Craig Bush
Freelance Pre-Press Specialist – Self employed
Hire this person
Send a job offer directly to this candidate
About
I have a long-standing career in print pre-press, starting as an apprentice film planner and progressing to senior roles. I am skilled in working independently or within teams, motivated, organized, and eager to learn and advance in the industry.
Experience
Freelance Pre-Press Specialist at Print-Ready Perfection (2025-12 – Present)
I help designers, print shops, publishers, and packaging companies prepare flawless, press-ready files for offset and digital printing. I ensure your artwork is technically perfect before going to print.
- File preflight & error fixing
- RGB to CMYK conversion
- Bleed, trim & safe margin setup
- Font embedding /outlining
- Image resolution correction
- Packaging dieline setup
- Imposition layout
- Print-ready PDF (PDF/X-1a, PDF/X-4)
- Fast turnaround • Detail-oriented • Print production.
Head of Studio - Pre Press / Artworker/Mac operator / CTP at Thames Technology Ltd (2015-09 – 2025-11)
Managing all aspects of the Studio which dealt in Secure Financial and Retail work. busy studio creating print ready art-works for Financial Bank cards for customers - Visa, Mastercard, Store cards for customers Amazon, Tesco's, Sainsbury's, JD sports, Nike, Decathlon, Costa, Nando's, and other UK and global brands in which strict corporate guidelines have to be adhered to. Daily Duties consist of:
- Meeting tight print deadlines
- Chasing artwork or general information from Account managers
- Preflighting all artwork and customer supplied files for quality and resolution
- Creating pdf /jpeg files for customer proofs and Epson proofs for internal account managers
- Creating print ready files for Internal and external printing
- Creating Impositions on the DFE and imposing print ready pdfs for the HP Indigo 35K Digital Press
- Creating Impositions and imposing print ready pdfs on the Screen TrueFlow rip for CTP output
- Colour corrections to match previous artwork or customer supplied literature
- Running retransfer /Bureau card proofs on the EDI secure retransfer printer
- Ordering stock for the studio and general house keeping of all equipment
- Booking engineers for Screen CTP & Fuji equipment
Studio Operator / Customer Service Executive at EWO Media/Essex Web Offset (2014-10 – 2015-07)
Working in the busy digital studio handling jobs for the litho, large format, and the screen presses, from pre-flight stage to press and liaising with customers regarding orders and artwork specifications and requirements.
Repro/Mac/Digital press operator at FM Print/ELLE Media Ltd (2006-07 – 2014-10)
Managing all aspects of the digital pre-press department. From stock ordering to service & calibration of equipment to fogra standards. Job briefs, job setup, trouble shooting files & pre-flighting with pitstop pro to create print ready pdfs for the Epson styus pro 9890 & 7880 large format printers, Heildelberg B1 10 colour, Komori B2 10 colour, Litho presses, & Konica bizhub pro C6501 & C8000 digital presses. Creating customer proofs (pdfs, epsons, hard copys on the Konica press, lasers). Using all the latest softwares, Adobe Creative Suite 4, 5, 6, Quark7, Quark8, Acrobat pro 7/8, Pitstop pro 7.
Microsoft
Office, Darwin Desktop for setting of variable data driven documents/artwork & proofing. Creating impositions in flatworker, Print ready Pdf's then ripped in trueflow se 7.20 for Epson proofs then plates, Also using EQUIOS-Pre4mClient.
Mac operator/Ctp operator, Coda operator at Delta Display Ltd (2004-11 – 2006-07)
Working in the busy digital studio handling jobs for the litho, large format, and the screen presses, from pre-flight stage to press, using all the latest softwares Quark 5/6, Adobe cs/cs2, Acrobat pro 7, Acrobat distiller, also running a luscher xpose ctp system, and a Kongsberg coda system
Repro operator, Mac/film/plates at Heronsgate Print Ltd (2002-10 – 2004-08)
Working in a very busy pre-press studio covering repro duties, Type amends, postscript/pdf creation, large format posters, digital proofs, ctp, film, plates.
Repro operator, Mac/planning/plates at Wednesday Press Ltd (2002-01 – 2002-10)
Controlling the repro/pre-press department.
Repro operator, Mac/ctp/film/plates at Carlton Barclay Group (1998 – 2002)
Controlling jobs from mac to press on a continental shift system.
Night overseer/filmplanner at Nuffield Webb Plc (1993 – 1998)
Over a period of five years overseeing all work aspects, and controlling repro/pre-press.
Final film planner/platemaker at Itp Print (1993 – 1993)
Over a period of eight months i ensured the production quality within the pre-press.
Apprentice final film planner/platemaker at Thamesmouth Printing Company (1988 – 1993)
Completing a four year apprenticeship, covering all aspects of the trade, Also day release at barking print college, Serving five years altogether within the company.
Education
Day release – barking print college
