GCSF Presents “Champion of Education” Award to Jack Powers and Scholarship Grants to 28 Metro Area Students

062214.gcsf.1Leave it to polymath Jack Powers to inspire students with a quipu, the string of “talking knots” used by the Incas as a data recording device hundreds of years ago.

Wielding a quipu knotted with the major events of his own life as a metaphor for personal development, Powers accepted the 2014 Champion of Education Award from the Graphic Communications Scholarship Foundation (GCSF) at its 12th annual scholarship awards presentation ceremony on June 19. He directed his quipu lesson mainly at 28 students who shared $56,000 worth of study grants from GCSF, which has presented a total of $416,000 in scholarships to 116 students of graphic design and production since the fund’s inception in 2002.

GCSF is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit corporation that has grown from a back-of-the-envelope project into one of the industry’s most noteworthy sources of funding for professional education. Its donors include printing companies, technology suppliers, publishers, trade associations, and individuals. Under the supervision of David Luke (DAL Consulting), its current president, GCSF remains an all-volunteer initiative that has no paid staff, no overhead expenses, nor any mission other than channeling 100% of the money it raises to deserving students.

062214.gcsf.2The presentation ceremony, which takes place at the Hearst Tower Atrium in Manhattan, sees the addition of new scholarship grants almost every year the event is held. This year, GCSF trustee Diane Romano (Hudson Yards) introduced the John Tempest Memorial Scholarship Award, co-sponsored by the Advertising Production Club. It becomes one of more than two dozen scholarship programs now administered by GCSF, which establishes criteria for receiving the grants and evaluates student portfolios submitted in application for them. Applicants, who must be New York City metro area residents, can attend any college or university with an accredited graphics program.

Tempest scholarship donors include the DEER Foundation of IDEAlliance and Printing Industries Alliance (PIAlliance), both of which counted the grant’s namesake as a board member during his lifetime. The two groups are sponsors of the combined Franklin Luminaire Awards event in the fall, which will donate its net proceeds to fund GCSF scholarships.

062214.gcsf.3Diane Romano (r.) presents the first John Tempest Memorial Scholarship Award to Vanessa Lora (High School of Graphic Communication Arts / Syracuse University)

At the ceremony, GCSF also inaugurated a mentoring program to provide career-focused learning experiences for New York metro area college students pursuing careers in graphic communications. The four-year plan includes one-on-one coaching, workplace assignments, plant tours, participation at trade shows and events, and other activities designed to streamline their entry into the industry.

In all of these ways, GCSF serves high school, college, and graduate students throughout the New York City metro area who are preparing for or are enrolled in some of the country’s most prestigious graphic studies programs. GCSF scholarship recipients—many of whom have earned more than one yearly grant—attend or soon will attend The School of Visual Arts, Rochester Institute of Technology, Pratt Institute, Parsons the New School for Design, and Rhode Island School of Design, among others.

First-year grant earner Tasnima Tanzim, a freshman at Pratt, said she spoke gratefully on behalf of all GCSF scholarship recipients who, like her, once feared that they couldn’t afford to attend the colleges of their choice. SVA senior Elizabeth Zalewski, a four-time recipient, said that the grants had been vital to her development as a creative and to the shaping of her future career.

The students owe their progress in no small way to the activism of Powers, a booster and a fundraiser for GCSF from the beginning. Powers has been a one-man army for graphics education in the metro region for more than 30 years, lending his time and talents to the area’s most important public and private efforts for training in the field.

Tristate industry veterans also know him as an evangelist for digital production workflows long before the terms “evangelist” and “digital production workflows” even existed. Although, as a technologist and a consultant, he has moved on to other areas of interest, Powers continues to be the advocate most strongly identified with changing the metro area’s mindset from analog production to the digital solutions its graphic service providers use now.

Powers got an introduction almost as singular as he is in an adaptation of the classic show tune “You’re the Top,” with personalized lyrics by Frank Romano (RIT) and a zingy rendition by GCSF co-founder Mark Darlow. Romano hailed Powers as, among many other things, “the most brilliant marketing person you have ever met.”

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Using his quipu, Powers makes a point about life and the value of education.

He illustrated the trajectory of the honoree’s early career by displaying a punched paper tape that he said Powers had coded to drive typesetting equipment in 1978. According to Romano, Powers—the son of a Jersey City, NJ, printer—was the first observer to recognize the enormous significance of the Internet for the printing industry.

