How to become a Pre-Press Technician
Official title: Pre-Press Technicians
Pre-press technicians proof and lay out text and images to produce images suitable for printing processes and other visual media.
Main tasks
- Operate digital cameras and phototypesetters to reproduce originals onto film, printing plates and digital output devices
- Combine graphics and text into files for printing and other visual media using computer applications
- Operate platemaking machines to make printing plates or other digital output from output film
- Operate electronic colour scanners to scan, separate, colour correct, mark up, design, combine, lay out and retouch images into film and four-colour separations, then make plates, rotary plates or other digital output from the film
- Produce digital and chemical proofs using digital systems, negative and positive film
- Set type by hand and with small proof presses
- Operate typesetting and type casting machines
- Lay out headings, borders, illustrations, tables and page numbers on printing plates
- Operate electric typewriters for phototypesetting on photographic paper or film
Ways in
- Technical college: Technician certificate: Pre-press. National technician skill test (技術士技能檢定) run by the Workforce Development Agency, trade 191 印前製程. Tested at grade B (乙級), grade C (丙級). Peernovo links this trade to the occupation.
Pay · Outlook · AI and this job
- Average pay: NT$457,000 a year
- Demand for Craft and related trades jobs is projected at about 1,519,000 in 2024 and about 1,515,000 in 2030. (-0.3%)
- Generative AI could change some tasks in this job, by the ILO's global estimate.
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Questions people ask
How do I become a Pre-Press Technician?
Ways in include: Technician certificate: Pre-press.
How much does a Pre-Press Technician earn in Taiwan?
Average pay is NT$457,000 a year (Ministry of Labor, Department of Statistics).
Is a Pre-Press Technician a growing career in Taiwan?
Demand for this job family is projected to change -0.3% from 2024 to 2030 (National Development Council).
Will AI change the work of a Pre-Press Technician?
Generative AI could change some tasks in this job, by the ILO's global estimate.
Sources
- Ministry of Labor, Department of Statistics: Occupational Wage Survey (職類別薪資調查) (2025 survey (July 2025 monthly, 2024 annual), released 2026-05-29), Open Government Data License, version 1.0, retrieved 4 October 2026
- National Development Council: Final manpower demand projections by occupation (職業別最終人力需求推估) (2025 to 2030 (base 2024), 13 job families), CC BY 4.0, retrieved 4 October 2026
- International Labour Organization, Generative AI and Jobs: A Refined Global Index of Occupational Exposure (ILO Working Paper 140, Gmyrek et al.) (ILO Working Paper 140, May 2025, Annex Table A1), CC BY 4.0, retrieved 4 October 2026
Updated 4 October 2026