DIE-CUT BASED LAYOUT

Description

[0001] The invention relates to a method for the optimized arrangement of blanks to be printed for further processing by means of a cutting die.

[0002] The invention lies in the technical field of label printing.

[0003] In label and packaging printing, printed sheets or rolls are usually die-cut after printing. These custom-made dies have a specific layout, which inevitably determines where and how the printed individual sheets must be placed on the sheet. Currently, the state of the art is to manually position the individual sheets according to the die-cut layout in an intermediate step during prepress, and then export the resulting layout as a PDF file for printing. The resulting PDF pages are then placed on the sheet, printed, and die-cut.

[0004] This approach, however, becomes problematic at the latest when using highly variable data (PDF-VT), as is frequently found in digital printing. With such print jobs, it is no longer just the pure placement of the copies on the printing material that matters, but also how precisely the varying content is distributed across the printing material. Such print jobs nowadays already have sizes in the range of 10,000 to 500,000 pieces of varying content, the so-called records. With the previous approach, for example, 10 to 500,000 individual copies would have to be placed manually, distributed across all sheets, and then exported. This represents a disproportionately high amount of work. In addition, it is not so easy to position the individual copies so precisely that they also match the die layout. If a data set is placed individually, this results in a print job with 10,000 individual copies for 556 PDF pages.

[0005] DE102012017636A1 discloses a method for determining the machine-dependent makeready requirements of a punching and / or embossing machine. The document begins by explaining the prior art, citing the production of packaging. Flatbed die cutters that process webs from web-fed printing presses inline are also mentioned. However, the effective arrangement of panels using a computer is not addressed.

[0006] DE2461308A1 discloses an elongated label supply tape provided with label prints wound on a supply roll. The effective arrangement of panels using a computer is also not addressed.

[0007] The object of the present invention is therefore to disclose a method with which an improved and more efficient positioning of individual copies of a print job can be carried out with regard to further processing to be carried out.

[0008] This problem is solved by a method according to claim 1. Most importantly, the computer must be able to accurately determine the layout of the cutting die used, as this is the only way to correctly arrange the blanks that are to be subsequently processed using the die used. This is particularly important because the layout of the cutting die and the blank are not always completely identical. Indeed, the very purpose of the present invention is to avoid having to manufacture a completely new and correspondingly expensive cutting die for each new print job with new blanks.

[0009] Advantageous and therefore preferred developments of the method emerge from the associated subclaims and from the description with the associated drawings.

[0010] A preferred development of the method according to the invention is that the computer analyzes the cutting die used using an outline analysis. Since the outline of the two-dimensional blank is naturally known, the layout or outline of the cutting die can be determined using the outline analysis. The computer is then able to optimally arrange the blanks in the prepress document using this information plus some additional parameters.

[0011] A further preferred development of the method according to the invention is that the print job is a print job for packaging printing. Since this is a print job whose printed blanks are further processed using a cutting die, it is appropriate to use these printed blanks accordingly for packaging printing.

[0012] A further preferred development of the method according to the invention is that the individual labels are labels for packaging printing. The labels are then punched out accordingly during further processing. These are usually self-adhesive labels, and the punching process is carried out in such a way that, after further processing, the labels are in a form that allows them to be peeled off and applied to the actual packaging material.

[0013] According to the invention, the necessary data on the cutting die and the blank are available in digital form for computer analysis. Otherwise, computer analysis would obviously not be possible. For this purpose, the computer preferably has access to the data file used to create the cutting die, from which it can then determine the layout required for optimized sorting using outline analysis. However, other types of input data are also conceivable, such as a photo of the outline edges of an existing cutting die to be used or similar. The corresponding necessary data on the blanks are usually available in the form of the print job data and can therefore be easily analyzed and evaluated by the computer.

