At the IFRA World Publishing Expo 2018 (9-11 October, Berlin), Fujifilm will introduce two new solutions to its newspaper portfolio, both reinforcing the company’s commitment to making newspaper production more profitable as part of its Superia initiative. The company will be present in Hall 21a Stand E.01.
Superia has seen considerable success in the commercial print market since its introduction, with its simple aim of reducing the resources used in offset printing in the form of materials, labor, water, energy and waste. Fujifilm has now applied these ideals to newspaper production, with a particular focus on improving automation and reducing material usage and waste.
The company will be showcasing two new modules as part of its Elara 5 Workflow, Elara Production Planner and Elara PDF, and will also unveil a new addition to its Luxel VMAX range, the Luxel VMAX 600, shown at Ifra in concept form and, which the company claims to be the fastest CtP device on the market.
Elara Production Planner
Elara Production Planner is a unique new workflow tool that allows Elara users to plan newspaper editions based upon press configurations that can be created from inside the Elara 5 system. Software-to-press interfaces are often extremely expensive (sometimes the interface costs even more than the entire workflow software) but such expensive systems are no longer needed. Elara Production Planner takes care of press configuration and template setup directly, from which the workflow gets all the information it needs. It also automates the process of page pairing, press cylinder correction and plate-stacking and sorting.
Elara PDF
Elara PDF is a new tool (available for all major platforms: Windows, Apple Mac and Linux) that can check, repair and normalize PDF files before production. Many newspaper printers get PDF files from external parties and these can have a range of specific issues that need to be addressed, such as RGB format images, thin lines, incorrect versions, missing fonts, low resolution images or overprinted text. Elara PDF finds and fixes these issues where possible and notifies the user via the user interface or by email. This versatile system also offers pre-flighting, picture enhancement, ink-saving, PDF flattening, anti-aliasing and more. A version that includes the high speed and comprehensive Elara Rip is also available.
Luxel VMAX 600 CTP
Having introduced an innovative trolley-based pallet loading option for its Luxel VMAX 400 CtP at last year’s IFRA exhibition, Fujifilm this year is demonstrating its leadership in newspaper systems by showcasing how even greater levels of speed and efficiency could be achieved with the technology showcase of the Luxel VMAX 600. Owing to its cutting-edge laser technology and optimal plate-loading functionality, it can operate at unrivalled speeds.
Whilst punch bender manufacturers and processors still struggle to keep up with these types of speeds, the Luxel VMAX 600 showcases what is possible in terms of raw plate imaging speeds. Fujifilm will therefore be reviewing customer interest with a view to introducing it as a commercial system at a later date.
According to Yasunobu Nishiyama, senior vice president, Graphic Systems Division, Fujifilm Europe, “Improving automation and maximising efficiencies remain key goals in Fujifilm’s continuous drive to innovate and develop leading solutions for its newspaper customers. These new additions to our Superia newspaper portfolio offer the possibility of even greater levels of automation and production efficiency, while also helping minimise environmental impact. In what continues to be a very challenging market, Fujifilm is striving to help newspaper printers make further advances in terms of optimizing production and maximising profits.”