Powers’s quipu had knots for the launch of his consulting business, his marriage and the birth of his daughter, his recent attainment of a master’s degree, and his receipt of the Champion of Education Award. He pointed out that the string still had ample room for further milestones he intends to tie in.

Education largely determines how many knots of achievement a person’s lifeline will contain, Powers told the students. He also counseled them to “write stuff down”; to be skeptical of “free” amenities from social media and the cloud; and to “remember the people” who helped on one’s way up.

Above all, never forget that everyone’s quipu is finite. “You don’t know how long your string is going to be,” Powers said. “Be sure that your knots have value.”

Conde Nast’s Townsend Is Honored with Prism Award from NYU-SCPS

14-0590Metro Graphics Reporter thanks Dona McKenzie (M.A. in Graphic Communications Management and Technology, 2014) for covering the event and providing the following post.

On June 17, more than 300 graphic communications and media professionals came together to raise funds for New York University’s Graphic Communications Management and Technology (GCMT) M.A. program at the 28th Annual Prism Awards Luncheon. In a departure from years past, Cipriani 42 was the newly chosen venue, a space that was both elegant and monumental in scale. The lively crowd mingled and networked at the opening reception as tuxedo-clad waiters passed around a never-ending supply of Bellini cocktails and sumptuous hors d’oeuvres.

After an hour of conversation and connections, the guests were gently ushered into the main dining area for the start of the program. There, William “Buzz” Apostol and Jennifer Bergin, Prism Committee Co-Chairs, welcomed everyone and thanked them for their continuing support of the GCMT M.A. program. The crowd enjoyed a tricolor salad of roasted beets with green beans and goat cheese while Dennis Di Lorenzo, Dean of NYU’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies (SCPS), took to the stage. Di Lorenzo praised the GCMT M.A. program for providing students with a “competitive skill set” learned under the guidance of working professionals in the media landscape.

Next, Dr. Joseph P. Truncale, GCMT professor and Advisory Board Co-Chair, gave a warm introduction for alumna Tina Powell, ’13, recipient of the Alumni Achievement Award for 2014. Powell, currently the Director of Business Management at Beacon Wealth Management, thanked her professors and former GCMT M.A. program director Bonnie Blake for their inspiration and their encouragement. She singled out faculty member Dr. Greg D’Amico for opening the most “important doors of all.” Powell finished by acknowledging the profound support of her family and friends. She graciously thanked her mother, saying, “to my mother, you will know my gratitude by the depth of my service.”

14-0590Scott Dadich, Editor-in-Chief of Wired, who accepted the 2014 Prism Award on behalf of recipient Charles H. Townsend, CEO of Condé Nast; and Tina Powell, recipient of the GCMT Alumni Achievement Award for 2014

Following lunch of prime roast filet of beef, risotto, and ratatouille, Paula Payton, Director of Strategic Communication, Marketing and Media Management Programs at NYU-SCPS, introduced Charles H. Townsend, Chief Executive Officer of Condé Nast. As Townsend, the recipient of the 2014 Prism Award for Distinguished Leadership, was unable to attend the event, monitors were placed throughout the venue so that the guests could see and hear his video thank-you. Townsend also expressed his deep appreciation to NYU for cultivating talent.

Accepting the Prism Award on Townsend’s behalf was Scott Dadich, Editor-in-Chief of WIRED. In a presentation entitled “The Future of Design, Invisible, Beautiful, Everywhere,” Dadich treated the audience to a micro- and macro-level look at the forces propelling contemporary trends in technology. He proposed that the main purpose of design is “human betterment’ and posited that “design doesn’t make things better, it makes them work.” Dadich argued that because of good design, “technology will fade into our everyday experience, instead of pulling us away from it.”

He said that the trends to watch are wearable computers, ultra high definition television (UHD TV), the game console wars, biometrics, and “quantified cars” that gather and share driving data. Mr. Dadich went on to say that all of these trends are data-driven, bandwidth intensive and individually focused, creating a potential “Hawthorne Effect” on society.

062114.nyuprism.1From left, Prism guests Junmian Sun (GCMT M.A., class of 2009); Bonnie Blake, past director of the GCMT M.A. program; and 2014 GCMT M.A. graduates Michael Patrissi, Melissa Pitts

Presented annually, the Prism Award recognizes distinguished leadership in the graphic communications media industry. The net proceeds of the Prism Award Luncheon help to fund student scholarships as well as student and program support for the NYU-SCPS GCMT graduate program, which prepares the next generation of media communications industry leaders. Since its inception, the Prism Award Luncheon has raised millions of dollars for scholarships for students in the GCMT program.

