Introduction to my GRCP101 Final Project

For my Final Project for GRCP101 I have decided to research the area of Electronic Publishing.

There are many types of Electronic Publishing and methods of Publishing but I would like to focus my research on Desktop Publishing in the print industry and the inventions and developments of publishing within that industry.

I shall give a brief overview of Electronic Publishing in general but for the most I shall concern my findings to Desktop Publishing. The title of this Final Project is “From the Printing Press to the Electronic Press”.

REASON I Choose this field of Research?

Given that I have spent many years in this industry. I feel this would be a very strong topic for my research. I would also like to include the different career paths in this industry from Production Artists, Graphic Designers, Digital Operators and the death of some careers also example the Plate Maker. I feel my research will be very useful to anyone who is thinking of entering into the Print industry, either as a Graphic Designer, Production Artist or a Digital Operator. This will help people decide if this career path is right for them.

What is Electronic Publishing?

So what is Electronic Publishing? To fully understand what the term Electronic Publishing means, we must first look at the word publishing and its aspect. Publishing goes through 3 stages, publish, publisher, and finally publishing. Publish means to issue, for sale or distribution, to the public printed, reproduced textual or graphical material. In order to publish one needs a publisher. A publisher is simply a person or company who publishes books, periodicals, multimedia etc., and finally, publishing is the business or activity of a publisher.

By adding the word electronic in front, it does not change the meaning of publishing, but the publisher does it electronically and with no paper involved. There are some exceptions to this rule in Desktop Publishing where the publisher sends electronic files to a printing press for final output to paper for distribution. This same principle applies to Digital Printing, which will be explained in more detail in this research paper.

There are various forms of electronic publications, ranging from books, newspapers, magazines, websites, CD ROMs, DVD, ebooks, E-journals, digital libraries, manuals and Social Networking. With escalating paper and publishing costs, magazine publishers and the academic community is now turning to electronic publishing as a way to reduce cost. On the other hand, copyright issues are limiting the amount of articles that newspapers are putting forth electronically.

Careers in the Print Industry



CAREERS IN THE INDUSTRY
I have worked for many years in the Print Industry from London's top Publishing Houses, to Design Companies of San Francisco, CA. I started my career as a Junior Finished Artist, in Dublin Ireland, where I got my first job in a small Design company. I have always wanted to work in Design since designing my high school newspaper. 

In the earlie days of Desk Top Publishing, everything was done by hand, Artwork had to be first designed by the Graphic Designer and then the Finished Artist had to create the final product by hand with the means of paste up, using camera skills to make bromides and pasting everything onto various boards as clean as possible, which was then sent to a repo house who made film and plates of the Artwork which where the placed onto a Printing Press for print. It was a pain staken process with many skill trades involved to get the final design published.

When the Apple Mac arrived in the Late 1980's, many Designers and Finished Artists where amazed with this new technology, everything could be done faster, no need for, paste up, so the Finished Artist now became the Graphic Designer, but for the Film stripper, the Plate Maker and so on it was do or die for their trade, either learn how to use the computer or move on which many did not.

I became the Designer and worked in many parts of the world, never in need of a job, but then came, high speed Internet and the Internet Super Highway started, now I had to become a Web Designer to, which I gladly accepted and got my Degree in Multimedia, learning all the latest programs like Flash, Final Cut Pro, HTML, CSS style sheets and 3D Modeling.

The print Industry is ever changing, you have to wear many hats in this industry, multitasking many projects at once, long hours behind a computer, always learning new software, updating your skills and having to compete to keep your job.

Yes that's right, don't let the video above fool you thinking a Design job is so fashionable and trendy, if you don't produce good designs and ideas, it wont be long before your moving on.

Having said all that, there are always jobs for Graphic Designers, Production Artists, Digital Operators, but the competition is high and every year more and more graduates from Art Universities are coming out! looking for that job and willing to work at a lower rate than you.

Technology is great in one sense but as the years go on less and less people are needed to create the final product.

So think strongly before entering the Print Industry!

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