Reasonable selection of the hottest digital proofi

Reasonable selection of digital proofing system

digital proofing system was first applied in gravure plate making industry in China. Two years ago, the largest gravure plate making enterprise in China at that time ordered dozens of proofing systems after a detailed investigation. The software used lor tuner and the hardware used the previous generation of Epson Pro 5500. Due to the reasonable system configuration, considerate supplier service and high quality of operators, it still plays a great role in the production process. Since then, almost all other gravure plate making enterprises in China have adopted such a digital proofing system

Epson (China) has successively launched large format inkjet printers more suitable for proofing in the Chinese market: Epson Pro 5500, pro 7000, pro 1000. With the coal price falling 0, the hardware foundation of the digital proofing system has been solved. With the introduction of CMS color management software and the addition of relevant foreign software, digital proofing has begun to be promoted on a large scale in the color commercial printing and color newspaper industries. At the beginning, it was difficult for printing houses to accept the concept of digital proofing, mainly wondering about points, color restoration, cost and other issues. However, after a large number of media publicity, large-scale exhibitions, tours, seminars and other activities of Epson and founder of Peking University, as well as the adoption of several famous printing enterprises such as Yachang, Nippon, Zhonghua business, shanghai art, the United States and Shanghai, as well as the promotion of domestic printing experts, finally, The color printing market like ice is moving. Now ask the director of any printing factory with a four-color printing machine, and he can say a few advantages of digital proofing over traditional proofing. For the hardware part of the digital proofing system, manufacturers' views are more similar. Larger printing plants choose Epson style Pro 10000, and smaller printing plants or plate making plants choose Epson style Pro 7000; The choice of software part is relatively confused. Generally, it is recommended by various vendors, and customers see the effect. In addition, for the most important part of the system - pre-sales and after-sales service, many users are not very clear about what kind of service can ensure the maximum role of the system. The following discusses several key issues such as the concept, purchase and service of digital proofing system one by one

I. comparison between digital proofing and traditional proofing

Digital Proofing is an important part of the printing digital process. In this sense, digital proofing and traditional proofing are not comparable. In the next few years, the digitization of printing plants will be faster and faster, the timeliness will be stronger and stronger, and the requirements for print quality will be higher and higher. The traditional print proofing can not make all processes of print production meet people's needs, so printing plants need digital proofing, which is the most convenient and fast proofing method at present. In fact, large prepress and printing equipment manufacturers have abandoned the production of traditional proofing machines in the world. At present, with more and more printing color management software and stronger functions, digital proofing will enable each printing factory to establish its own printing color standards, and then realize the color standards of the printing industry

second, which machine is more suitable for proofing

many large format inkjet printers claim to be used for digital proofing, and some dealers apply it in the system scheme. How to choose depends on the following points

1. inkjet mode: at present, there are two inkjet modes for large format inkjet printers: thermal spray (thermal foaming) mode and piezoelectric mode. The thermal spray method is that the ink is heated by the air in the ink head to produce pressure to eject ink drops. When the ink drops eject, some are vertical and some are oblique, with strong randomness. The particles of the ink drops are coarse. In January 2016, it was renamed as Allianz resin group, which is rough and obvious, specifically manifested in fine lines. This method can be used in spray-painted advertising pictures, but it can not show the fineness of fine lines such as hair in printed materials, nor can it have a good level of performance. Epson series large format machines are all in fine piezoelectric mode. The ink droplets are ejected on demand by electric signals. The ink droplets are concentrated, with high precision and good accuracy. Therefore, the font output of large format machines using piezoelectric mode is clearer and the image level is richer

2. accuracy: large format inkjet printers can basically reach more than 1000dpi, and digital proofing can generally use 720dpi. The accuracy above 1000dpi mainly depends on the size of ink drop particles. The Epson large format inkjet printer SP1000 ink drop particles can reach 5pl. People can't directly see the ink dots with their eyes. This is the concept of pointless printing, which realizes a smooth transition in the highlight part of the portrait

