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March 14th 2006
When Artwork Systems launched Odystar early in 2004 it brought to the market a completely new approach to automating the digital pre-press environment. Unlike existing pre-press workflows, Odystar offered not only the optimisation of the CTP device but also streamlined the daily and often manual pre-press work required to make the job ready for output, including all the necessary communication and job routing involved in the process.
The subsequent acceptance and success of Odystar in the commercial and publishing markets has been driven by several factors. Taking full advantage of the latest industry standards, including PDF 1.5 - PDF 1.6, JDF and Certified PDF, Odystar was the first workflow to completely embrace these cutting-edge technologies, from the moment the job arrived until the final plate was generated.
“With its ease of use and an intuitive graphical user interface far beyond what the industry until then could hope for, Odystar proved that sophisticated workflows do not need to be cumbersome and difficult to operate,” says Jan Ruysschaert, associate director of sales. “Installation and training of Odystar could be reduced to a minimum, resulting in significant savings. From preflight, automated correction, certification, advanced trapping and integrated imposition through to sophisticated proofing and screening technologies, Odystar offered all the necessary tools coupled with a level of automation and flexibility previously unseen in the industry.”
The latest release, Odystar 2.5, brings an elaborate suite of new functionality to further automate the tasks encountered daily in demanding pre-press environments. An impressive suite of new modules as well as major extensions and improvements to already existing modules have been implemented in this new release.
New Versioning Technology
The cost of paper and ink wastage and press down time can be staggering when a plate change required for a different language or version does not exactly match the other plates already on press. Odystar 2.5 can now eliminate these errors with its extensive versioning technology. Being able to automate versioning in a production environment not only drastically increases throughput but equally reduces manual intervention and potential mistakes. Typical examples include language changes eg a new plate for another language and localised versions of documents eg different catalogue prices for varying regions.
“Odystar’s elaborate versioning capabilities offer a completely new approach, accommodating the automation of even the most complex versioning where multiple plates on a job need to be swapped out. Regardless of how the versions of a document are supplied to the pre-press department eg as layers in a file, separations in a file, or even completely separate documents, Odystar has the capability to perform the versioning requirements instantly,” says Mr Ruysschaert.
“Furthermore, all Odystar versioning technology can be executed on multi-page, one-up documents, which offers a maximum of flexibility for further processing (trapping, proofing, imposition, ripping etc) of the files. If errors are detected, for instance due to the accidental shifting of an image or a translated paragraph that no longer fits, correcting the one-up merged document is straightforward using Artwork Systems’ new native PDF editing application Neo.”
New Comprehensive Color Management
Odystar offers streamlined ICC based colour management throughout the entire system. With version 2.5, comprehensive colour management controls are available in each of Odystar’s gateways. The new Manage Colour gateway has been created with a broad range of parameters for which objects need to be colour managed. These include the selection of ICC profiles, the use of PDF/X output and the options for rendering intent for lineart as well as images, black preservation and single separation coloured objects preservation.
Enhanced Automated Imposition
For imposition purposes, Odystar 2.5 features an unprecedented level of automation capabilities. In the greatly enhanced DynaStrip gateway, the user simply defines the sheet template to be used, the binding, work and turn, tumble etc whilst submitting the job to the workflow. When all the pages are available, the imposition template then simply builds the imposition job from the parameters defined, and uses as many sheets as necessary to impose the complete job, without the need for operator intervention. This enables far greater efficiency, less workflow building and better control.
New MIS control of Odystar workflows
In today’s demanding pre-press environment, the key to productivity is communication and integration. The job ticket format in Odystar is based on JDF and using this format it is possible to offer elaborate control over the Odystar workflow from a database or MIS system. The ‘External Parameter Control’ option in Odystar allows external systems to submit jobs, including job tickets to an Odystar workflow.
Based on the JDF parameters from the Odystar workflow, the MIS system can, per job, assign all the relevant parameters and send the job to Odystar for processing. Odystar will accept this data and execute the job based on the variable parameters defined by the MIS system.
Typical examples for parameters that would be job specific include email addresses, PitStop preflight profiles, imposition variables, type of proofer output etc. In addition, Odystar will incorporate all the relevant timings, parameters used, status and log information in the Audit Trail section of the JDF job ticket file, so it can be parsed and retrieved in the MIS system for further use, such as for costing or statistical purposes.
Additional enhancements
The above presents some of the major improvements to the Odystar workflow system in version 2.5. Other new functions include additional trap controls, special ink handling, additional screening technologies (including Concentric Screening), automatic spread processing and new output options that include support for directly driving a wide range of proofing devices.