[0014] A further preferred development of the method according to the invention is that the sorting rule automatically arranges the individual copies with regard to their content either from left to right, right to left, top to bottom or bottom to top in several rows and columns in the prepress document and a user selects the appropriate sorting rule in each case via the computer. The copies in the prepress document are usually lined up in several rows and columns and then have to be sorted accordingly, depending on the printing substrate used. Since the copies are essentially the same in terms of their outline, but otherwise differ in terms of their content, e.g. numbering, and are therefore not completely identical, they have to be sorted in an appropriate order.This sequence can then be either consecutive according to the numbering from left to right, right to left, top to bottom, or bottom to top. For label / packaging printing, the top-to-bottom sorting order is usually the most suitable. According to the method according to the invention, the computer selects the most suitable sorting order depending on the available data and thus arranges the corresponding blanks in an optimized manner on the corresponding printing substrate.

[0015] A further preferred development of the method according to the invention is that a web-fed printing press is used as the printing press, and the optimally arranged blanks are printed on a roll substrate. In the case of printing labels for packaging printing, this means that the blanks on the corresponding roll logically have only a small number of rows but a large number of columns, and thus are sorted, in particular from top to bottom, continuously across all columns of the first row, before continuing with the topmost columns of the second row, and so on.

[0016] A further preferred development of the method according to the invention is that, after the printing process, the further processing step consists of first punching out the individual blanks using the die and then, in a further step, cutting or "slicing" the printed roll substrate into individual webs column by column in the running direction of the rolls. The goal is to obtain a fixed roll of blanks, in particular labels, in which the individual labels are numbered in sequence, which can then be applied to the actual packaging material in appropriate order.

[0017] A further preferred development of the method according to the invention is that the ends of the individual webs are joined together in such a way that a wide roll with several columns of individually arranged blanks is converted into a narrow roll with exactly one column of arranged blanks.

[0018] This procedure ensures that the desired narrow roll is created with exactly one column of arranged blanks, which allows the desired application of the produced labels to be carried out most efficiently. This inventive method is best applied to a web-fed printing press with a roll substrate, but in principle, the creation of a final roll of self-adhesive labels from several existing printing sheets by means of "slicing" is also conceivable.

[0019] The invention as such, as well as structurally and / or functionally advantageous developments of the invention, are described in more detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings using at least one preferred embodiment. In the drawings, corresponding elements are provided with the same reference numerals.

[0020] The drawings show: Figure 1: The schematic structure of a finishing system with die cutter and printing press Figure 2: An example of a digital die cutter layout in the prepress stage Figure 3: An example of individual copies to be punched Figure 4: An automatic sorting function for the individual copies Figure 5: Sorted and placed individual copies in the prepress stage Figure 6: The slicing process

[0021] Figure 1shows a schematic of the infrastructure required for the method according to the invention in the print shop. A computer 1 carries out the method according to the invention. This is usually the computer 1 which organizes the prepress stage and prepares the image data for printing with the printing press 2. In most cases, this takes place via a workflow system 6 which is operated by the computer 1. Since one of the goals of the method is to reuse as many existing dies 3 as possible for printing individual copies, corresponding digital layout files 4 must be available for these dies. If no die 3 yet exists for the individual copies of the current print job, the user must have a corresponding die 3 produced. In both cases, however, a corresponding CFF2 file 4 exists, based on which the die 3 was created.

[0022] In the following, the method is explained in more detail in a preferred embodiment using an example of a printing and punching process for punching a beer bottle label. The punch 3 is precisely described with regard to its punch layout 8 using a CFF2 file 4. The CFF2 file 4 can be selected as a new selection function 7 in the graphical user interface 15 of the prepress or workflow system 6. As soon as the user selects this function and the corresponding CFF2 file 4, it is displayed in a preview window, as shown in Figure 2 is shown.

[0023] The user next selects a PDF file with variable print data. This PDF file contains the corresponding individual item, in this case a beer label with personalized main text. In this case, a counter from 1 to 10,000. The labels are then precisely distributed by computer 1 directly onto the die-cutting layout 8. Figure 3shows the result of this automated assignment.