3. speed: on the premise of ensuring accuracy, the speed of digital proofing is particularly important. At present, the thermal spraying machine adopts increasing ink holes for general plastic parts and increasing the number of ink heads to improve the speed, which will increase the maintenance cost of the machine. Due to the limitation of thermal spray method, the accuracy will be lost if the speed is increased again, which is a contradiction that is difficult to solve. Epson large format inkjet printer not only adopts piezoelectric inkjet method to improve accuracy, but also adopts intelligent ink drop transformation technology to improve speed. When high accuracy is required, it can output 5pl ink drops to ensure clear image; In some places with large color blocks, use large ink drops to spray paint and improve the speed. In this way, accuracy and speed can be achieved. It takes only minutes to output a split sample (using Epson 10000), which is not inferior to any thermal spraying machine that claims to be the fastest

4. equipment price and use cost: the current price of Epson style Pro 10000 is 93000 yuan, which is a very favorable price. The use cost is mainly the cost of consumed materials. Taking Pro 10000 as an example, the price of 500ml ink per box is 876 yuan, with an average of 1.752 yuan per ml. Epson also has an ink use promotion plan. For major customers, 3 boxes will be sent for each 12 boxes purchased, so that each ml is only about 1.4016 yuan. Moreover, Epson printer itself is relatively ink-saving. In terms of paper materials, the price of special paper for proofing is 25 yuan/m2

5. There is a good prospect to choose Epson large format inkjet printer when choosing digital proofing system: most printing plants in Europe, the United States and Japan choose Epson equipment for digital proofing. According to statistics, there are about 500 sets of digital proofing systems in use in China, of which more than 470 are Epson large format inkjet printers. Printer inks of different brands are also different. It is difficult to maintain good color communication with most of the same industry with other printers. This damage is long-term and fatal

third, the choice of digital proofing software

with the increasing maturity of digital proofing system, many companies at home and abroad have followed up and launched their own color management software. There is a conceptual problem here. There is a big difference between the software used for digital proofing and the powerful color management software. The theoretical basis of color management lies in the bridge of intermediate conversion independent of the color system of the equipment. If the color adjustment function is achieved simply by manually adjusting the color curve, it can only be called color adjustment software, which does not have the function of color management. A complete digital proofing system first reads the customer's color code samples, and then calculates with the built-in standard color code values. In the calculation process, the color system independent of the device will be used to convert the color values between color systems, and finally generate ICC profile files

this ICC profile file will be automatically compensated every time the sample is output to get the desired digital proofing sample. In this process, one part is completed by special color reading equipment, and the other part is slightly adjusted manually. It is often encountered that most of the colors of an image are accurate, but there is still a deviation in the color of a certain place, so a real digital proofing software with spot color management function and local color adjustment function according to the region is required. Using it, even if a region is selected for color adjustment, it will not affect the color of other parts, so that the color management function of digital proofing software will play a role

IV. selection of pre-sales and after-sales services

when choosing a digital proofing system, we must see whether the supplier has a rich foundation in printing, whether there is a special color matching equipment, and whether there is a standard light source system. After confirmation, you should also ask the supplier for standard color code documents and several sample drawings with large color contrast and rich layers, and do output, proofing and printing tests in your common environment. At the same time, let the supplier make corresponding color curves according to the environment, and manually fine tune them until you get your own satisfactory sample drawings and ICC profiles suitable for your own color compensation. In practical application, several different inks and different papers may be used, so try to make several color compensation documents for application

after purchasing the digital proofing system, in addition to training in the use of software and hardware, hardware manufacturers should also be able to provide certain after-sales services. For example, Epson has launched the "heart to heart" service plan. Users only need to pay a relatively low fee at one time, and they can get free maintenance services in the later long service period. At the same time, they will also enjoy rapid response speed, door-to-door maintenance and other services. In addition, users must also have access to long-term channels to provide proofing materials, so that they can enjoy the new experience brought by digital proofing