Previous NYU Prism Award recipients include Steve Forbes, chairman and editor-in-chief of Forbes Media LLC; Thomas J. Quinlan III, president and chief executive officer of RR Donnelley; Vyomesh (VJ) Joshi, former executive vice president, HP’s Imaging and Printing Group; Cathleen Black, former chairman of Hearst Magazines; Antonio M. Perez, former president and CEO of Eastman Kodak Company; Anne M. Mulcahy, former chairperson and CEO of Xerox Corporation; Janet L. Robinson, former president and chief executive officer of The New York Times; and Ursula Burns, chairman and CEO of Xerox.

NYU/SCPS to Honor Condé Nast CEO Charles Townsend with Prism Award on June 17

The Advisory Board of the NYU School of Continuing and Professional Studies (NYU-SCPS) Graphic Communications Management and Technology (GCMT) graduate program has selected Charles Townsend, chief executive officer of Condé Nast, as the recipient of the 2014 Prism Award. Presented annually, the Prism Award recognizes distinguished leadership in the graphic communications media industry.

Sponsored by the NYU-SCPS Master of Arts in Graphic Communications Management and Technology program, the 28th Annual Prism Award Luncheon will take place on Tuesday, June 17, 2014 at Cipriani 42 in New York City. Scott Dadich, editor-in-chief of WIRED, will accept the award on Mr. Townsend’s behalf and discuss future trends at the nexus of design and technology.

“We are honored and delighted to recognize Charles Townsend, an innovator in the media industry, with the 2014 Prism Award,” said Dennis Di Lorenzo, dean of the NYU School of Continuing and Professional Studies. “His leadership qualities and his ability to anticipate and to navigate change in a continuously evolving business environment are an inspiration to us all. We are equally fortunate to have Scott Dadich to serve as our Luncheon chairman and to have him accept the Award on Mr. Townsend’s behalf.”

0621214.charles_townsend_scott_dadichCharles Townsend; Scott Dadich

Previous NYU Prism Award recipients include: Ursula Burns, chairman and CEO of Xerox Corporation; Steve Forbes, chairman and editor-in-chief of Forbes Media LLC; Thomas J. Quinlan III, president and chief executive officer of R.R. Donnelley and Sons Company; Vyomesh (VJ) Joshi, former executive vice president of HP’s Imaging and Printing Group; Cathleen Black, former chairman of Hearst Magazines; Antonio M. Perez, former president and CEO of Eastman Kodak Company; Anne M. Mulcahy, former chairperson and CEO of Xerox Corporation; and Janet L. Robinson, former president and chief executive officer of The New York Times.

“It is a source of great pride for Condé Nast to join this esteemed group of former recipients in supporting the NYU School of Continuing and Professional Studies,” said Townsend.  “Talent is at the cornerstone of what makes all our organizations successful—I can think of no better investment in our future than growing these scholarship programs.”

WIRED is where tomorrow is realized,” added Dadich.  “I’m thrilled to be part of an event where ideas and innovation are fostered and to be accepting this prestigious award on Condé Nast’s behalf.”

The net proceeds of the Prism Award Luncheon help to fund student scholarships, as well as student and program support for the NYU-SCPS GCMT graduate program, which prepares the next generation of media communications industry leaders. Since its inception, the Prism Award Luncheon has raised millions of dollars in scholarship funds for students in the GCMT program.

“Over the years, hundreds of talented and deserving students have benefitted from Prism Award scholarship funds, graduating from the M.A. in Graphic Communications Management and Technology program and launching their own highly successful careers in an industry that continues to grow and thrive,” commented William “Buzz” Apostol, Prism Award Committee co-chair and vice president, sales – Americas at X-Rite/Pantone Inc.

Tickets for the Prism Award Luncheon are priced from $750 per person to $6,000 for a sponsor’s table of eight and $10,000 for a co-chairmanship (which includes a dais seat as well as a table of eight). Tables, ticket reservations, and additional information are available through the NYU-SCPS Office of Development. Contact Melissa Malebranche at 212-998-6950, by fax at 212-995-4039, or by e-mail at melissa.malebranche@nyu.edu. Visit www.scps.nyu.edu/prism to learn more about the Prism Award Luncheon and Scholarship.

