Ottawa, Canada – Tilia Labs releases Phoenix 5.1, an exciting new version of its planning and imposition solution.  This release is loaded with many new features and enhancements designed to give customers the ability to fully automate an even wider range of ganging and imposition work than previously possible.

Phoenix 5.1 will be on full display at drupa 2016 at the Tilia Labs booth: Hall 7A, D41.

Push the boundaries of ganging

The Plan tool can now split product orders across layouts.  When this ganging profile option is enabled, Plan will try potentially hundreds of thousands of different ways to break products up across layouts to further drive down costs, press times, and waste.  For customers that can handle spanned products this feature can result in significant savings.

The multi-layout ganging Plan tool has been redesigned to produce even better results in less time.  For double sided work Plan makes intelligent decisions to optimize layouts for front and back printing, using the capabilities of the press to determine the best way to combine product orders on a sheet.

Find and tightly nest additional products into any region of the sheet instantly using the new Smart Place Tool.  The tool works by drawing an area in the artboard where you would like to try to gang more products.  A list of candidates will appear with placement previews.  Double-click and you’re done, the tool ensures die positions meet press and product spacing requirements.

Seamlessly integrate with CAD systems and wide format devices

Die line handling has been greatly enhanced to support importing from and exporting to virtually any CAD system or cutting device.  There are now 26 built-in dieline types and as well as custom line types to support any line type you need. 

Set up dieline mappings once and Phoenix will automatically match die paths to line types during import.  There is no need to specify technical inks, layers, or CAD line types at import time when creating products manually, through automation, or CSV import.

New export line type mappings gives you precise control over die layout export for CFF2, PDF, and PS.

Handle a wider range of problematic dies and multiple shape dies with new gap margin and shape search options. 

Detect production problems in real time

Phoenix 5.1 introduces a new status system designed to detect potential problems in production during job editing.  Several common problems are currently detected and reported in real-time in the new Status panel and in the left corner of the status bar and again at export time.  Examples include:

• Dies extending beyond content or image margins of a layout
• Incompatible stock or sheet sizes for the current press
• Total ink count exceeding press limits
• Empty or invalid dynamic barcodes
• Unfulfilled orders in the job

Increase productivity

5.1 also features a number of user experience enhancements designed to increase productivity.

Filtering and sorting products is now possible in the Products panel to help pinpoint the set of products in the job you want to work on.  There are 7 filtering options and 14 sorting options to choose from.  For example, you can view all unfulfilled orders sorted by their ordered amounts, product name, size, and more.

A new Move Tool is available for precise positioning of items.  Just snap to any internal die lines in two product instance and define new relative positions.  For example, you can select crease lines of adjacent products to align carton flaps horizontally or vertically.

PDF rendering is now even faster in Phoenix 5.1 with multithreading optimizations.