Software manufacturer OneVision has expanded its product range with the release of Generate Print Form, new software that enables print service providers to generate printing forms based on individual requirements of printing, embellishment and finishing machines, as well as different properties of the artworks to be printed.

Setting up a print form manually is noted as a time-consuming process, where often the print substrate is also not fully utilised in the process. The new software significantly shortens make-ready times and ensures efficient use of substrates, it is claimed.

Print jobs received via a web shop or sales department are transmitted to Generate Print Form with all job information from the MIS or ERP system. Alternatively, job information including customer data can be entered directly into the software and the print files can be uploaded manually. Generate Print Form can therefore be used by printers who, until now, have worked without an MIS. Generate Print Form thus functions as a ‘mini-MIS’, and can be used to manually create jobs, including job and customer information, job tracking, and upload function for print files.

All production machines and materials, including their specifications, are created as master data in the software itself. Users can specify which combinations of press and post-press machines are suitable for which substrate or job. Once these settings have been made, the software intelligently and accurately creates print forms tailored to the quantity and type of print files, and the requirements of the production machines. Free-shape artworks are nested or ganged, rectangular elements are arranged in a space-saving manner or placed via step-and-repeat, and round objects are positioned via honeycomb nesting. In addition, standard pre-press tasks, such as preflighting, colour management, flattening transparencies and file normalisation, are done automatically. If preferred, the user can intervene and adjust the placement by hand. The software allows full automation in the set-up of the print form and pre-press control and correction, as well as – if requested – manual intervention.

As soon as a print form is ready, Generate Print Form adds print marks that are needed by finishing machines for cutting or embellishment. Once the user is satisfied with the layout of the print form, production can be started with a simple click and the data is transferred – production-ready – to the press. Finishing and cutting information is automatically sent to the post-press machines.

With the launch of the new software, OneVision stated, ‘[It] provides an ideal, intelligent calculation of forms for print jobs, taking into account various parameters such as number of pieces, delivery date, and material consumption. The intelligent combination of different print jobs achieves significant time and substrate savings and thus a more economical operation for print service providers.’

Generate Print Form is part of OneVision Software’s latest update to its product offering, which has included the introduction of the latest version of its Asura pre-press package, v21.1, which has been equipped with new features to automate print file preparation and support PDF workflows.

Read more about workflow and software in the July/August 2021 issue of Digital Labels & Packaging; register here to receive the magazine