 About Charles Townsend
Charles H. Townsend is chief executive officer of Condé Nast, the premier media company renowned for producing the world’s highest quality content for the world’s most influential audiences. Attracting 164 million consumers across its industry-leading print and digital brands, the company’s properties include some of the most iconic titles in media: Vogue, Vanity Fair, Glamour, Brides, Self, GQ, The New Yorker, Condé Nast Traveler, Details, Allure, Architectural Digest, Bon Appétit, Epicurious, Wired, W, Lucky, Golf Digest, Golf World, Teen Vogue, and Ars Technica. Condé Nast also owns Fairchild Fashion Media (FFM) and its portfolio of comprehensive fashion journalism brands:  WWD, Style.com, Footwear News, NowManifest, Beauty Inc., M, and Fairchild Summits. The company’s newest division, Condé Nast Entertainment, was launched in 2011 to develop film, television, and digital video programming.

During Townsend’s 20-year tenure at Condé Nast, the company has reached record profits, tripling its topline growth and exponentially expanding its distribution platforms. In just the past five years, Condé Nast’s footprint swelled by more than 100 million consumers and in 2013, the corporation was named one of the fast-growing companies in the digital video business. Earning a record 107 National Magazine Awards in the past 20 years, Condé Nast also led the industry as one of LinkedIn’s Top 50 Most In-Demand Employers in the World. In late 2014, the company will relocate to its new global headquarters at 1 World Trade Center, where it will play a leading role in the resurgence of Lower Manhattan.

Before being named CEO in 2004, Townsend served as Condé Nast’s chief operating officer after joining the company in 1994 as publisher of Glamour. Earlier in his career, he served as president and CEO of The New York Times’ Women’s Magazine Publishing Division and as publisher of various Hearst Magazines titles. Townsend is a graduate of the University of Michigan.

About Scott Dadich
Scott Dadich was named editor-in-chief of WIRED in November of 2012.

Prior to being named editor-in-chief, he served as vice president, Editorial Platforms & Design for Condé Nast. In this role, he oversaw the creative efforts to bring Condé Nast’s storied brand portfolio to emerging digital channels.

From 2006-2010, Dadich was the award-winning creative director of WIRED, where he initiated and led the development of WIRED’s groundbreaking iPad app, which was introduced in May 2010, one month after the introduction of the revolutionary device. Building upon that success, Dadich and his team have led all of the company’s brands into monthly tablet publication across multiple digital platforms.

Collectively, Dadich’s work has been recognized with eight National Magazine Awards, including three General Excellence Ellies (Texas Monthly, 2003; Wired, 2007 & 2009). He is the only creative director ever to win both the National Magazine Award for Design and the Society of Publication Designers Magazine of the Year award three consecutive years: 2008, 2009, and 2010. Additionally, he has received more than 100 national design and editorial awards from organizations such as the Art Directors Club, American Photography, American Illustration, The Society of Illustrators, and the Type Directors Club. In 2011, Fast Company named Scott Dadich one of the 50 Most Influential Designers in America.

Prior to joining Condé Nast, Scott was creative director of Texas Monthly, which was nominated for 14 National Magazine Awards during his tenure and won for General Excellence in 2003.

Dadich graduated from Texas Tech University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree.

Tech Strategist Jack Powers To Be Honored as “Champion of Education” by Graphic 
Communications Scholarship Foundation

061114.JackPowersHIRES

The Graphic Communications Scholarship, Award and Career Advancement Foundation (GCSF) will present its 2014 Champion of Education Award to Jack Powers, technology strategist and longtime public education advocate. Part of GCSF’s 12th Annual Scholarship Awards Celebration on Thursday, June 19, the Champion of Education Award honors exceptional individuals in the graphics field who have helped to prepare its next generation.

For over 30 years, Powers has explained each step of the digital revolution for media professionals on six continents. Beginning with electronic composition and pagination, moving on to desktop publishing and evolving through computer graphics, digital imaging, interactive multimedia, and the World Wide Web, Powers has evaluated the big steps in media technology for private clients and public audiences in books, articles, web sites and videos.

He chaired his first national conference in 1985 for the National Composition Association and worked with many associations and commercial conference developers internationally. He was chairman of the breakthrough Internet World conferences in 24 countries during the dot com boom. Along the way, he produced innovative education programs in electronic commerce, ebooks, artificial intelligence, pervasive TV, digital photography and healthcare IT.

Powers is the director of The International Informatics Institute (IN3.ORG), a Brooklyn-based technology education, consulting, and research organization he founded in 1982. The firm’s research associates advise clients about issues and opportunities in media, technology, business, and society.

