Tilia Labs of Ottawa, Ont., has launched Phoenix 5.1 with new features to automate a wider range of ganging and imposition work. The software will be on display at Tilia Labs’ booth during drupa 2016, beginning May 29 in Germnay.
Phoenix 5.1’s Plan tool can now split product orders across layouts. When this ganging profile option is enabled, explains Tilia Labs, Plan will try potentially hundreds of thousands of different ways to break products up across layouts to drive down costs, press times and waste.
Tilia Labs continues to explain this multi-layout ganging Plan tool has been redesigned to produce better results in less time. For double-sided work, Plan makes 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.
The company also points to its new Smart Place Tool, which allows users to instantly find and nest additional products into any region of the sheet. The tool works by drawing an area in the artboard where the user would like to try ganging more products. A list of candidates will appear with placement previews. The tool ensures die positions meet press and product spacing requirements.
Die line handling has been enhanced to support importing from and exporting to most any CAD system or cutting device, explains Tilia Labs. There are now 26 built-in die line types, as well as custom line types to support any line type.
Tilia Labs explains users can set up die line 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 users control over die layout export for CFF2, PDF, and PS.
Phoenix 5.1 also 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. 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, or unfulfilled orders in the job.
With Phoenix 5.1, filtering and sorting products is now possible in the Products panel to help pinpoint the set of products in the job to be worked on. There are seven filtering options and 14 sorting options to choose from. For example, users can view all unfulfilled orders sorted by their ordered amounts, product name, size, and more.
A new Move Tool is available for positioning of items, allowing users to snap to any internal die lines and define new relative positions. For example, users can select crease lines of adjacent products to align carton flaps horizontally or vertically. PDF rendering is also now faster in Phoenix 5.1 with multithreading optimizations.
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