One of the core functions of Web to Print is to reduce manual intervention at the pre-order and pre-production stages. We all know that every printing company wants to keep their machines busy, which is only possible when they have error-free print-ready files, ready to punch for printing.
‘Pre-flight’ is the printing industry jargon for the process of confirming that all the digital files required for the printing are present, valid, correctly formatted, and of the desired type. Can we automate pre-flight process using the WebtoPrint technology? Technically, Yes!
Web2Print also allows previously printed artwork, stored in editable format on the web, to be accessed by users/ clients to select, edit and send for re-printing. This is a very important feature for the B2C or retail printing segment.
Web2 Print also facilitates storage of all print products of your existing corporate customers as a digital repository. The system even remembers these as previously printed jobs that were checked and approved for their print readiness.
In both the cases of B2C and B2B suggested above, it is important that the Web to Print tool you are using allows you to update the error-free files that the client can edit without losing the pre-flight parameters. Also, the solution should re-perform the pre-flight check on the file edited by the client.
Pre-flight is a technical term from the printing industry, however, an end-user would always want to easily modify the print products (if the facility is offered). What a printing company should work on, is uploading all layer pre-checked and disable areas that the users should not be allowed to modify. For e.g., elements such as a Logo (in case of corporate customers), position of fields such as Name, Address etc., Designation, Background, Colors, etc. This way the auto pre-flight will be limited and restricted to changing the text. The fonts too are automatically determined by the system.
In case of a retail customer, you offer them more liberty to upload their own image, which must be in particular pixels, size and most importantly, the format. These are the basic pre-flight checks that one should perform. The templates that you allow them to modify can be customized with minimum access given to the end customer. E.g. the can change the Logo, Image and Text without disturbing the size, cutting marks, etc.
The objective of this post is to focus on the w2p / Web to Print environment as it based on templates which are created by your own team or Web 2 Print solution providers and there will be minimum scope for errors, which are kept open and are checked automatically when a user modifies the design.
This is possible when your Web to Print solution provider gives you the flexibility to upload your templates and define pre-flight rules, rest is taken care by the system.
Did we say we can work on pre-flight situation for your online printing web shop? Learn more.