News Briefs
Post Installs Presses
On April 4, 1997, The Washington Post celebrated a reel-stand-settingceremony for the first Mitsubishi Heavy Industries press to be installed at thePost's Springfield, Va., production facility. |
The Springfield project involves removing four existing offset presses andinstalling four new Mitsubishi 45-couple tower presses.
Prior to the ceremony, Bob Ray & Associates Inc. of Algonquin, Ill., putin more than 3,000 staff hours of preparation work, setting up more than 100tons of structural steel and 16 electric chain falls. This maze of equipmentwill be used to install the Mitsubishi presses.
Installation of a second Mitsubishi press began May 1. The third press willbe installed July 1. In September, press installations will begin at the Post'snew College Park, Md., facility.
Both plants are scheduled to be operational in late 1998.
Acquired Knowledge and Transoft AnnouncePartnership
Acquired Knowledge Inc. of San Diego and Transoft Technology Corp. announcedon April 16 an agreement to bundle Acquired Knowledge's Download Mechanic Prowith Transoft's PSExpress.
PSExpress allows users to quickly create PostScript files from applicationfiles, while Download Mechanic Pro ensures that these PostScript files areoutput correctly. Buying the two programs together will allow users to savealmost $200 over the cost of purchasing them separately.
For further information, contact Acquired Knowledge at (800) 482-1252, orvisit the company's World Wide Web site at http://www. acquiredknowledge.com.
A Web Site for QuarkXtensions
San Francisco-based Media-Network announced xtension.com (http://www.xtension.com), which the company bills as a comprehensive sales and informationWeb site for QuarkXtensions. The site includes Xtension descriptions; reviewsand news from Usenet newsgroups and listservs; QuarkXpress tips and tricks;desktop publishing news; trade show listings, and threaded discussion groups.Users can find and try demo versions, buy electronically at a discount withimmediate delivery, or buy and receive the packaged product.
Progress on Color Profiles
Trumatch, RIT Research and Apple Computer have jointly developed colorprofiles, or generic "fingerprints," of four-color presses underindustry-accepted standard conditions for Apple's ColorSync 2.1 color-managementsystem.
The profiles enable designers to control color more accurately by puttingtheir own electronic color printer in synch with the color gamut of theirfour-color press. Likewise, they enable color monitors to more accuratelyrepresent on-press results.
The profiles were created for standard SWOP four-color process-ink pigmentsusing Profile/80, a new profile-making utility from RIT Research. The profilesconform to the formats defined by the International Color Consortium. Apple isproviding the profiles free of charge.
L-H Debuts Drum Scanner
Linotype-Hell Co. of Hauppauge, N.Y., has introduced TANGO, which itpromotes as a small, easy-to-use drum scanner for office environments. |
TANGO is a 17.7-by-18.8-inch vertical-drum scanner that offers LinoColortechnology, Dmax of 4.2, resolution of 11,000 dots per inch, and scaling to3,000 percent. List price is $65,000.
Managing Editor Releases CLS 2.0
Managing Editor Inc. of Jenkintown, Pa., released its new Classified LayoutSystem 2.0., which combines rules-based pagination with standard Apple Macintoshhardware.
A rules-based pagination engine gives the user the power to define how itemsare placed. CLS 2.0 comes bundled with some of the most common user requests forplacement rules, and users can create an unlimited number of their own rulesusing standard AppleScript commands.
Al Edwards Named President of ATS
Wilmington, Mass.-based Advanced Technical Solutions Inc. announced theappointment of Al Edwards as president of the company. Ray Toothaker, presidentand cofounder of ATS, will take the role of chief executive officer.
Most recently, Edwards was president of Autologic Information Internationalafter its merger with Triple-I, where he had also served as president. Hiscareer includes positions with Atex and System Integrators Inc., as well as workas an industry consultant.
KBA Press Wins Design Award
KBA's new Compacta 215 commercial web offset press was "highlycommended" at the 1996 Rhineland-Palatinate awards ceremony for productdesign. |
According to the jury, "The external appearance of the printing unitsis accentuated by the recurrent use of convex surfaces in conjunction withconcave inlets featuring contrasting areas in KBA's corporate design. Theseaccents distinguish the individual units while simultaneously creating acohesive overall impression."
KBA-Motter Corp. has its U.S. headquarters is in York, Pa.
Edgil Announces Internet Classified-Ad HostingProgram
At NAA's Annual Convention in Chicago, Edgil Associates Inc. of NorthChelmsford, Mass., announced its centralized Internet classified-ad hostingprogram. The program was created to satisfy the newspaper industry's need for aninteractive classified-advertising service that provides an immediate revenuestream without any capital or resource outlay.