[0024] As a next step, the labels must be precisely distributed on the printing substrate 5 for the subsequent die-cutting process. The benefit can therefore be determined via a corresponding selection 10 in the workflow system 6, which determines the distribution of the data records on the die-cutting form. Figure 3 The data records of the labels 9 are still distributed from left to right. However, an automatic distribution of the labels from top to bottom is much better. To do this, the user selects the down arrow in the user interface 15. This selection function 10 is in Figure 4 The labels 11 are thus distributed by the computer across the entire printing substrate from top to bottom. Figure 5 shows the result of this sorting. In this particularly preferred embodiment, a printing material roll 5 is used as the printing substrate 5, since packaging printing is usually carried out using roll-fed printing.

[0025] On the respective section of roll 5, which is in Figure 5 As shown, you can now see the labels with the numbering text 1, 2, 3 in the first column. The second column, however, already starts with the data record 3337. This is related to the following processing step of "slicing", which is Figure 6 is shown in more detail. Figure 6 First, the slicing pattern 12 is shown on the far left. Then, the resulting printed roll is cut column by column into individual strips 13. This means that the cuts are made in the running direction of the rolls 5 from top to bottom, creating three individual strips 13. The ends are then glued together so that the wide roll with three columns becomes a narrow roll 14 with exactly one column. This creates a correct sequence for the labels after gluing; in this example, Figure 6 i.e. from label 1 to label 10000.

[0026] The process always proceeds in such a way that after printing on roll 5, it is first punched and then sliced. This then creates a roll 14 with label stickers, starting with the first label and ending with the last label.

[0027] This process thus enables an optimized and efficient distribution of the individual blanks to be produced. The preferred distribution is top to bottom, bottom to top, left to right, and right to left. However, the process is not limited to these distribution variants. In principle, other variants are also possible, which are also common in the printing industry and which result from the geometric conditions that define a grid of columns and rows with individual blanks for the respective die-cutting die. List of reference symbols

[0028] 1Workflow computer 2Printing press 3Die cutter 4CFF file 5Roll (printing substrate) 6Workflow system 7CFF file selection function 8Die cutter layout 9Labels distributed from left to right 10Selection function for automatic sorting function 11Labels sorted from top to bottom 12Slicing pattern 13Cut individual webs 14Reassembled roll with labels 15Graphical user interface of the workflow system

Claims

1. Method for performing a print job, wherein individual blanks (9, 11) are arranged in an optimized manner in a prepress document for efficient further processing of the printed blanks (9, 11) via a cutting die (3) in accordance with a cutting die layout (8), and further processing is carried out after the blanks (9, 11) have been printed, characterized in that a plurality of cutting dies (3) are present, for which corresponding digital layout files (4) are available, and in that a computer (1) uses a cutting die (3) from the plurality of cutting dies (3), and in the process analyzes the cutting die (3) used for further processing using the corresponding layout file, arranges the blanks (9, 11) in the prepress document in an optimized manner in accordance with a sorting rule (10) on the basis of the cutting die layout (8) thus determined, and then carries out a printing process and further processing with the prepress document thus optimized, and in that necessary data of the cutting die (3) and the blank (9, 11) is available in digital form for the analysis via the computer (1).

2. Method according to claim 1, characterized in that the computer (1) analyzes the cutting die (3) used via an outline analysis.

3. Method according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the print job is a print job for packaging printing.

4. Method according to claim 3, characterized in that the individual blanks (9, 11) are labels for packaging printing.

5. Method according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the sorting rule (10) automatically arranges the individual blanks (9, 11) in terms of their content either from left to right, right to left, top to bottom or bottom to top in a plurality of rows and columns in the prepress document and a user selects the appropriate sorting rule (10) in each case via the computer (1).

6. Method according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the printing press (2) used is a web press and the optimized blanks (9, 11) are printed on a web substrate (5).

7. Method according to claim 6, characterized in that after the printing process, the further processing operation consists of first punching out the individual blanks (9, 11) via the cutting die (3) and then, in a further step, cutting the printed web substrate (5) into individual webs (13) column by column in the running direction of the rolls (5).

8. Method according to claim 7, characterized in that the ends of the individual webs (13) are joined to one another in such a way that a narrow roll (14) with exactly one column of arranged blanks is formed from a wide roll with several columns of individually arranged blanks.