The document discusses automation and JDF (job definition format) workflows in the printing industry. It summarizes that: 1) Both small and large printing companies are finding benefits from automation, with JDF allowing automation to benefit smaller printers by standardizing job tickets and specifications across different printing processes. 2) Case studies of smaller printers like Action Printing and Stevens Printing show how JDF automation has helped speed up production times and reduce errors. 3) While automation has benefits, adoption has been slow as bindery equipment is often not automated and integrated automation (CIM) is still low on many printers' priorities. However, automation is becoming more accessible and beneficial for all size printers over time.

1. 18 November 2005 www.electronic-publishing.com www.electronic-publishing.com November 2005 19
A
utomation isn’t just
for the biggest print-
ing companies and
publishers. Speeding
printing jobs from one process to anoth-
er with little or no human intervention
reduces the time the whole electronic
publishing process takes.
Squeezing
more value out of
those intervening min-
utes and hours can actually
mean more to the smaller com-
pany than to the larger one.
For instance, Action Print-
ing, a mid-size printer with 110
employees in its plant in Fond
du Lac, Wisconsin, won a CIP4
award for implementation of a
JDFworkflowfromjobplanning
to the bindery.
Automating the workflow “al-
lows us to save a day or two on
the production process,” says Bob Carew, president.
Similarly,StevensPrintingofPortland,Oregon,asheetfedprint-
er with 20 employees working a single shift per day, installed Hei-
delberg’s Prinect workflow automation system and the Prinance
jobestimatingandjobticketsystematthebeginningof2005.“We
start 25 to 35 separate print jobs every day,” explains Rich Stevens,
president and co-owner with his brother, Dave. “Of those, 25 per-
cent are printed on the same day their job dockets are written
up, or the day after. For us, it was critical that we make the pro-
Automation for
the
Masses
Early on, many printers had the wrong impression
of JDF and assumed that it was an advantage for
only large operations. But shops of all sizes are
finding benefits.
— by Scott Bury
cessofcreatingjobdocketsandmoving
jobs through the shop as efficient and as
streamlined as possible.”
Enhancing quality and
throughput
At one time, fully automated systems were out
of reach for smaller companies. Mechanized plate
changing is an expensive option, and it makes sense
only when the volume of printing going through
a press is high enough that the extra minutes on
the press add up to enough production. Meanwhile,
functions such as inline finishing and automated
bindery require a certain sameness to their volume
to pay off—one job has to be similar enough to the
next to allow the machine to operate in a consistent
way. For smaller printers that do a variety of jobs for
many different customers, this just isn’t realistic.
JDF, or “job definition format,” is one automation
strategythatisbringingthebenefitsofautomationto
smaller printers by allowing all the processes to use
the same information. As a standard for describing
all aspects of a print job, from prepress to finishing,
JDF is a standard for writing job tickets, including
paperstock,quantities,colorinformation,andevery
other specification. JDF workflows carry this infor-
mation along with the files through all prepress and
imaging stages, and even can be used to preset ink
keys on a press and mechanical settings on a stitcher,
folder, or perfect binder.
JDFwasdevelopedforsheetfedoffsetprintingand
digital printing. However, the latest version, 1.3, was
just released in October, and extends the specifica-
tion to web offset printing, newspaper production,
and, in rudimentary form, packaging.
Capturing the requirements and ensuring that
they stay with the print job through the production
process automates a crucial and time-consuming
partofprinting:writingandrewritingspecifications.
All the major workflow automation systems, which
electronically move printing jobs through prepress,
taking care of imposition, trapping, and RIPing at
the right times, are now based on, or are compli-
ant with, JDF.
“One of the main challenges we face as a small-
format printer is that we produce a large number
of small jobs every day,” explains Rich Stevens, of
Stevens Printing. “Previously, we had to write a job
ticket by hand. Not only does it take forever, but also
there’s a large chance for error. When we can auto-
matedensitometryandspectrophotometry,andespe-
cially when we can capture the clients’ requirements
and specifications all at
one time with a job ticket,
and flow that information
through the prepress system
right to the pressroom, we can achieve very consis-
tent,high-endcolorandeliminateerrors.“Themore
times that you have to write down job specifications,
the more chance you have for error. That’s why, ulti-
mately, we want to have our bindery equipment con-
nected to the same system, too.”
Action Printing uses JDF to set the ink keys on its
pressesbasedoninformationcapturedintheportable
jobticket.“Thesameinformationstreamsthroughout
prepress,whereverthejobisoutput,”saysCarew.This
savestimeinpressmakeready,butalsoinproofing,as
the prepress system can use the same job ticket infor-
mation to preset proofing devices.
