Color Management of Cigarette Packaging Design(II)

Color Management of Cigarette Packaging Design(II)

 

Editor's note: The successful implementation of color management requires not only the introduction of advanced tools by printing companies, but also the ability of users to use and manage these companies.

 

Requirements for contract proofing

While there are a variety of proofing options available to printing customers, the focus of this article is on contract proofing -- which is very important to both the printing buyer and the printing house. Because this proof can play the role of contract, so it is also very strict on the color management requirements. Let's take a look at the specific color management requirements of this proofing system.

 

Color accuracy and repeatability: These concepts can often be confusing. Accuracy refers to how close a particular proof is to the ideal color. Think about the speed detector in your car! If it's accurate, then when it says you're going 90 MPH, you might actually be speeding.

 

Repeatability measures how stable or consistent something is over a given period of time. Of these two factors, repeatability is more important than accuracy. If the proofing system doesn't print exactly the colors you want, but it always produces the same results, you'll get used to it and you'll even be able to predict what the proofing will look like. However, if the effect of proofing can not be repeated, or can not be consistent, then its accuracy is not in question.

 

Our analysis of cars shows the importance of repeatability. You may know your speed meter is inaccurate, but it's repeatable. For example, when it says 45 miles per hour, you know you're actually going 55 miles per hour. If it does that every day, then you won't get a ticket if you drive your car on the highway at 45 MPH or less on the speedometer. But if the speed meter isn't consistent enough, by the time it says 45 MPH the next day, you might actually be going more than 65 MPH.

 

Proofing requires both accuracy and repeatability. The accuracy of proofing is still a hot topic of discussion in the industry today. As you can see at the IPA and other trade shows, well-made proofing systems generally have high accuracy. Some equipment manufacturers even claim that their proofing tolerance is within 2 Delta E. However, when you are evaluating the repeatability of a system and trying to integrate it with multiple systems, the accuracy of the proofing becomes very important because each system has a certain amount of error. Imagine if there were ten proofing systems in ten places, and each system had two Delta E errors, how much error would add up!

 

Verification Standards: It is essential for printing production to have each contract proof meet certain standards. Although this concept is relatively unfamiliar to many people, it is the most basic means of quality control in every printing production. In the case of cars, a driver's license is a radar gun in the hands of the police. It determines whether your performance meets the requirements of the relevant criteria. It may be difficult for customers and printers to determine which standard to choose, but validation procedures are essential to any production process.

 

Matching of local and remote proofing and local proofing: In a proofing environment with multiple decentralized systems, proofing locations must be stable. With the upgrading of prepress system, the popularization of broadband network and the emergence of globalization, remote proofing system has become a magic weapon for the printing house to maintain its competitive advantage.

 

With the strong support of software, hardware and technical services, content providers can modify and confirm the final printed content and color proofing locally through a remote proofing system, rather than having to travel to the printing plant. The process is so fast that it not only saves on delivery fees, but also allows the printer to make last-minute changes to the document before going to press. In today's market, it has become quite common for print clients, advertising agencies and print service providers in different places to collaborate.

 

In this case, there are more important factors to consider than accuracy and repeatability.

Setting up a local proofing system is relatively easy. You can define your own color standards, print out test charts, and see if it meets your standards. But the cost and complexity of scaling this form to multiple systems -- and spreading it around or around the world -- increases dramatically.

So let's think about the simplest case. In general, remote system operators have no formal color management training, and they have no idea what changes they are making to the environment mean. Someone might say, "Wow, this screen demo looks so much better because I adjusted the brightness and contrast."

 

If you are using a display-based remote color proofing solution, there are very strict requirements on the surrounding environment and hardware, especially the control monitor Settings to create an ideal soft proofing environment. Because of this, screen proofing is currently used more in the layout and content correction stages. It allows printers to send proof drafts to customers early in production, so they don't know what the final print will look like until it's made.

 

Hard copy remote color proofing also puts forward high requirements on the environment and tools. For example, the lack of color separation calibration and characterization files can complicate remote proofing. To achieve high quality contract proofing on multiple remote ICC proofing systems, the characteristic description file for each proofing machine must be optimized and sometimes manually adjusted by the operator. This model is inherently error-prone, labor-intensive, and difficult to manage. Fortunately, we have now found a solution that can replace it.

 

User environment and skills: Things are easier when the proofing system is limited to the printing house. A good printing plant generally has a master of color knowledge of technical personnel, the distance between the press and the press is relatively close. Today, with proofing pervading the entire workflow, many users, especially those in the field, have difficulty with these prerequisites. Also, many companies are trying to use the same product in different production environments.

 

A successful solution starts with an accurate and objective assessment of the environment, both locally and externally. Does the user have the color management knowledge and care enough about the consistency of the system? Do they have enough control over their surroundings, such as lighting, temperature and humidity? Does their network have enough bandwidth? Who will be responsible for installing and maintaining the proofing system? Who knows when the system needs maintenance or has advanced maintenance techniques? How will proofs be verified? Is the user willing to invest in a color work management system -- to set up a system and maintain it?

