Nesting Strategies

Nesting is a process whereby as much width of the paper as possible is utilized by aligning or rotating many separate images before the job is printed.

Available options Description
Automatic Nesting Images are placed automatically according to the minimum paper usage (similar to the command Automatic Placement in the Manual Job Manager). Disadvantage: Less control on the job layout (only predefined settings for image rotation available). Advantage: Useful for nesting images in different sizes and orientations, maximum savings on print media.
Print Single Image per Job Strictly speaking, this option is not a real nesting strategy, as only one image is placed per print job. This method is not used for saving print media, but is especially useful for production of photographic prints or for large-format printing (for example, newspaper proofs), where nesting would be inappropriate. Centered images are centered not only horizontally, but also vertically. This way, you are able to create sheet-like jobs such as DIN A4 or letter on roll media to ensure a uniform and pleasant visual appearance of proof jobs.
Single Line Nesting Images are placed automatically according to the minimum paper usage, but only up to a single row of images in the nested job. The job is printed as soon as the defined percentage of paper width has been filled with images. Disadvantage: Offers less savings on print media than the Automatic Nesting mode. Advantage: You do not need to cut the print medium manually to separate multiple rows of nested images.
One Input File per Job For multipage PDFs. All pages of one PDF document are printed in one proof job. Each page of a PDF is considered to be a separate image. The job is printed as soon as all pages of the document have been placed.

Nesting strategies that handle multiple images such as Automatic Nesting have two components:

  • Rules for the automatic placement of images on the print medium, including automated image transformations such as scaling or cropping
  • Rules for finishing the nesting state and printing the job: Either time based (job is printed after a predefined time) or after a predefined paper usage is reached. Rules are validated after all new images from the hotfolder have been placed in the job.

You can check the layout of a job in Nesting status in the info pane and prematurely start printing by using the Print command from the context menu of a selected job.