In general, automation in manufacturing makes
a company more efficient by mechanizing tasks
that previously required the touch of human hands.
This speeds production greatly, but also can im-
prove quality by making the processes and the re-
sults much more consistent.
“Sectors such as packaging and book publishing
are more aware of the value of automation because
thoseserviceprovidershavealwaysconsideredthem-
selves to be manufacturers. In other words, automa-
tion is a no-brainer for them. They know they can’t
live without it,” says Doug Still, marketing manager
NorthAmerica,MANRolandInc.However,hesays,
“commercial printers have been slower to accept au-
tomation because they consider what they do to be
a craft.” While quality comes from the craft aspect,
Still points out that automation enhances the craft
by making quality more consistent and accelerating
the manufacturing aspect.
What gets automated?
JDF has been getting a majority of the attention in
discussions about automation in printing. But that’s
not the only kind of automation that’s important to-
day in publishing. Variable data printing relies heav-
ily on automated processes in selecting and printing
information from a database, while printers have al-
ways valued automatic plate changers, wash-up sys-
tems,inlinecoating,foiling,die-cutting,anddrying.
Web printers and standalone binderies are looking
to automate as much of the finishing and binding
operations—trimming, cutting, sorting, stitching
and gluing, and even distributing or mailing—as
they possibly can.
MAN Roland’s Still says that automated fea-

2. www.electronic-publishing.com November 2005 2120 November 2005 www.electronic-publishing.com
tures, whether they’re electronic controls
or mechanical innovations, are seldom or-
dered as standalone options. “Both elec-
tronic controls and mechanical types of
automation are in demand because they
perform most effectively when working
together,” he says. “Printers are becoming
aware that the ultimate automation hap-
pens when you integrate all the separate
innovations into one streamlined system.
That’s what computer-integrated manufac-
turing is all about.”
But computer-integrated manufactur-
ing, or CIM, isn’t registering a very high
profile for most of the people in this in-
dustry. “While the ‘CIM’ concept is at re-
cord highs as a business challenge in the
industry, actual implementation—or even
theperceptionofitasasalesopportunity—
remains at a very low ebb,” reads a report
from TrendWatch Graphic Arts. Accord-
ing to a TrendWatch survey in the spring
of 2005, only 24 percent of printing man-
agers and professionals rated computer-
integrated manufacturing as a business
challenge. Heidi Tolliver-Nigro, the au-
thor of the report, says that only 4 percent
of respondents said they were interested
in implementing CIM. “It’s not on their
radar screens.”
The research firm found similar results
for interest in implementing JDF: only 6
percent saw it as a challenge.
Electronic publishers and printers have
been pioneers in digital automation: high-
speed digital networks, online and remote
proofing, digital asset management, auto-
matic trapping, imposition, and workflow
and computer press controls, to name a
few. So why are so few taking the step
that other manufacturers are taking: an
integrated approach to controlling every
process through enterprise-spanning in-
formation technology?
“Printers often see JDF and CIM as a
nice option, but they have other fish to
fry—such as integrating digital printing,
for example,” says Tolliver-Nigro.
“Automating processes is hard if you
have to automate every piece of equipment
at one time,” says Bob Carew of Action
Printing. It’s easier to justify the invest-
ment if a printer can phase it in over time.
The trouble with that approach, say the sys-
temsvendorsandtheconsultants,isthatto
realize the full benefits of automation, you
really need to automate the whole process
from beginning to end. Creating “islands”
of automation still leaves gaps between the
islands, where jobs can get bogged down.
One of the major advantages of a stan-
dard such as JDF is that a company can
implement it in stages, automating some
of the workflow without creating new bot-
tlenecks.“ThenicethingaboutthePrinect
system is that you can buy one piece of it
at a time and automate one process at a
time,” says Rich Stevens. While they have
JDF enabled in their prepress department
and on some of their presses, they will on-
ly extend it to the bindery later, once their
people get used to the system and its ben-
efits. “We don’t even have to buy Heidel-
berg products, as along as they’re
JDF compliant.”
“Automation is a better bar-
gain than it was five or ten
years ago because the ROI
it delivers per dollar spent is
higher than ever and it con-
tinues to grow,” says Doug Still.
“Think Moore’s Law, which says
that the power of the integrated cir-
cuit doubles every two years. Printing
automation is putting that always-increas-
ingpowertowork,whichmakesCIMeven
more affordable as time goes on.”
