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Digital colour comes of age - at last PDF Print E-mail
Written by Bill Parker, GMC Software Technology, 2007   

Over the last decade, digital printing technology has made significant progress. Many of its initial shortfalls have been overcome. Bill Parker, Managing Director of GMC Software Technology's UK operation, offers an overview of the business opportunities that digital printing can now offer. 

Who wants black and white TV? Soon we will be looking back on digital printing in the same way and wondering how we managed without the benefits of digital printing in colour.

Of course, the industry has been predicting a boom in colour digital printing for at least 10 years, and so far the take-up has been slow and sure rather than rocketing, as many had forecast in the early 1990s.

But with the advances in printing equipment and software over the same period, particularly in colour management, the technical barriers that put off potential users have been overcome. Now it really is possible to take advantage of the many exciting opportunities colour digital printing offers to benefit a business and more than compensate for the extra cost of printing in full colour and the effort of making the change.

Benefits

And the benefits are considerable, if the way digital colour is used is properly thought through.

In documents themselves, the intelligent use of colour adds to impact and clarity and provides the opportunity to add other information without causing confusion.

The flexibility of digital printing combines this versatility with high degrees of personalisation. New generation digital printing software makes it possible for marketing, promotional and financial communications to be combined in a single document, governed by pre-set rules. Digital printing means that in theory every letter or bill could be different, not just with the financial data, but everything else too - from highlights of relevant deals and offers, which tie in with the recipient's trading profile, to recent phone communications, problems, enquiries and topical local advice. For utilities and financial service providers, who regularly need to communicate by post, this has obvious attractions.

Instead of multiple communications from different departments in the same business and the proliferation of loose inserts, which usually end up in the bin, this 'joined-up' approach not only reduces postage and printing costs, it is much more likely to hold the customer's attention. We already know from extensive research that the one document virtually guaranteed to be read is a bill or financial statement.

Clever use of colour will help to differentiate and reinforce any printed messages. It makes it easier to separate financial information from promotional details and product or service advice from marketing messages. Cross-selling and upselling using transactional documents become much easier and more likely to be successful. This could involve colour images of products, for example.

It also means an end to stocks of pre-printed stationery, even the smallest number - one if necessary- of any document can be printed on demand in any colour without the loss of quality and using plain paper stock. This can apply to everything from letterheads to bills and statements. Offset printing of stationery, on the other hand, involves the production of plates, set-up time and minimum run lengths. There are lead times, deliveries, scheduling, stock holding and management and other implications.

Early experience

As with most technologies, we can look to the US to see where and how colour digital printing is likely to make the most impact. Studies there1 show that over the five years up to 2009, high-speed colour digital printing is likely to soar in volume and value so that by 2009, of the estimated $13.2 billion turnover in digital print, the majority ($10.4 billion) will be colour.

It is expected that the need to keep up with the competition will become a motivating factor. Once one company switches to colour for its customer documentation, others will have to follow if they are to maintain their market image. There is also increased confidence in the new generation of inks, toners, software and printers and their ability to deliver the sort of colour print quality that once could only be achieved with conventional printing. Digital paper is also readily available so the costs of this and other consumables continue to come down.

There are other issues that early experience in this field has already thrown up2. Colour needs to be used to highlight and improve understanding, not to distract. Designs and layout will have to be carefully thought through and it may well mean a radical rethink of document presentation if the full advantages of colour digital technology are to be realised. There is a resistance to change in some types of document, particularly transactional material, from both customers and the businesses that send them.

It must also be remembered that something like 8 per cent of the population suffer from colour blindness, so colour should not be the only differentiator, and high contrast in colour selection is advisable. It is also important to be aware of the symbolism of different colours to different cultures and societies.

To make the most of this 'joined up' approach to customer communications, it needs traditional barriers with the communicating organisation to be overcome too. Now, where bills and statements are the province of finance and IT operations, for example, marketing and commercial departments could and should be able to have an input.

Then there are the production issues - colour digital printing means much larger file sizes, which can slow down operations. The printers themselves need more highly skilled operators who can continually calibrate equipment so that the colours remain consistent regardless of temperature, humidity and the age of consumables, such as photo cells. Some images have transparent areas too, which may not be printed as displayed, since many front-end devices don't support transparency properly.

Colour management

At the end of the day, however, the real key to the success, or otherwise, of digital printing in colour must be in the colour management itself. If it is to succeed it is vital that colours can be accurately and consistently matched, as we are used to in the familiar Pantone system used in conventional print production. Design, marketing and commercial staff also need to be able to see colours on screen as they will appear before printing and agree on the use of colour, design and personalised information.

In this, current software has progressed in leaps and bounds allowing real time job tracking within integrated document management and data handling environments. A business is able to install a completely integrated software solution for personalised document design, composition, production, online collaboration/approval and Internet-hosted services. It bridges the gap between the world of design and communication and the world of IT, implementation and production by offering a single, integrated IT environment with multiple 'touch points' accessible to every sector of a business and to any staff with average computer skills.

This means that personnel from any department can have equal input to digitally printed material to bring their various skills to bear in the way colour is used. The technical reproduction of colour, virtually on screen, and in print, has progressed equally.
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No longer need it just be RGB. Software, and printers, are now process (CYMK) capable. ICC colour profiles are in-built in the software and digital printers are able to faithfully reproduce this colour faster (more than 60 pages a minute) and more accurately than ever before. The quality gap between conventional and digital colour printing is getting narrower all the time

It won't be all plain sailing, but we can confidently predict that we will all be thinking, and printing, in digital colour in the near future.

All the components are in place: digital colour printing has at last come of age.

References

1. Info Tech Inc.
2. Madison Advisers.
 
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