Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2002/07/15

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Subject: Re: [Leica] Black and White Magazine
From: "Steve LeHuray" <icommag@toad.net>
Date: Mon, 15 Jul 2002 07:37:50 -0400

Steve LeHuray said:
 
>> Darrell, It seems that is the magazine publishers decision to make, I have
>> banned all digital images from my own monthly print magazine, they are too
>> much trouble technically for print.

Steven Alexander asks:
>
> Please explain this decision of yours and the meaning of ...too much trouble
> technically for print.

In the past five years accepting digital files have reached a crisis stage
for my magazine when it reaches the pre-press stage: advertisements that
lose fonts, become low-rez, same thing with pictures sent to me e-mail as
jpegs then I convert them to tiffs cmyk, but some of them during the
pre-press stage apparently become corrupted becoming low-rez.

So now all material to go into the magazine, including 4-color
advertisements, must be supplied as film. Editorial photos must be prints or
slides.

>  I have read, for several years and been told by the
> stock agencies that represent my work and most users of my material,  that
> most consumer, technical, limited distribution magazines and similar print
> publications are almost entirely produced using digital methods and files up
> to the ink hitting the paper.

Yes that is true and digital files are a constant problem for printers,
whether it be corrupted files or whatever, I do not know.

>  Are you saying that the printer and the
> printing process can distinguish between an original digital image file and
> a digital image file produced from film?

No. I think that for some digital files it is a long and winding road before
it gets to me and then past on to my production department and then the
printer. Photos that I have digitized have never had a problem. I have
banned digital files (pictures or advertisements) that come from sources
that are out of my control, (even Kodak now has to supply me with film for
their advt).

It is a BIG problem when your cover photo mysterialy  becomes low-rez and
your time slot has come up to go to press. If you say "wait a minute while I
try to straighten that low-rez pic out" you lose your turn in line and may
have to wait a week to get printed. THAT is a bigger problem than telling
some photographer that I need his submission in film.

sl
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