We just wrapped up our December issue, which is now at the printer. Senior editor Ron Kovach and I have been walking you through various aspects of the editorial and production process; today I'll touch on what happens after an issue has gone through Editorial and Art. Don't hold me on every detail, but the basics are all there.

Once an issue is "preflighted," which literally means ready to go to the printer, all pages have been put into PDF format and sent to the printer via an FTP Internet line, which allows for the transfer of extremely large files. The printer, Schumann Printers of Fall River, Wis., prepares the final files and posts them on the Internet for one last look before they go to press. I simply scroll through the pages online, looking for obvious errors (headline misspellings, "folio" or page-number errors, etc.). This beats the old system, which was in place when The Writer moved to Milwaukee in 2000, when hard copies were shuttled between publisher and printer. During the final proof, errors were marked on photosensitive paper in blue—hence the term "blueline proof."

Once Editorial, Art, and Advertising sign off on this last proof, the printer gets the go-ahead to plate each page and set up the press for printing. We'll receive copies of the December issue later this month; subscribers will start seeing their copies at the end of October; and newsstand copies will show up during the first week of November.

--Jeff Reich, editor

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