In support of public education, Powers has served on the New York City Department of Education’s Graphics Industry Advisory Commission since 1986, leading the volunteer group’s teacher training, curriculum review, and mentoring activities and producing the long-running citywide Graphic Arts Competition. At the Commission, he helped to launch the Graphic Communications Scholarship Foundation and has served as a trustee and officer of GCSF for years.

In 2010, Powers was appointed by the New York City Schools Chancellor to the city’s Advisory Council for Career & Technical Education, the all-industry coalition of business leaders, employers, trade unions, and community organizations that support more than 140,000 technical education students and their teachers in the New York City school system. Voted chairman of the CTE Advisory Council by his colleagues, he has helped develop innovative career-oriented education programs in many fields beyond graphics.

A longtime supporter of CUNY’s New York City College of Technology, Powers serves as the chairman of the Advisory Commission for the Department of Advertising Design and Graphic Arts (ADGA). He also is a member of the advisory councils for Virtual Enterprises International, Thomas Edison High School, and Queens Vocational & Technical High School. He has taught at the Pratt Center for Computer Graphics in Design and at New York University, and he is completing a master’s degree in politics and urban education at the City University of New York.

The award to Powers highlights “The Future of Graphics,” a special program paying tribute to the latest recipients of GCSF scholarship grants. The event also will feature the inaugural presentation of the John Tempest Scholarship Award in memory of its namesake, a print sales executive with a long record of service to industry trade associations.

GCSF’s 12th Annual Scholarship Awards will take place at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, June 19 in the 3rd-floor Atrium and Joseph Urban Theatre of the Hearst Tower, 300 W. 57th Street in Manhattan. Admission is free, but all attendees must pre-register by e-mailing a request for entry to Jerry Mandelbaum at jmandelbaum@601west.com.

The Graphic Communications Scholarship, Award and Career Advancement Foundation is an all-volunteer, 501(c)3 non-profit organization that provides financial support to New York City metro area students pursuing careers in graphic communications. Since its founding in 2002, GCSF has given financial support to more than 108 students in graphic studies degree programs at leading institutions in the field.

See the Machines That Won WWII at Long Island’s New Museum of American Armor

museum_of_american_armor.smThis is a post about heavy iron—but not the printing kind. There’s a striking new collection of World War II-vintage armored vehicles at the new Museum of American Armor in Old Bethpage, NY, on the grounds of the equally historic Old Bethpage Village restoration. Naturally, the armor museum will provide many a blissful afternoon for World War II tank and artillery buffs. But, it also has much to offer anyone else interested in learning more about the immense contributions of mechanized weapons systems and the men who operated them to the winning of the Good War.

The museum, which opened to the public two days ago on the 70th anniversary of D-Day, is the gift of Lawrence Kadish, a real estate investor who contributed more than $2 million to the construction of the building and the creation of the exhibits. Some of the work remains in progress under the supervision of museum director and exhibit curator Mark Renton, an expert in the restoration of historic armor. Renton says that eventually, more than 20 of the combat vehicles will be in full running condition for live displays.

Some of the pieces—the Sherman tank, for example, or the “Long Tom” field gun—will be familiar to students of the period. Many other, less well known machines add detail to the panorama of American industrial ingenuity and might that the museum stirringly celebrates. There’s also a gallery of war-themed art and, in a space that will be a VIP conference room, a life-sized replica of that icon of American armor, Gen. George S. Patton.

History in the form of war-winning fighting vehicles soon literally will be on the move at the Museum of American Armor. It has all the makings of a national treasure of its kind, and we’re indeed fortunate that it has made its home in the NY-metro region.

Highlights: 2014 Gamma Gold Key Awards

IFOn May 30, Howard Weinstein (left) and Mark Darlow became the 2014 recipients of Gamma Gold Key Awards from Gamma Chapter, Gamma Epsilon Tau. A metro area tradition since 1956, the Gamma Gold Key Awards salute those who have made exceptional professional and personal contributions to the graphic arts industry.

IFHoward Weinstein is congratulated by his brother, Scott (left), and his father, Murray, at the awards ceremony at the 101 Club in midtown Manhattan. The three are the founders and principals of Candid Litho, one of the metro area’s leading commercial printing firms. Howard’s advice to the students in attendance: “Know a little bit about lot of things. Be able to listen first, and then speak. Learn from the work ethic—nothing will come easy.”