 

A well-monitored system can be used in a variety of fields and environments, but the above variables will continue to affect color consistency as the location of the sample is changed. [next]

 

At this time, hard copy proofing has become the ideal choice for most printers/printing buyers. Nevertheless, screen proofing has been recognized by more and more users. Our current experience is that most successful screen proofing systems are installed where the user can directly participate in color management and environmental control. Screen contract proofing, like all proofing systems, requires calibration of the display and closed-loop testing to verify the calibration status of the display. Only in this way can repeatability and accuracy of color be guaranteed.

 

If people can follow these requirements strictly, then screen proofing can become a viable solution. In the process of implementation, people also need to use expensive systems to control the variables on local and foreign sites. When customers check the calibration of the display, they must use quality inspection tools and ensure that the surrounding environment is in compliance with requirements. Time Inc., for example, recently introduced a screen proofing system and is pleased with how well it works. Time Inc. has the ability to require and control all of its dealer systems to ensure that they work properly. While most of us may be reluctant to accept this type of collaboration and control, the growing trend of screen proofing systems is likely to continue because, when used correctly, they can save users significant costs and production time.

 

In the same way, the user of a hard proofing system must be able to ensure that the printer's color is consistent. If not, they are better off introducing a proofing system that automatically adjusts and calibrates.

 

Total cost of ownership

From our experience so far, many companies do not take into account other expenses associated with buying and operating the proofing system when calculating the cost of the system. Printing buyers also have the same problem, they tend to focus only on a style, such as the cost of substrate or consumables, and ignore labor costs and other factors. In this case, the best approach is to calculate the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of the proofing system. This is a technique that helps organizations evaluate, manage, and reduce all the costs associated with an organization acquiring an asset over a time frame. These assets might be: factory buildings, vehicles, or software systems. The purchase cost of hardware and software is the easiest factor to consider. The cost of consumables is also easy to calculate, but few users can think of the cost of changing consumables. For example, how do you know if your ink and paper supplier (whether intentional or not) is providing you with a product that doesn't meet specifications? Do you have the tools and procedures to inspect all of your facilities in the field? How much does it cost to keep it that way?

 

Many users factor in the lifetime of these systems when calculating the cost of hardware projects and infrastructure (network costs, physical space, etc.). In addition to maintenance costs, the path and cost of upgrading will also account for a large proportion of the total cost of ownership of the system.

 

Experienced users, when calculating labor costs, will not only take into account the cost of installing equipment and training staff, but also the cost of future training and maintenance. In the same way, they also consider the cost of replacing and upgrading color standards and characterization files over time. For example, ICC based proofing systems are inherently difficult to adapt to global standards in a decentralized environment.

 

Some may think that a screen proofing system is not too expensive, but for high-end displays, this is a false concept. Even low-end systems may cost money to correct correctly. Display-based proofing systems require both an investment in a completely new set of technologies and the creation of an environment dedicated to observing proofing. In addition, some systems can also require pay-per-click, which means that each proof is produced at an additional cost.

 

Finally, there are the costs of violations. What happens when the proofing system fails to match the printing press? Who will be held responsible for this? The cost of reprinting a live piece is enough to buy a top-of-the-line inkjet proofing system that avoids this mistake in advance. If the consequences of the error are serious, the printing house will lose both customers and money - which should, of course, be added to the total cost of ownership.

 

Regardless of how you calculate the costs, and regardless of what costs you calculate, most printing suppliers are involved in the process of recommending, illustrating, or even supplying proofing systems to their customers. Whether you like it or not, you have an obligation to understand and maintain the system and calculate its total cost of ownership.

 

Select a criterion

Adding color management to your workflow helps improve color interoperability (such as the ability to share color information between devices). So if we could adopt a common standard, it would make things very simple. But given the state of the global economy and the repeated use of the same content in different places and different media, we have never found a single standard. Therefore, the biggest problem we face now is how to integrate multiple different standards.

 

Generally speaking, there are three main types of standards: the first is custom or internal standards, which are mainly developed by printing houses to improve the efficiency of their pre-press and printing processes; The second is the unofficial standard, which has been accepted by most people and has long been used in production (such as Photoshop Sheetfed Offset and Adobe 98 RGB). The third is the accepted standard, which is officially published and endorsed by trade associations and other organizations such as IDEAlliance and ECI.

 

We may not be able to describe the process and status of all standards in detail in this article, but it is helpful to have a quick overview of all standards related to proofing.

 

The European Colour Consortium (ECI) is a group of experts dedicated to promoting media-neutral colour data processing in digital publishing systems. The Reference Color Space Gravure standard published by the organization has been used successfully in European gravure since the spring of 2002.

 

SNAP (Specifications for Newspaper Advertising Production) created the color standard used in newspaper printing.

 

Fogra (Graphic Technology Research Association) has created a colour standard that can be used in Europe and has set a set of target values for the proofing certification system, even though it is a European standard.

 

The International Standards Organization (ISO) has established a committee on printing technology to specialize in work related to color printing, standard development and measurement.

 

The International Color Council (ICC) is committed to promoting open, neutral, cross-platform color management systems within the industry.

IDEAlliance is a United States-based industry organization dedicated to the development and research of best practices and standards in the printing industry. It is currently responsible for the management of standards such as: rotary offset parameter description (SWOP, mainly applied to long-format rotary offset printing) and the basic requirements applied to commercial offset printing (GRACoL, mainly applied to short-format commercial sheet printing).