Automated workflows often
end at the bindery
The one place that publishing automa-
tion is hitting a roadblock is the peren-
nial bottleneck: the bindery. Action
Printing bought a new, JDF-compliant
stitcher last year, and uses the standard
jobticketstosetitup.“JDFallowsustopre-
set the stitcher,” says Carew. However, the
companystillusesitsolderstitcher,aswellas
anon-JDF-enabled
perfect bind-
er. They’re
still pro-
ductive,
profit-
able ma-
chines.
“As we re-
place equip-
ment, we try to
go with the latest tech-
nology, which is JDF
enabled.”
Stevens
Printing al-
so hasn’t
yet ex-
tended
JDF to the bind-
ery department,
although Rich Ste-
vens says they plan
to soon. “Again, us-
ing JDF to set the
equipment mini-
mizes the chance of
errors.”
“Right now, there is a
lot of equipment in use that
is not JDF enabled but is still productive,”
says Tolliver-Nigro. “Who will buy a new
perfect-binder or saddle-stitcher just to get
JDFcapability?Yetwithoutit,youcan’tfully
realize the benefits of a JDF workflow.”
“Post-press processes are definitely be-
hind prepress and printing when it comes
toautomation,”agreesJimMauro,product
manager, Prinect Press, Heidelberg USA.
However,binderyandfinishingequipment
already is highly automated—just not, for
the most part, electronically controlled
and linked to the same network as press-
es or imagesetters.
Binderyequipmenttendstobelong-lived
as well, so there will probably be a long lag
before JDF is found in most binderies. Still,
as equipment is gradually replaced, more
and more of the installations will have JDF
or comparable, capabilities and will be
linked to an electronic network.
Who’s automating?
It seems that smaller printers and publish-
ers are frequently the companies that are
pursuing automation, especially the JDF
workflow.
Jim Harvey, executive director of the
International Cooperation for the Integra-
tion of Processes in Prepress, Press and
Postpress Organization, better known as
CIP4, the organization behind the JDF
job definition format, says that anywhere
from 26 to 40 percent of the U.S. print-
ing market is studying or implementing
JDF or other forms of process automa-
tion. Around the world, between 6500 and
7000 printing operations are using JDF in
some way. “It’s the small to mid-size print-
ers that are making use of JDF,”
Harvey says. “That’s how they
gain a competitive edge: by
aggressively finding some-
thing different that can
offer benefits to their cus-
tomers.”
“Iwasataconferenceabout
a year ago where the present-
ers were saying ‘JDF is just for
the biggest printers,’” says Mauro.
“But that’s not the history of JDF. Hun-
dreds of companies are using our Prinect
[workflow automation software].” These
users span the range from the largest to
the smaller companies.
“Automation helps the big firms
accelerate and control the qual-
ity of the high-volume jobs they
need to produce. Medium-size
and smaller printers need auto-
mation to cost-effectively handle
the short-run, quick-turn jobs that
have become their bread and butter,”
says MAN Roland’s Doug Still.
Standards such as JDF have a way of
bringing technological benefits to a wid-
er market because they involve many
competitive vendors working to-
gether toward the same goal. Thus,
JDF has made workflow automa-
tion systems affordable for many
of the smaller printers.
In fact, JDF may be much more
attractive to smaller companies for
just this reason. “The bigger printers,
the Quebecors and the Donnelleys of
the world, have in-house IT departments.
They can develop their own networks
and workflow solutions,” says Mauro of
Heidelberg. “Smaller and mid-size
printers can’t afford to do this, so
the impact of a technology stan-
dard such as JDF is going to be
much greater on them.”
Generational change
With all of these benefits and appar-
ent interest, why do the surveys still
turn up such low interest in the topic? “I
see it as a lot like computer-to-plate tech-
nology,” says Tolliver-Nigro. “At first, the
technology appears complex and expen-
sive.Aftersomeinitialhullabaloo,itseems
to die on the vine. But once the early adopt-
ers try it and vendors learn what the mar-
ket really needs and make improvements,
it starts to take off.
“AsCIMandJDFgetbuiltintomoreand
more machines, and as we
get a new generation of pro-
fessionals for whom JDF has always been
there, it will start to creep into general use
until it’s everywhere,” Tolliver-Nigro says.
“We won’t even be aware of it happening
unless we watch for it.”
Scott Bury is a journalist and educator
based in Ottawa, Ontario. He can be
reached at scott@writtenword.ca.