IFMembers of the Darlow family share the auspicious occasion with Mark Darlow, recognized as a technical pioneer during the days of the industry’s transition to modern digital production methods. To his right in the photo are Prof. Frank Adae, Department of Advertising Design and Graphic Design (ADGA), New York City College of Technology (NYCCT), the award dinner’s organizer and emcee; and Annette Wolf Bensen, honored during the program for her many years of service as an ADGA instructor. Bensen was the recipient of a Founders Gold Medal & Citation Award fron Gamma Chapter in 2011.

IFAs part of the induction ceremony for Gamma Chapter, Gamma Epsilon Tau, ADGA students light candles to signify the light of reason cast with the aid graphic communications down through the centuries. Domiciled at NYCCT, Gamma Chapter is part of a national fraternity for students of graphic production and design. ADGA is the largest academic organization in the metro area for graphic studies.

Gamma Epsilon Tau Fraternity Will Honor Darlow and Weinstein at “Gold Key” Ceremony

Gamma Chapter of Gamma Epsilon Tau, the national graphic arts honor society, will present Gamma Gold Key Awards to Mark Darlow and Howard Weinstein at its 2014 Gold Key Awards ceremony in New York City on May 30.

For more than 60 years, Darlow has been prominent in New York City’s graphic communications industry as a pioneering technical innovator and as a tireless advocate of industry causes. He is best known for his leadership of Cardinal Type Services and Cardinal Press, family businesses that he took from hot-metal typesetting and letterpress printing to modern methods of phototypography and, later, desktop publishing, digital printing, and wide-format output.

Darlow accomplished this transition at a time when digitization was sweeping the industry and pushing many other traditional graphics firms into obsolescence. Cardinal Communications Group, as the business became known, was the site of one of the first Indigo digital press installations in the country. The company also developed software, broke ground in digital photography, and produced films and audiovisual presentations.

An activist for the industry throughout his career, Darlow had a leading role in the creation of New York City’s first industrial condominium for printers. He has been the president or a board member of most of the metro area’s principal trade associations and a lifelong standard-bearer for industry education. Most notably, he is one of the founding members of the Graphic Communication Scholarship, Award and Career Advancement Foundation, a volunteer group that has raised and distributed hundreds of thousands of dollars for students in graphics study programs.

goldkeyawards.051213.howard_markHoward Weinstein, Mark Darlow

Like Darlow, Howard Weinstein is being recognized with a Gamma Gold Key award both for his professional achievements and for his work on behalf of industry education. He is the owner and CEO of Candid Litho, one of the metro area’s leading commercial printing firms. Along with his brother,  Scott, and his father, Murray, Weinstein built the business from a small printing brokerage in 1985 to what is today the largest sheetfed facility in New York City.

Weinstein further expanded the business by launching Blue Ocean Worldwide, a digital print, grand-format, print management, and media display company serving creative and media agencies and the national brands they represent. The operation as a whole employs 240 people at the main plant in Long Island City, Queens, and at the Blue Ocean Worldwide facility in Las Vegas, NV.

Support for learning and professional development has been a keynote of Weinstein’s career. He frequently opens the main plant to tours by student groups, and he serves on the board of several organizations that raise funds and sponsor programs for graphics education. In 2013, the Graphic Communication Scholarship, Award and Career Advancement Foundation selected him for its Champion of Education Award in recognition of these activities.

Gamma Epsilon Tau is a national, coeducational, collegiate printing fraternity in which students of printing and publishing can meet and interact in a professional and social atmosphere.  It has eight chapters at colleges and universities that offer degree programs in graphic communications.

Gamma Chapter of Gamma Epsilon Tau is located at the Department of Advertising and Graphic Design (ADGA) of New York City College of Technology, part of the City University of New York. Gold Key honorees in recent years include Mike Connors, Frank Romano, Bob Sacks, Annette Wolf Bensen, Michael Cunningham, and Florence Jackson.

The 2013 Gold Key Awards dinner will be held on Wednesday, May 30 at Club 101, 101 Park Avenue, New York City. For more information or to purchase tickets, contact ADGA Prof. Frank Adae at (718) 260-5833 or by e-mail: fadae@citytech.cuny.edu

Canon Hosts Printing Industries Alliance in First Tour of Its New Corporate Headquarters on LI

pialliance_visits_canon.031314.1 When Canon U.S.A. Inc. opened its new corporate headquarters in Melville, NY, last year, it invited printers to use the facility’s elaborate showroom and demo center as a learning resource. On March 13, the Long Island division of Printing Industries Alliance (PIAlliance) became the first industry group to take Canon up on its offer by bringing more than 40 members to the site for a guided tour.

