Bruce Tietz

PITTSBURGH—Do film-based plates require fewer remakes than digital plates? A survey of 29 companies conducted by the Graphic Arts Technical Foundation (GATF) and the National Association for Printing Leadership (NAPL) produced some interesting results. Participants were asked to choose from a list of likely causes of plate remakes and record them for 30 consecutive days. In all, data was recorded on roughly 55,100 plates (42,600 digital and 12,500 film-based). The leading remake causes for film-based plates were plate wear (17.7 percent), voids (8.1), register (6.6), plates not stored (6.2) and changed press (5.5). For digital plates, the top causes were plates damaged on-press (9.1