To adapt a printing press of fixed cutoff to a printing press of variable cutoff, by maintaining the size of a blanket cylinder.

A blanket cylinder 10 contacts a plate cylinder sleeve 13 through a first nip and a web 20 passes through a second nip. An ink pattern is transferred to a blanket cylinder sleeve 14 through the first nip and the ink pattern is transferred from the sleeve 14 to the web through the second nip. A control means controls a drive means to make the circumferential speed of a sleeve of a plate cylinder 12 equal to that of the sleeve 14 at the first nip. The diameter of the sleeve 14 is variable and the length of a printing image varies in proportion to the variable outer diameter, maintaining the outer diameter of the blanket cylinder sleeve 10 at a constant value.