Printing Trades Workers
Design, bind, finish and produce printed materials.
A rush job and a colour that will not behave
You are a printing machinist in a busy print shop, with a job of posters for a music festival that has to go out by noon. It is 9:30am. The press is running smoothly, and the first sheets look good. Then you notice the festival's bright orange logo looks slightly duller than the proof the customer approved.
Choose what you would do. Then see what happens. There are often good reasons for each choice.
The festival people are coming at noon. Does it look all right to you? The orange seems a bit flat, but I do not think anyone will notice. If we stop now, we will miss the pick-up. What do you think?
Run the job as it is, since the difference is small and the deadline is firm
Some of the posters look right, and some are noticeably duller. The festival organiser spots it as soon as she sees the pile, and you are asked to explain why you did not stop.
Check the sheet against the proof in good light, adjust the press, and tell Dale
The difference is real. A small adjustment fixes it in twenty minutes, and Dale rings the customer to say that the pick-up is delayed and why. The posters match the proof.
Stop the job and tell Dale the whole run must be redone from the start, wasting paper
You waste paper and an hour on a run that could have been rescued with a small change. The posters finish after the customer has gone, and a good plan became a bad week.
I am so sorry, I know it is late, but I have just spotted a spelling mistake in the support act's name on the poster. I should have caught it on the proof. Can you quickly fix it while it is running?
Stop the press, fix the file and start the print again, with a new proof for her
It is the right answer for the poster, but she is angry about the extra cost, and you have used up the afternoon. Nobody had a plan for the time it would take.
Print the rest as it is, and hope that nobody sees the spelling
The band's name is misspelled on every poster across town. The band notices first and the festival is embarrassed for the whole month.
Tell her what a reprint costs in time and money, and let her decide
Camille chooses to pay for a reprint of the first half and to stick a small printed correction over the rest. The posters go out on time and the band's name is right.
There is a smell from the guillotine, and the blade seems to be catching on a stack. I do not want to bother you, but is it all right to push the paper through a bit harder to finish the cut?
Tell him to push on, since the stack is nearly done and the deadline is near
The blade catches, the stack jams and a sheet cuts crookedly. You are lucky nobody's hand was near the blade, and the machine needs service before the day is out.
Tell him to stop at once, step back and let someone senior look
The blade needs sharpening, and the machine is taken out of use until it is done. Wren is thanked in front of the team for stopping and asking.
Take the stack to a different machine, and say nothing about the guillotine
You get the cut done, but the next person to use the guillotine finds the same problem. A fault you did not report becomes a fault someone else has to find.
How it went
By noon the posters are boxed, the colour is right and the guillotine has a tag on it. Print work is craft, speed and precision, with a lot of small decisions made quickly. Would you like to see your work on posters around town?
This is a simplified, fictional situation to help you explore. It is not professional instruction or a test of your ability.
Case study: The programs with the wrong date
A fictional case set in a commercial print shop with presses, cutting and folding machines, and a small binding area at the back.
The situation
A charity ordered two thousand programs for its annual fundraising dinner, which was on a Saturday. Hamid, the pre-press operator, set up the files and the proof was approved by the charity's coordinator, Ms Voss. Just before the press was due to start, Hamid noticed that the date on the cover was a week earlier than the dinner date shown on the charity's own website. Ms Voss had signed off the proof, and the job was due that afternoon.
What they did
Hamid stopped the press and rang Ms Voss, who checked and found that the date was wrong in the file she had sent. She was upset, but also very relieved that the mistake was caught before printing. Hamid fixed the file, made a new proof and re-approved it with her. The press started an hour late. He did not charge for his own time, as the proof had been signed, but he did ask that she check the details more carefully next time.
How it turned out
The programs were printed on time. The charity did not miss its Saturday. Hamid and Ms Voss now use a short checklist for dates, names and phone numbers before any proof is approved.
What would you do?
- Why do you think nobody noticed the date mistake at the proof stage?
- How would you feel about stopping the press when a customer had already approved the file?
- What would a checklist for a proof include?