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Imposition Modes — which one, and when

Imposition is half the costing: how the job lands on the sheet decides how many sheets you buy, how many clicks or plates you pay for, and how long the guillotine runs. The PressCal calculator has 7 imposition modes — you pick them from the bar above the canvas. Here is what each one does and when a printer reaches for it.

Two choices, not one

The calculator asks two questions, and it is easy to notice only one of them:

  • The mode says how the job lands on the sheet. It is geometry: get it wrong and you see it on the canvas straight away.
  • The archetype — Sheet, Pad, Booklet, Perfect Bound, Die-cut — says what the product is, and above all what the quantity field counts. It is arithmetic: get it wrong and the canvas is right while the price is not.

An example that costs money: 100 pads of 25 sheets.

  • As a Pad, you type quantity 100 and SHEETS/PAD 25. The calculator works out 2,500 leaves.
  • As a Sheet, you type quantity 2,500, because there the quantity counts leaves.

The imposition on the canvas is identical either way. Choose Sheet and type 100, though, and the job is costed at a twenty-fifth of itself — with nothing on screen to say so. Pick the archetype first: it narrows the modes on offer and opens the fields your job needs.

N-Up

The everyday mode: many copies of the same piece on one sheet — business cards, flyers, single sheets, stickers. Enter the piece size and quantity and the calculator works out how many fit (columns × rows) — you immediately see Pieces per sheet and Imposition sheets (print).

Example: 1,000 business cards at 90×50 mm. Enter the size, then try Rotate 90° — changing the orientation often squeezes in an extra row and drops the sheet count. If you need a specific layout (say, to match the guillotine's cutting program), set columns/rows manually.

Booklet

Saddle-stitched booklet, up to ~64 pages. Pages go into 4-page signatures, which is why the page count must be a Multiple of 4. Example: a 16-page A5 booklet — each A3 sheet carries 8 pages (4 front, 4 back), so 2 sheets per copy. PressCal computes the signatures automatically and paginates your PDF.

Because the inner signatures push outward as the paper gets thicker, you enter PAPER THICKNESS (MM) and creep control shifts the content per sheet — so page numbers don't get trimmed off at the edge. On export you get reverse order and a separate body/cover split.

Perfect Bound

Perfect binding — books and catalogs of 50+ pages. Body and cover are independent: the cover has its own paper, its own machine, its own bleed, and its spread includes the Spine computed from paper thickness × pages.

Two paths for the body: Offset (Press) — classic signatures for folding and gathering, the way the bindery wants them; or digital flat — sheets printed front/back with no folding, the way a digital press delivers them. There is also a gang option: several titles share the same run (TITLES PER SHEET), each title with its own PDF.

Cut & Stack

Numbered work that must come off the guillotine in the right order: receipt books, tickets, NCR forms. The mode distributes numbering stack-first: you cut, stack the piles on top of each other, and the pad counts 1, 2, 3… with no hand collating.

Enter Numbering from – to (e.g. 1–500) and the quantity fills in by itself. Drag the number into place right on the canvas or type exact X/Y, with size in pt, rotation 0°/90°/180°/270°, a prefix (e.g. "NO."), Helvetica or Courier, black or red. What you see on the canvas is exactly what prints in the PDF.

Gang Run

Several different jobs on the same sheet — 3 different flyers together, sharing paper, setup, and waste. Each cell can carry its own PDF; load one multi-page PDF and it splits into jobs automatically. With the picker you click a job, then click the cells it should take, and the Gang Run Summary shows how many copies each job yields in the end. The export is a single PDF with crop marks for everything.

Step Multi

Freeform layout, for whatever doesn't fit the other modes: mixed sizes on one sheet — a label next to a card. Each block has its own PDF, dimensions, and rotation (Add block), and you place it anywhere on the sheet.

Work & Turn / Work & Tumble

Two sides from one plate set: front and back sit together on the same form; you print, flip the pile, print again, and cut the sheet in half. Half the plates, one makeready — the classic way to run two-sided work on an offset press without a perfector. Turn = flip on the long axis (same gripper edge); Tumble = flip on the short axis (the gripper edge changes). Example: an A2 poster printed both sides on 70×100.

The back side: Facing, Turn/Tumble, Tête-bêche

On any two-sided job you control how the back lands — and you see it in the preview:

  • Facing — the back with the correct flip, so front and back line up at the cut.
  • Turn — back mirrored left-right: book work, heads on the same edge. Tumble — mirrored top-bottom: calendars, heads on opposite edges.
  • Tête-bêche (alternate 180°) — neighbouring copies rotated 180°, for shapes that interlock and save paper.

Bleed, gutter, and the canvas

Bleed defaults to 3 mm around every piece; the gutter is the gap between pieces, with a separate value per axis once you unlock Linked gutter. Job with no bleed (an internal form, say)? Set bleed to 0 — more pieces fit on the sheet.

The canvas is live: drag the handle to change the grid, rotate pieces 90°, switch on crop marks (or File Crop Marks taken from the file itself). And the golden rule: the preview IS the PDF — what you see on the canvas is exactly what downloads on Export, ready for the press or the platemaker.

Which archetype and which mode, job by job

  • Business cards, flyers, posters, single sheets → Sheet + N-Up. The quantity counts pieces.
  • Numbered pads (receipts, tickets, dockets) → Pad + Cut & Stack, with numbering on. The quantity counts pads.
  • Pads without numbering (notepads, planners) → Pad + N-Up. The quantity counts pads.
  • NCR pads (carbonless paper) → Pad with an NCR paper. The quantity counts sets.
  • Saddle-stitched booklets → Booklet + Booklet. The quantity counts books, and the pages must be a multiple of 4.
  • Perfect-bound books → Perfect Bound + Perfect Bound, choosing offset or digital inside the mode settings. The quantity counts books.
  • Several small jobs on one sheet → Sheet + Gang Run. Each job carries its own quantity.
  • Different sizes on the same sheet → Sheet + Step Multi. The quantity counts pieces.
  • Two sides from one set of plates → Sheet + Work & Turn. The quantity counts pieces.
  • Stickers and labels with a cutting die → Die-cut + N-Up or Step Multi. The quantity counts pieces.

Each archetype opens its own fields too: SHEETS/PAD on a pad, PAGES on a booklet, BODY PAGES on a perfect-bound book. If one of them is missing from the screen, you are on the wrong archetype.