 Pride and excitement is running through the plant at the U.S. Government Printing Office. For the first time ever, employees are printing the official photograph of the President of the United States. This is our biggest job. This is the biggest job we've ever run, the President's photo. And it means a lot to us to get this right. This being almost an historic event, First African American President, I am very happy to be able to work on this project. The President of the United States, I was overjoyed that someone even recommended me to run this particular job down here, and I was just ecstatic. GPO employees are printing 130,000 official photographs of President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden, which will be hung in more than 7,000 federal installations managed by the General Services Administration. The public can also purchase their photograph of the nation's 44th President, Public Printer Bob Tappella and Deputy Public Printer Paul Erickson congratulate employees on a job well done. The presidential portrait is a high honor for the employees of the Government Printing Office. This portrait will hang in government office buildings all over the country and our employees will be able to point with pride that it was done at the Government Printing Office. But before the photographs are wrapped and shipped out across the country, the printing process actually begins with a phone call. A White House Representative contacts GPO's Print Procurement Office. An agency representative works with the White House on the specifications of the President's photograph. That information is then handed off to GPO's plant. The first stop is an area called PostScript. This is where a digital image of the President's photograph is sent. GPO's Jeremy Gelb takes the White House specifications in PDF file and crops it down to a printable version. That file is then sent to pre-press and the plate room. GPO employees make aluminum plates of the President's image to fit the sheets that will be printed. The files will go into what they call a rep. The rep will then image four plates. They will image a blue, which is magenta, cyan, black and yellow plate, which will form one image. Color bars will be added so the press operator can adjust the color once the plates are put onto the four-color press. This press can produce up to 15,000 print sheets an hour. A tech review team reviews all aspects of the photograph to be sure it is in compliance with the White House specifications. This scanning densitometer reads the color bars to keep consistency throughout the job. That keeps consistent color tones as far as shadows, highlights and mid-tones. It also ensures that our flesh tones are correct. It's the President of the United States and we want to keep him looking consistent and as good as possible. The photographs then head to GPO's bindery for the final step in the process. Employees use an electronic cutter to set the sizes and make the perfect cut. It gives you an accurate cut. If you want eight and a half, the machine agamagically sets you up for eight and a half. It dials right in. GPO is producing three sizes of the President's photograph, 8x10, 11x14 and 20x24. When the cutting is complete, this historic photograph is wrapped and shipped out to federal agencies and to the public. GPO has a long history of craftsmanship. It's been evidence since we opened our doors in 1861 and I think this is just another example of the great work coming out of our plant. GPO employees have been keeping American formed on the documents of our democracy for nearly 150 years. During that time, GPO has produced many historic documents of our nation's history. Employees can now be proud to add the official photograph of the President of the United States to their historic collection.