The 12,000-square-foot showroom is the centerpiece of a 700,000-square foot-building designed to promote Canon’s corporate philosophies as well as its technologies and products. Canon executives briefed the visitors on the layout and construction of the building, emphasizing the great lengths to which Canon has gone in order to make it sustainable and environmentally friendly. Product briefings followed, including overviews of some of Canon’s most advanced systems for production digital printing.

“Kyosei” is a Japanese word for the idea of living and working harmoniously—a concept that Canon says it strives to honor both as a profit-making business and as a responsible member of the communities where it operates. Environmental responsibility at all stages of the life cycle is paramount, and the headquarters building, the visitors were told, has been engineered to be as environmentally friendly 100 years from now as it is today.

Among the steps taken toward that goal was laying out the building in a way that permits 75% of it to receive natural light—an architectural strategy that cuts consumption of electricity. The structure has no indoor thermostats, relying instead on external sensors that modify the interior climate according to changes in temperature outside. Benches on the property’s park-like, 52-acre campus—formerly a pumpkin patch off Route 110—are made of recycled toner cartridges.

pialliance_visits_canon.031314.2Dennis Amorosano, vice president of the marketing division of Canon’s business information and imaging solutions group, gave the visitors a corporate overview of a $35.5 billion supplier of consumer, B2B, and industrial imaging technologies that employs more than 194,000 people worldwide. Amorosano said that Canon invested a sum equal to more than 8% percent of last year’s net sales in R&D and received 3,825 U.S. patents, making it the third-largest holder of U.S. patents in 2013.

The company had $2.2 billion in net income last year. 2013 also saw the completion of Canon’s integration of Océ, a digital print systems manufacturer it acquired in 2009. Frances Cicogna, commercial print segment manager, said that the Canon-Océ combination represents the industry’s broadest portfolio of solutions for cut-sheet and continuous production printing in color and black and white. In 2012, she said, Canon and Océ equipment produced 68 billion digital pages—about 20% of all digital pages output in the U.S.

Although the tour of the showroom focused mostly on production systems and workflow, it also familiarized the PIAlliance visitors with Canon’s extensive lines of consumer cameras and personal imaging products. The exhibit space—equal parts library, museum, and machine demo room—features numerous hands-on product stations and interactive displays that trace Canon’s history from its founding in the 1930s.

The showroom also houses examples of Canon technologies that are not well known to the general public, such as devices for medical exams and a “mixed reality” imaging system that can inject computer-generated graphics into real-time views of the physical world.

The Canon visit was one of a number of activities scheduled this year by PIAlliance’s Long Island chapter, which is chaired by Richard Schielke. Upcoming are a golf outing, a fishing trip, and a town hall-style meeting for members in May.

Printing Industries Alliance is a regional affiliate of Printing Industries of America (PIA), the national trade association for the graphic communications industry. Printing Industries Alliance represents graphics firms in New York State, northern New Jersey and northwestern Pennsylvania.

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Zenger Group Prepares for Productive Future with Speedmaster XL 106 Perfector from Heidelberg

030514.zengerboncraftFrom left, Zenger Group owners John Zenger, Joe Zenger, and Steve Zenger.

Zenger Group, Inc. reports the installation of a Heidelberg Speedmaster XL 106 eight-color perfector with Prinect Axis Control at its new corporate headquarters and plant in Tonawanda, NY. The new press takes the place of an early-generation Speedmaster XL 105 at the Zenger Group’s Orchard Park, NY facility, one of three plants to be consolidated into the new facility.

“We wanted the fastest, most productive, most reliable full-size press available to serve as the centerpiece of our sheetfed operation at the new facility,” said Steve Zenger, president and CEO. “Heidelberg presses are the benchmark in terms of production speed, output, and print stability throughout the industry.”

Capable of production speeds up to 18,000 sph in straight or perfecting mode, and with effective quality assurance via the Prinect Axis Control color measurement system, the new Speedmaster XL 106 will significantly increase Zenger Group’s capacity and broaden the scope of its manufacturing capabilities. Central control of the pressroom is managed via Prinect Pressroom Manager.

Zenger Group has been a leader and an innovative force in the western New York’s printing industry for more than 30 years.

