RESTON, VA— June 4, 2008—A committee of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) is currently drafting an international standard that will define a variable data printing (VDP) job exchange format. ISO 16612-2 (PDF/VT) will specify how to use the Portable Document Format (PDF) to define and exchange all content elements and supporting metadata to produce predictable output for variable or transactional document content. PDF/VT (“V” for “Variable” and “T” for “Transactional”) is designed to enable VDP in a variety of environments, from desktop printing to digital production presses, and to accommodate linkages for content, such as TransPromo applications, which combine color promotional content with transactional information. PDF/VT is a modern PDF
Digital Printing-Toner - Cut Sheet (Color)
MAY DAY, observed as a holiday in his native England, proved to be a busy day for Tony Seaman. The director of Printing and Graphic Services at the University of Mississippi put the in-plant’s new five-color Kodak NexPress 2500 digital press into service on May 1, leaving little time to dance around the Maypole. Seaman, born in Binbrook, England, just outside of Oxford, admittedly deviated a bit from the in-plant’s norm with the addition of this machine. Traditionally utilizing Xerox equipment exclusively on the digital side of shop, Seaman decided on the Kodak digital press after comparing its features to that of the Xerox
When your printer has to stop and cool down after printing just 99 pages, it can be tough to keep your productivity high. That’s what the Copy Center at the University of Houston-Clear Lake faced with its previous printer. “It would also not run different types of stock, and we had a lot of jobs that needed to go on a variety of paper,” explains Dmitri Melendez, Print Shop technician and Copy Center assistant. So the three-employee in-plant recently replaced that indolent printer with a new Océ CS550. Among other benefits, it can run a variety of stock instead of being limited
When McMaster University Media Production Services installed its Xerox 2060 back in 2001, print on demand took off—particularly the “demand” part. Customers quickly began to expect color jobs almost immediately. “Their expectation is, ‘I want sun, moon and stars and I need it yesterday,’ ” quips Sue Moorcroft, senior manager at the Hamilton, Ontario-based in-plant. So if the 2060 needed service, all of that print on demand work came to a halt. “We were getting held accountable for that on campus,” she says. To build in some redundancy, the 20-employee in-plant recently replaced that 2060 with not one but three Xerox digital color
Océ has been holding VIP Events all around the country to get the word out to in-plants that “green business is good business.” IPG attended the recent meeting in New York City, which drew 39 in-plant representatives to the Océ showroom there. Aided by former in-plant manager and consultant Vic Barkin, the group learned how Océ promotes sustainability and got ideas on how they can run greener in-plants. Eric de Goeijen, vice president of DPC Marketing, welcomed attendees and provided some background on Océ’s products, which range from wide-format printers to MFPs to high-speed printers, like the VarioPrint 6250. It uses two imaging units to
The University of Washington’s Xerox iGen3 has been a smashing success since it was installed in October. In April, it set a new record when it produced nearly 400,000 prints, shattering the previous record of just under 300,000. “We are currently way ahead of the initial volume projections,” says Frank Davis, associate director of Creative Communications. Since installation, the iGen3 has printed more than 2 million sellable prints. Two of those jobs won Gold and Silver awards in the In-Print 2008 contest.
ROCHESTER, NY—May 19, 2008—PODi, the Digital Printing Initiative, today announced PPML Consumer Certification Programs and the first group of certified products for users of PPML (the Personalized Print Markup Language). PPML is the leading open-standard VDP (Variable Data Publishing) language for production digital printing. PPML facilitates creating personalized high-volume print campaigns by service providers, enabling meaningful one-to-one “conversations” for their customers. The addition of PPML Consumer Testing and Certification to the previously announced Producer Certification now provides independent verification that compliant products from different companies will correctly process PPML for the print service provider. Certification is traceable to a single PPML/GA test suite and
ROCHESTER, N.Y., MAY 2—More than 300 members of the Graphic Users Association (GUA) of Kodak Solutions gathered last week at the Wynn Las Vegas to learn about the latest techniques, products and best practices for advancing their graphic communications business. The GUA’s annual North American Conference, sponsored by Kodak’s Graphic Communications Group, included 50 presentations and roundtable discussions. Subject matter experts from Kodak and the GUA exchanged information with attendees on a wide range of topics, such as workflow, color relationship management, growing a digital print business, the impact of offset class inkjet, sustainability, transitioning from a printer to marketing services provider, trends in
INTERQUEST has released a study called Digital Printing in Government: Perspectives of Federal Print Buyers & Third-Party Providers. The study is based on extensive, in-depth interviews with 60 large government agencies and service providers. It complements a 2007 report which primarily focused on in-house printing at the state, local and federal levels. The study focuses on three primary areas: the government procurement process, including an in-depth look into the Government Printing Office (GPO) practices and trends; government print buyers, including overall practices and trends in procuring print; and the use of digital printing technologies among leading providers to the federal government. Issues and topics
The Print Shop at Columbia College recently installed a Canon imagePRESS 7000 CV to meet quality and speed expectations that its previous device, a Canon CPP500, could not fulfill. Mark Tindell, director of Mail and Print Services at the Columbia, Mo., college, says the CPP500 “required frequent repairs, and the amount of up time was problematic.” So the in-plant turned to the imagePRESS 7000 CV, justifying its lease from Ikon by examining what it would cost to do the same type of work using outside sources. It is using the new digital press primarily to print newsletters for the start of the
