Prepress Department

Our prepress department is one of the most talented in the marketplace today with almost 2 centuries of combined printing experience. We use the latest applications and technology to help you create outstanding publications. Our digital workflow affords us the maximum amount of customization to meet all your specific needs.

Our continuing investment and alliance with software creators in advanced prepress technology allows us to remain on the cutting edge in productivity, quality and efficiency. We currently use CTP (Computer To Plate) technology to leverage the benefits and cost savings of a truly digital workflow for you, our customer.

     

Scanning
An essential part of our electronic prepress department is a full service scanning operation where we can take your originals, whether they are transparencies, prints, negatives or drawings and create beautiful reproductions. District Creative Printing also offers color correction and image modification services available upon request.

 
Proofing
District Creative Printing offers a wide variety of proofing formats to suit every jobs specific need.

We offer a traditional, light-sensitive "blueline" proof that shows simple color-breaks on envelopes and small pieces.

For more complex jobs, we create digital proofs on one of our high-speed, wide-format plotters. We use the same front end for these proofs that drives both our CTP device and our imagesetter. By doing this, we insure that what you see on your proof is what you will see on your printed piece.

Our FujiFilm FinalProof creates high-quality 4-color proofs of your job. We have gone to painstaking lengths to calibrate our FinalProofer to our printing presses to ensure that what you see on the FinalProof will be what you see on the final printed piece.

For more information about our proofs and our proofing process, please feel free to contact your sales representative.

CTP
The cornerstone of our digital prepress technology has been our investment in CTP (Computer To Plate) technology. Our Xcalibur VLF Computer-To-Plate Platesetter is linked to one of the most advanced and efficient workflows available today. Our supporting technologies help us to reduce waste in both labor and materials, reduce the risk of errors and streamline the operation, allowing us to pass on the savings in both time and cost to our clients.

Ripping (Raster Image Processing) your file is the process of taking your page layout document from Quark, Pagemaker or InDesign, etc. and converting it to a language that our high resolution imaging equipment can understand. Ripping is a very complex process where file creation mistakes usually show up. However, once your file is ripped, it is locked and essentially not editable without returning to the layout application. District Creative Printing's philosophy is to rip the files once and output them to many devices. In that spirit, we have configured all of our prepress equipment, from the most basic proofing device, to our computer-to-plate imagers so they all use the same ripped file. This process greatly reduces the time spent handling your job and the chance for errors to occur by constantly re-ripping the file.

With our system, we rip your files as individual pages. A 16-page book will have 16 individual ripped files. We do this to ensure the integrity of the data throughout the production and correction cycles. If you make a change on page 10, we only re-rip page 10. The other 15 remain intact, thus minimizing the chance of an error. Since we do not have to rip our data for each output device (ripping can be a time consuming process), we are always ready to start imaging at a moment's notice. This helps us make plates when the pressroom needs them and make proofs on time to meet your schedules.
 
Computing Equipment
    HP Windows 2000 Server
  • 4 - 72GB Drive RAID 5 Storage
  • Dual 2.4GHz Xeon Processors
  • 1GB ECC PC2100 DDR Memory
  • Gigabyte Ethernet
    Intergraph Windows NT Server
  • 126 GB RAID 5 Storage
  • Dual 550 MHz Microprocessors
  • 256MB RAM
  • Gigabyte Ethernet
    Sun Ultra Enterprise
  • 42GB Raid Storage
  • Dual 200 MHz Microprocessors
  • 128MB RAM
  • Gigabyte Ethernet
  • Helios OPI Software

(9) Power Macs Compatibles
Each of our Power Mac Workstations has the latest software to allow any of our operators to work on your project. We have also equipped each of our workstations with a 21" color calibrated monitor. DCP has created a high speed Ethernet network to allow each of our workstations to transfer files quickly, saving valuable time.

(5) IBM Compatibles
We have stocked each of our PC workstations with the latest software that is available. All of our PC Workstations has been integrated into our high speed Ethernet network to allow access to all the computers on our network, including Macintosh. This allows us to process jobs that are gathered from multiple sources and contain files from both PC and Macintosh platforms.

Scanning Equipment

    Lintotype-Hell Chromograph S2000 Scanner
    Color and B&W Scanning
    HP ScanJet 8250 Document Scanner - flatbed scanner
    Color and B&W Scanning
  • Reflective and Transmissive
  • Enlargements up to 2000%
  • Originals up to 10" x 14"
Analog Proofing
    Dupont Dylux "Blueprint" Proofing Paper 
Digital Proofing and Imaging

    (1) Apple® Laserwriter 16/600 Laser Printer

    (1) Agfa® AGFAJET Sherpa Color Proofer

  • 36" Proofing Paper Roll
  • 1 Sided Proof (serves as digital "blueline")

    (1) Hewlett Packard® Design Jet 2000CP

  • 28" x 40" Matte Proofing paper, Coated 2 sides
  • 2 Sided Color Proof (serves as digital "blueline")

    (1) FujiFilm® FinalProof 5600

  • 21" x 32" 2400 dpi proofs
  • 4 color process proofs (provides accurate color proofs, uses actual printing dot)

    (1) Linotype-Hell® L-330 Imagesetter with RIP50

  • HQS Screening Technology
  • 1270-3386 dpi Output

    (6) Rampage® RIP and Satellite Shooter/Screening Tower

  • Each with Dual 3 GHz processors and 1 GB RAM
  • Interactive, User-Variable In-Rip Trapping
  • Agfa® Balanced Screening and Adobe® Accurate Screening

    (3) Apogee Print Drives

  • With Microsoft® Windows NT 4.0 Server and 2003 Server

    (1) Agfa® Avantra 4400 Imagesetter with In-Line Processor

  • 44" x 36" Output to 4 Mil or 7 Mil Film
  • Stoesser-compatible head and tail punch
  • 1200-3600 dpi Output Resolution

    (1) Agfa® Xcalibur VLF CTP (Computer To Plate) Plate-Setter

  • With In-Line Processor
  • 44.240" x 50.377" Maximum Output to Aluminum Plate
  • 1200-3600 dpi Output Resolution

Traditional Prepress
    (2) 46.5" x 65.75" Light Tables
  • Stoesser Register System

    (1) Agfa® RPS 2024S Horizontal Camera

    (1) Douthit® 60" Vacuum Frame

    (1) Stoesser® 60" Vacuum Frame

    (1) Encore® Plate Processor