Trident production director Steve Young is in no doubt that PDFs have transformed the creative industry. The technology offers the ability to lock design in place electronically and, when combined with high-speed connections, to achieve remarkable turnaround of printed output.
It surprises Steve that as many as 30 per cent of publishers and agencies cling to ‘old’ ways of working and continue to send native Quark files, transparencies and prints to press.
“A lot of it is fear,” Steve says. “They don’t know the technology and don’t trust it.”
In a Print Media magazine interview, he suggests many would-be users of PDF technology simply don’t know what the technology can do – and perhaps don’t have the time to learn. Steve believes the benefits far outweigh the cost of learning.
Trident was an early convert to PDF technology. One area where it has had a major impact is in producing daily newspapers at trade shows around the world. At the Singapore air show in February 2006, a 72-page full colour tabloid newspaper was turned around in 12 ½ hours. The last pages were sent as PDF files to the printer at 5.30pm and the first copies were on show-goers’ breakfast tables at 6am the following morning.
“We used to print sections in advance,” says Steve, whose experience spans more than 25 years in the creative industry. “Now it’s all live. That opens the possibility for taking late adverts as well as late stories, adding to our clients’ revenue in a true daily environment.”
Because PDF technology hands control back to the creative team, success using it depends on the sum of a company’s knowledge and who has it. “I wouldn’t want designers creating PDFs, for example,” says Steve. “A prepress guy can check a PDF much quicker.
“As with so many things, anyone with the tools can do it after a fashion, but professionals will get it right – every time.”