm not sure if the technology or the money is there to have all the bells and whistles, but can I hook my Mac (or PC) up to it and show how I work the layout, show trapping, etc.? If I used LegMeIn, which I use anyway, I could do it I suppose as long as the TV supported Wifi and had a browser. Or I could upload the videos to Photobucket and run the presentations from there.
Any thoughts?

Good morning -
The boss has asked me to start getting serious about finding a cutting table for making samples and mockups of folding cartons. Does anyone have some info they would like to share about what in fact I should be looking for??? Our Komori is a 28x40 and our diecutting plant has 2 Bobst and 2 clam shell cutters, so I wouldn't need to be looking for anything more than a 28x40 cutting table. I see the names Esko and Kongsburg tossed around a lot. his looks like some new fun for an old prepress guy!
Thanks in advance -

We are a packaging company - folding cartons, lots of die cutting, folding, gluing, etc. We have our first emboss job and want to get the thing as close to right-on the first shot. The printing is only 2 color, black and white (yes, white ink). We're printing on 18pt chipboard and one face of the carton will have an emboss. The die maker has given us the option of emboss die with or without counters. I would assume the counters are needed to form the emboss. Fortunately it is a blind embos so there won't be any registration problems. The emboss is flat, not contoured, so we are unsure if we really need the counter. Any input?
Thanks - Rick

Well, this isn't the normal prepress stuff, but I stepped into this project with both feet and now I can't scrape it off the bottom of my shoes!
I promised a 40' banner, just type, outlined, black only, on some polypropylene material on our HPZ3200PS plotter. Obtaining the materials was the easy part - 42" wide by 75 ft long. That sounds simple enough. Illustrator only lets you build a file 10' or 227" wide. So I built it at 1/10th of the size in Illustrator (4.1" x 48"), saved as a pdf, and tried to print it at 1000%.

Anybody print big banners without using a big banner program?
The print acts like it is setting up and then clears - nuthin...Maybe I've found the Outer Limits?
 

The question has come up about running similar colors in line with each other or staggering them on the sheet. Darker colors to the gripper? This is a very basic sample because there is black type and more art. But the background colors are the same.
Thanks and Happy Friday!!

I am attempting to manually trap a 5 color job in Illustrator. I am pretty happy with the results with the exception of some outlining of type that is not giving sharp inside corners. Attached are two samples, one with the overprint stroke turned on and one with the stroke turned off. It's only a half point stroke but is noticeable in the inside corners of the 'N'. These letters are 3/4" tall and not a lot on the sheet, but is there a way to make that inside join into a single anchor point rather than two? I thought about making a compound path of the type and the background to create a knockout behind the yellow letter, then choke the knockout. Any thoughts?

Oklahoma Folding Carton and Printing Company is the fastest growing packaging production plant in Oklahoma. If you are an experienced Komori L640 Press Operator or a press helper with pressroom knowledge and experience, this career opportunity is for you. Located 45 minutes southwest of Oklahoma City, we are in need of an individual who can take the lead in a fast paced, growing carton and packaging company. This is a career opportunity for the right person. Work hours are 7-3:30 Monday-Friday, although at times some overtime may be required.

Background and references will be checked. We are a drug-free workplace.

Reply with your Name, a phone number that you can be reached, address where you live, and any information you feel makes you stand out as the individual we want in our employ. Attach a resume if you have one. Job opening is immediate. email: print_position@cox.net
We will respond to all inquiries.

Phone calls will not be accepted.

Good day all - I have a carton print job comping up that I want to put a second coat of black. I first suggested a hint of cyan to richen it up but they (the powers that be) want to print two units of black. Any ideas please on how much of a percentage on the second unit to take care of any imperfections? I was going to go 100% Black on first unit and 40-60% on the second, printing 2 sides on a 22pt clay coat.

Need some information about printing 4 color plus spot with black type and black shadows overprinting. We have a 40" 6 color Komori.
In my logical way of thinking, the black will have to go down last so as to overprint the spot color, correct? I'm getting blank looks from the rest of the crew. Black type is too small to trap and needs to overprint. So my logic says that the spot color has to go down before the black.
Rick