Agfa Graphics and EFI Enhance Hybrid Workflows through Apogee 10 Integration with Fiery Digital Front Ends

Friday, September 23, 2016

Press release from the issuing company

Electronics For Imaging, Inc. and Agfa Graphics have developed an integration between EFI™ Fiery® digital front ends (DFEs) and Agfa Graphics’ latest Apogee 10 system to enable joint customers to increase digital printing productivity and profits

“With this integration, existing Agfa Apogee users, including users of the latest Apogee 10 system, will be able to take advantage of hybrid offset/digital workflows,” said Andy Grant, Head of Software at Agfa Graphics. “Through certified, industry standard JDF connectivity, Apogee users can select from the wide choice of Fiery Driven digital presses to establish easy and quick ways to direct jobs to the most appropriate print devices for the best production scenario.”

While many printing companies use digital presses to cost effectively meet increasing demand for short runs, fast turnaround, and value-added services, many digital presses do not efficiently integrate into offset workflows. Agfa Graphics and EFI deliver one of the most advanced hybrid print workflows available in the commercial market, taking advantage of the strengths of both traditional offset and Fiery Driven™ digital presses.

One customer who has streamlined its operations with the Fiery/Apogee integration, Hakan Walhed, general manager of Malmö, Sweden-based printing company Skånetryck, conducts preparation tasks such as imposition, media selection and color management for Fiery Driven digital presses right from the familiar Apogee user interface, eliminating touchpoints for production.

“We save up to two hours on busy days,” Walhed says of the integration’s benefits. Plus, the consistent prepress workflow between offset and digital presses with Apogee and Fiery integration helps Skånetryck’s operators achieve a close match in color quality with minimum training.”

Agfa Graphics Apogee 10: saving valuable time in prepress
Because Apogee acts as a unique hybrid production hub with connections to CtP for plate imaging and to EFI’s Fiery DFE platforms, it centralizes all prepress tasks and saves print service providers valuable time. Apogee 10 features the ability to split parts of a job and send those for digital output, which turns out to be extremely powerful in case of versioning jobs and proofing of (parts of) books with large page counts.

EFI Fiery DFEs: Delivering more from digital press investments
EFI’s newest Fiery DFE platform, Fiery FS200 Pro, helps printing companies get the most out of their digital press investments in terms of productivity, quality and efficiency. With the Apogee/Fiery workflow integration, users can access the latest Fiery DFE capabilities, including HyperRIP – a key Fiery job acceleration technology offering 55% faster job processing – as well as advanced make-ready and color management tools, right from the familiar Apogee workflow user interface. JDF templates can be used to automate any color, media, layout, or finishing settings available for Fiery Driven digital presses.

Users also can leverage award-winning EFI Fiery color management technology from one consolidated point of control with color profiles and rendering intent managed by Apogee. In addition, Apogee users can access the full Fiery Paper Catalog from the Apogee user interface, with the system dynamically mapping media selection to the Fiery DFE. Users can also map parameters for inline finishing on Fiery Driven digital presses.

And, in Fiery/Apogee integrated hybrid workflows, Fiery DFEs report job status data directly to Apogee so both prepress and production operators can monitor job status in real time.

“Within Agfa’s large Apogee installed base, there are also a large number of Fiery Driven digital presses from all of the leading digital press manufacturers,” said Toby Weiss, senior vice president and general manager, EFI Fiery. “This integration will enable those organizations to streamline their workflow even more, taking time and touches out of the process for a more cost-efficient operation, critical in today’s fast-paced and highly competitive printing environment.”