DG3 Blasts Off into High-Volume Personalization with the Debut of Its HP T230 Color Inkjet Web Press

022714.DG3.HPT230.1On February 27, with rocket ship imagery and the acrobatics of a pair of glittering aerialists as the backdrop, the Diversified Global Graphics Group (DG3, Jersey City, NJ) launched an HP T230 color inkjet web press into an orbit it hopes to fill with richly colored variable print.

There to celebrate the liftoff were about 100 customers who now can add high-volume digital web printing to the array of services they buy from DG3, one of the top providers print and visual communication products in the Northeast.

The press, installed last November and put through its first full-scale production run a few weeks ago, is DG3’s latest investment in technologies aimed at broadening the range of the digital and conventional marketing resources it offers to a high-end business clientele.

“For me, it’s about custom communication,” said Thomas Saggiomo, president and CEO of the $150 million company. With the HP T230 in place, he said, “the challenge is to get clients to think creatively” about how it can help them personalize the ways they communicate with their customers via direct mail, marketing collateral, documents, and other kinds of work the press will be used to manufacture.

022714.DG3.HPT230.2Thomas Saggiomo, president and CEO, Diversified Global Graphics Group (DG3)

The HP T230 is the new centerpiece of a digital pressroom that also features a pair of cut-sheet HP Indigo six-color devices. Connected to the web press are finishing units for inline perforating, scoring, and cutting—key assets for achieving the kind of high-speed, high-volume integrated workflow that is essential for ROI with a press of this capacity. Close by are additional resources for post processing, including saddlestitching and perfect binding.

The HP T230 is the enhanced-output version of the HP T200, one of three T-series color inkjet web platforms available from HP. Designed to run a 22″ web (20.5″ image area) at speeds up to 400 feet per minute in duplexed mono or full color, the press can print with full variability on standard uncoated offset web stocks and compatible coated media. The ink set is CMYK, augmented by a liquid bonding agent that improves ink appearance and durability when uncoated stocks are used.

All of these performance features came into play in the production of the HP T230’s first job for DG3, a 650,000-piece run for a healthcare provider in which every copy contained unique data. Guests at the launch party got a smaller-scale but no less personalized demonstration of what the press can do in printed keepsakes that displayed their faces, photographed when they arrived, in three different formats on the cut and perfed sheet.

Joseph Lindfeldt, DG3’s executive vice president for corporate development, said that the HP T230 would go a long way toward helping customers achieve “collateral virtualization”: DG3’s term for print-on-demand workflows that eliminate the need to over-run and stockpile printed matter. The ability of the press to print variably in whatever quantity and on whatever schedule the customer wishes will “make fulfillment extinct as it relates to print collateral,” Lindfeldt said.

The high-volume capacity of the web press—HP puts its duty cycle at 50 million letter-sized impressions per month—also enables it to achieve production economies in personalized long runs that cut-sheet digital presses can’t match, according to Lindfeldt.

“This widens the gamut of print on demand,” he said.

Although DG3’s enthusiasm for its HP T230 is intense, the passion wasn’t kindled overnight. Lindfeldt said that before the purchase finally was announced at Print 13, he and other DG3 personnel had spent “a year and a half in a room with HP” making certain that the press would be the right platform for the customized solutions that DG3 offers to healthcare and insurance companies,  pharmaceutical manufacturers, advertising agencies, and other corporate customers.

Now the priority for DG3 is to fill “the big gap” that exists in the way some of these customers think about personalized digital printing and the data management issues that go along with it, Lindfeldt said.

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Also on hand for the launch was Aurelio Maruggi, HP’s vice president and general manager, who noted that other T-series customers have been successful with the same applications that DG3 plans to run on its HP T230. He said that one of every three color digital web presses currently sold by HP goes to a printer who already has one or more of the machines. Repeat customers know that the flexibility high-speed inkjet web printing gives them will be essential to keeping up with changing print market demands, according to Maruggi.

As DG3’s director of digital operations, Larry Durso shepherded the HP T230 from initial setup to readiness for full production. He praised the press for its ability to handle a wide range of stock weights with full ink coverage at or near full rated speed. The press is crewed by two operators who also tend the inline finishing equipment while runs are in progress, Durso said.

The HP T230 takes its place in a general production environment where high-speed, high volume-printing is routine. In addition to its digital printers, DG3 has one of the largest concentrations of offset litho equipment in the tristate metro area, including two eight-color and two six-color sheetfed presses and six webs. The company also has extensive capabilities for binding, finishing, mailing, and fulfillment.

Transitioning from offset to digital printing was not a factor in the decision to install the HP T230, Saggiomo said.