Newspapers use Edgil's WebCentral software, which is hosted at Edgil, andpay only for those ads that are transferred to the Web. No initial capitalpurchase is needed, yet newspapers benefit from using Edgil's systems andrevenue-generating applications. WebCentral systems also can be installed at thenewspaper.
Helios Unveils ColorSync 2 Xtension
Helios Software GmbH of Hannover, Germany, publisher of professionalprint-spooling and Open Prepress Interface solutions, is shipping version 2.0 ofits Helios ColorSync 2 Xtension for Power Macintosh computers.
Introduced in 1995, the Helios ColorSync 2 Xtension for QuarkXpress is atool for color-matched-print output on the Macintosh OS platform. Using theHelios ColorSync 2 Xtension, users of QuarkXpress can exploit thecolor-management capabilities of Apple ColorSync 2 to achieve predictable colormatching throughout the pre-press process-including screen representations,proof prints and final output.
Greensburg Plant Completed
McClier Newspaper Group of Chicago has finished constructing the Greensburg(Pa.) Tribune-Review's new Pittsburgh-area production plant.
An accelerated design/build schedule delivered the project more than fourmonths sooner than traditional design and construction methods. The fast-trackapproach allowed construction to begin on the project before the design andbidding phases were entirely complete. For instance, construction of thefoundation moved forward, while the design and bidding of the mechanical andelectrical systems were still in progress.
The 145,000 square-foot, $43-million facility, called NewsWorks, will employ100 people and allow the Tribune-Review to better serve its circulation base inAllegheny County.
The new plant features an eight-unit Goss Newsliner color press. Wide-bandcommunications networks permit newspaper pages to be transported electronicallybetween production sites.
New-Media Pricing Guide
Indianapolis-based Hayden Books announced its Web & New Media PricingGuide, which it touts as the complete business and pricing guide for multimediaand Web professionals. The book covers how to write a business proposal, how toprepare budgets, annual salaries and hourly rates, how to manage a profitablenew media and Web business, and legal contracts. The authors are J.P. Frenza andMichelle Szabo.
Sing Tao Installs Microcolor
Sing Tao Ltd. has installed Graphic Microsystems Inc.'s Microcolor systemson all three towers of its new Goss Community SSC four-high presses. Theinstallation includes one operator console to control 16 inkers and another tocontrol eight inkers. From each of the Microcolor consoles, operators can makeprecise press-run adjustments, by color and by ink key, in increments of lessthan 1 percent.
Sing Tao publishes the Hong Kong Standard, that city's second-largestEnglish-language newspaper. It also publishes newspapers in San Francisco, NewYork, London and several other cities.
Stauffer Launches Online Classified Service
Seven daily newspapers now offer their classified advertising online throughQuadrant, a new World Wide Web service provided by Stauffer Media Systems,Joplin, Mo.
"Quadrant is especially attractive to small- and medium-sizepublications because it is affordable," says Keith Wood, sales manager.With an initial investment of $2,000 and a monthly rate that averages less than20 cents per ad, newspapers can publish their classifieds on the Web through SMSservers in Topeka, Kan. SMS also plans to sell classified publishing systems forinhouse use.
Initial installations of Quadrant all use Baseview Products Inc. classifiedsoftware for their print products, but other vendor front-ends also will besupported.
Photoshop Plug-in Available on Internet
Magic Software Co. of Buffalo, N.Y., introduced the Magic Separator LE, onsale for download from their Web site (http://www.magicsoftware.com) for $49.95.The company claims the software will allow amateurs to do world-class colorseparations with the click of a mouse.
CE Spell-Check Feature
Loomis, Calif.-based CE Engineering Publishing Systems Inc. announced therelease of an interactive spell-check feature for its Decade 33terminal-emulation software. The spell-check feature can check stories beforethey are filed on the system and check system messages before they are sentinternally. Custom dictionaries can be incorporated into Decade, and users canadd words to their personal dictionary.
Real Media Upgrades Ad-Management Software
New York-based Real Media Inc. announced advancements in its Open AdStreamInternet advertising-management system with the release of version 4.0. Theseinclude features that help advertisers reach Web audiences with greatercertainty, efficiency and economy.
Open AdStream's new features include inventory and campaign forecasting,campaign reach and frequency regulation, and guaranteed ad delivery.
Ex-Scitex Employees Unite
A large group of ex-Scitex employees have established a Scitex GraduateAlumni Group called "ExScite." The ExScite Web site(http://www.rozin.com/exscite) is engineered to provide all "Scitexgraduates" with a good personal networking tool in cyberspace, free of timeand geographic limitations.