File Preparation When your designs are complete, the files will be sent to the pre-press department. At a very basic level, our file technicians will prep your files to make them ready to print. This can entail many things depending on the size and complexity of your job: Creating high resolution scans from film or other printed material, confirming all fonts are embedded in the files correctly, trapping colors, and adjusting color balances (just to name a few). Proofs As soon as the files are ready, a proof is made for both the printer and client to review. A proof is a color-correct representation of what the final piece will look like when it's printed. The proofing stage is the last point in time a change can be made without incurring significant costs. Plates When everyone is happy with the proofs, they put their signatures on them signifying that the job is ready to print. The last stage in the pre-press process is to transfer the design from the files onto metal plates that will actually be hung on the press to make the printed 'impressions' on the paper. Stochastic Screening The computer monitor you are looking at can display images using a continuous range of colors or grey tones. Printers however, can only produce a much smaller range of color intensities on the page. The process of converting continuous tone images into the much smaller range required by the printer is known as halftoning, or screening. Halftoning places dots on the page in a controlled manner. When the dots are small enough, your eyes observe the collections of dots, not as dots, but as a continuous tone. There are two principal halftoning techniques, AM (Amplitude Modulation) and FM (Frequency Modulated) screening. AM Screening breaks an image down into dots of varying sizes, which are clustered together. When looked at closely these dots tend to be noticeable to the human eye. FM Screening, also known in the industry as Stochastic Screening, keeps the dots the same size and varies their frequency, or number and placement, to simulate a continuous tone image. The result is an image which is more closely perceived as a continuous tone image. Villanti uses 100% Stochastic Screening to make your project shine. For near photographic quality results trust our highly skilled pre-press operators with your files. Get in touch with us to learn more about these printing techniques, and how we can put them to work to deliver a perfectly printed piece to you.