DALiM's powerful new online approval system combines collaborative approval with sophisticated job workflows.
Australian print production still cleaves jealously to printed proofs. The evolution of 3DAP is a perfect example of how a cabal of print producers hold the inkjet printout as the highest standard of colour fidelity. -- This from the same mob who, not so long ago, championed Chromalins as the gold-standard of contract proofing. Hard copy proofs have some distinct advantages: You can write on them, carry them around and show them to whomever is within arm's reach.
These advantages turn around and bite when one considers that a physical proof not only needs to be created, it needs to be transported to the approver. And colour parity for physical proofs goes out the window the moment the proof leaves the viewing booth. Remote proofing mitigates the first problem by printing out the proof directly at the customer's location, and strict adherence to colour reviewing protocols can ensure print buyers get what they expect.
Additional challenges remain with physical proofs, though. First, unless the proof is approved, no changes, some feedback must be communicated back to the producer. This is easily done over the phone, say, but complex instructions can quickly get confusing without a shared visual reference. A customer could send back the marked-up proof. This has the advantage of clarity, but time is lost sending physical proofs back and forth. Finally, inkjet proofs are *expensive*. Gram-for-gram, proofing ink rivals gold in cost.
More and more producers are short-circuiting this process with email proofs. PDF attachments sideline the entire question of colour parity and concentrate on content -- which is great, as long as the finished product is small enough to fit in an email. Production staff are routinely tasked with down-sampling high-res artwork to squeeze into a mailbox; image quality and detail are the inevitable casualties in this game. And emailed PDFs invite an awful risk: Print producers are asking their customers to approve something other than the finished artwork.
DALiM DiALOGUE, now at version 4.1, has brought paperless proofing closer to the Australian mainstream. DiALOGUE's SWOP certification already gives it a strong leg up in the North American market, which is rapidly advancing to a soft-proofing ad-approval infrastructure. With DiALOGUE's closed-loop colour proofing, customers can review and mark up on-line proofs, with approvals and comments from multiple users transmitted in real-time to the producer. Keeping the local monitor calibrated can be as simple as running a colorimeter over the screen once a month.
Building on this foundation, DALiM's newest product, DiALOGUE ES, expands DiALOGUE's superior soft-proofing capabilities to include a sophisticated tiered approval workflow. Backed by a SQL database, DiALOGUE ES offers real-time, remote, collaborative access to any file — from original documents to validated jobs. Users can make live annotations on high-resolution data. Comments are preserved for auditing, and all changes are tracked. Annotation history can be downloaded in a separate PDF report. ES is more than just an on-line proofing system. Using an industry-standard JDF interface, ES Technology can connect to any compatible MIS system to automatically set up new projects. Projects can consist of multiple pieces of collateral, with a wide array of approval and review privileges assigned to any combination of participants. DiALOGUE ES integrates with LDAP or Active Directory, allowing user management from a unified authentication structure.
And using its web-based user interface, all workflow participants can easily upload files over the web or through intelligent hotfolders, where Dalim Software JDF devices or those from third-party developers can process them. ES combines DiALOGUE's collaborative web access and powerful annotation, mark-up, correction tracking, and density measurement tools with comprehensive history tracking and reporting, including visual comparisons between revisions. ES brings hierarchical, job-based approval workflows and user management, as well as automated email or RSS notifications. Adobe's PDF rendering engine, flat-plan view and DALiM Virtual Library are each available as options.
Traditional physical proofs have evolved to meet the changing demands of our industry, but the time has arrived when paper proofs are no longer sufficient. Agencies and print providers are increasingly playing the role of one-stop shop when it comes to designing, managing and fulfilling complex campaigns. Paper proofs cannot move fast enough to satisfy deadlines, and emailed PDFs are just not up to the task of reviewing and approving high-quality media. DiALOGUE ES offers fast, flexible colour proofing on-line, and integrates custom approval schemes with a business's production and business processes.
Both DiALOGUE and its ES sibling are available for a wide range of budgets and applications. Nexus maintain DiALOGUE demo sandboxes which can be configured for customer exploration. Demonstrations are available upon request; please don't hesitate to contact us for more information.