Articles

Drupa 1995 was the definitive breakthrough of computer to plate as replacement of the labour intensive platemaking with film. After the first small steps since 1990 drupa 1995 featured professional CtP systems from suppliers such as Agfa, Autologic, Cymbolic Science, Purup, Barco, Crea, ECRM, AM Varityper and Western Litho. Together they showed more than 50 different…

Everything was digital at drupa 1990, from the new generation scanners to managing automated offset presses. Linotype was one of the examples of the pre-press digitisation. Linotype seemed to be conquering the world with its LinoColor and System 1000. Pre-press manfufacturer Scitex gave a peak into the future of digital proofing. with its costly and…

The heart of every computer to plate or digital printing system is a raster image processor. A RIP ensures that the digital data, usually in PDF form, are converted into a raster pattern with which the laser can drive the CtP system or the inkjet heads in a digital printer. A good RIP ensures that…

Ten years after the introduction of Postscript the real breakthrough at drupa 1986 was data exchange, or the exchanging of orders between pre-press systems with their own file formats. This was now possible with Adobe Postscript. Drupa 1986 was dominated by PostScript Level 1 image setter which were able to set four colour separation i…

If you are serious about improving your environmental impact, partnership may be the way to go. It can even have additional unexpected benefits for your business, unrelated to the main project. Partnering works not just between developers, but also across the developer/customer divide. Toray and Seacourt Printing, a UK printing company, have been working together…

At drupa 1982 I saw, only just returned from 2 years military service in Surinam, how web offset became a disrupting technology which made rotogravure an expensive and old-fashioned technology. This was great for me as I had just started in sales at Machinehandel Houtstra, distributor for Solna Offset, the Swedish press manufacturer with relatively…

During drupa 1976 I looked at things with different eyes. I had just started studying for my teacher certificate print technology and I was writing a paper about inks. I visited all known ink manufacturers, from the famous market leader K&E to Dutch pride Royal van Son. Inks had started a quiet revolution. Manufacturers made…

In 1972 I saw the breakthrough of small format offset on my second drupa. Contrary to table offset and duplicators, presses such as Heidelberg GTO (Grosser Tiegel Offset), the Nebiole Invicta and the MAN Roland Favoriet RF could produce prints at the same quality as middle and large format offset presses. I, who had just…

  My first Drupa I visited my first Drupa in 1967 when I was still an apprentice in master Henk Adolfs´ class. Adolfs inspired me to continue learning and get my teaching certificates, something I am still grateful for. The bus trip from Nijmegen to Düsseldorf was organised by ANGB (Dutch Print Association) and was…

We recently received a 43 page document outlining environmental legislation that applies to printing companies. It was for one single country with around 7,000 printing companies! Reading through this lengthy document it becomes clear that legislators are working hard to protect us all from pollution and related nastiness. The law is working hard to keep…

Some very large industry associations are arguing for carbon markets at the COP21 meeting in Paris. The reasons for a global carbon market are compelling, however they tend to be based on a somewhat fragile premise: accountability, according to universal principles. A global carbon pricing model generally assumes that a conventional cap and trade model…

As if the deforestation and corrupt abuses by Asian Pulp & Paper (APP) weren’t bad enough for Indonesia, the country’s recently reached the top of the global warming rankings. Indonesia has achieved this dubious honour in the wake of massive fires that have been burning through great swathes of the archipelago causing extreme pollution. Because…