Implementation of ink saving in color management
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Faced with the continued global financial turmoil and economic slowdown, coupled with multiple pressures and challenges such as rising raw material costs and labor costs, our printing companies are faced with unprecedented grim conditions and heavy crisis. Jumping out of the old thinking mode frame and effectively reducing operating costs through creativity is a positive measure to survive this storm.
As the basis of business management and production, cost has always been one of the most important factors for business managers. Reducing consumables, improving production, and optimizing quality can directly affect the survival and development of the company.
If there is a way to improve printing performance:
Further increase the printing speed;
Reduce dusting during printing;
Reduce the total amount of ink coverage;
Reduce printing preparation time;
Reduce the requirement for the weight of paper;
Speed up the drying of the ink;
Improve ink overprinting;
Improve the expansion of outlets;
Easy to control gray balance;
Regardless of environmental protection, will it attract the interest of industry peers and be sought after by manufacturers?
The answer is yes, because these benefits are actually what many printing companies have dreamed of. Specific to how to achieve, which method or principle is used, I believe that everyone is more concerned about the focus. The essence is realized by the principle of UCR or GCR in CMS color management.
UCR is the abbreviation of Under Color Removal, Chinese translation is the background color removal. Refers to the method of removing the neutral gray part from the CMY three primary color version in the mixed color or dark adjustment area of the color, and replacing it with the corresponding black version. The disadvantage is that it may cause gray balance in the neutral gray shadow, and sometimes it needs to be compensated by the UCA (Under Color Addition) background color gain method.
GCR is the abbreviation of Grey Component Replacement, which means that any non-color value overprinted or mixed with CMY tri-color ink can be replaced by black ink which is equal to the weakest color of the three colors. Visual effect.
The difference between the two is that the black version of the GCR color separation is more and the tone is longer; while the black version of the UCR color separation is relatively less hierarchical, but in the deepest part, the black value is Bigger.
Speaking of this type of undertone removal technology, photo-imprinting has been introduced more than 30 years ago to introduce UCR technology for background color removal adjustment. At that time, it relied mainly on manual experience control, and the removal range was relatively short. In the era of electronic scanning platemaking, professional computing electric distance control was used, and multiple color removal methods were implemented. In English, it was called PCR, namely PolyChromatic Color Removal; and complementary colors. The reduction method is called CCR in English, which is Complementary Color Reduction. In Japan, there are many scanners that use integrated color removal, ICR, Integrated Color Removal, but these removal ranges are gradually extended, and the black version that is developed to any GCR tone can be automatically generated. But why is this type of technology not fully usable?
The main reasons are:
1. Most of the plate-making color separation depends on the operator's experience to make adjustments.
2. Generally pay more attention to the color version, but ignore the black version.
3. There are many types of originals, and there are very few products that can fully meet the requirements of color separation.
4. The variability of printing adaptation conditions often causes adjustments to be made when printing on the machine.
5. Currently, PDF is the printing standard, and it is difficult to adjust the image color information in the file.
Now, if you have a kind of software, you don't need to pay attention to the truth. Just throw the file format of PS, EPS, PDF, etc. provided by the customer into the "hot folder". In the process of RIP or plate making, the same dot position will be overlapped. The CMY tricolor is replaced by the K version, I believe most manufacturers are happy to use it.
In fact, there are ready-made automated color conversion workflows in the industry. They can accurately calculate the usage of CMY tri-color inks automatically, and can also adjust the color balance of files without replacing them with black. Affect the final print quality, and do not require much manual intervention. E.g:
GMG's Ink Optimizer
CGS's ORIS Ink Saver, etc.
Last year, Li & Fung Accor tested GMG's Ink Optimizer, which calculates the amount of ink applied to the page by calculating the amount of color conversion from CMYK to CMYK, while also ensuring ink quality and improving printing conditions. Under the control of this system, the automatically reduced amount of color ink reduces the total Ink Limit of printing to more than 25%, while significantly reducing drying time and print job preparation time, thereby further speeding up the printing press. Improve productivity.
This year Lifeng Accor is testing another similar product, OGS Ink Saver of CGS. This is a color-managed UCR/GCR system that uses a unique algorithm to automatically reduce ink usage and apply it to linear and continuous-tuned image data. This software can vary depending on the amount of ink coverage on the original. The amount of ink is reduced by more than 20% while relatively reducing ink drying time, printing preparation time and reducing the requirement for paper weight.
The test results are as follows:
1. Increased the amount of black ink used, but the amount of CMY color ink can be reduced by 15%. Note the following:
① The larger the coverage of the image area, the more saved;
② The darker, grayer and more gradual tone of the image is not conducive to the bright colors;
③ The larger the printing quantity, the more provincial, preferably 10,000 printing or more; it is not conducive to short-run printing, commercial rotation is the most beneficial;
④ Black version will have different effects due to different color separation settings. When adjusting software, using more than 50% GCR will save ink, but sacrifice some color saturation. 2. It is well known that dusting is an indispensable process for multi-color printing. Its main function is to speed up ink drying and prevent sticking of paper when stacked. The application of the Ink Saver system saves powder dusting, although it does not bring very intuitive economic benefits to the company, but the other aspects are remarkable.
The reason is:
① For stamps that need hot stamping, such as hot stamping, if the amount of powder is too large, it will be suspended between the ink layer and the hot stamping foil to form a barrier, which will easily lead to the lack of strokes in the hot stamping image, thus affecting the final hot stamping. the quality of.
② The powder is finally fused in the ink. If it is too much, the gloss of the print will be reduced, which will affect the overall reproduction of the image color.
③ excessive powder spray, will also affect the quality of film processing. Because the suspended particles of the dusting powder will reduce the adhesion between the film adhesive and the printed matter, resulting in a film that is not strong.
④ If the powder is used too much, it is easy to make the paper-receiving chain full of dust, which hinders the normal operation of the chain lubrication device, thereby increasing the maintenance cost of the printing machine.
⑤ Although the powder is non-toxic, a large amount of dust accumulation will destroy the printing environment and greatly increase the chance of workers suffering from tracheal diseases.
3. Easy to control gray balance. During the ORIS Ink Saver experiment, at the normal density, our magenta version in the four-color ash was deepened by 0.1, and there was no obvious change in gray. It can be seen that the system can easily correct the neutral gray color cast. In addition, black can stabilize the color of the image, and its stable range depends on the length of the black tone, and the longer the tone, the larger the stable color range.
However, some blind spots need to be noticed, such as dark purple areas, dark green, dark brown, etc., the software will be mistakenly judged as dark gray, you need to turn down the black version.
4. Using ORIS Ink Saver and PIP print data of CIP3, the printing performance has been greatly improved. In addition to improving ink overprinting and dot gain, printing preparation time has also been reduced by a quarter, and because of the faster drying of inks, the speed of printing presses has increased by nearly 10%.
5. In terms of cost-effectiveness, we have tested five different types of books, with print volumes between 10,000 and 30,000. The average data obtained is about 14% of the total ink saved, roughly estimated, printed monthly. The cost savings are over 140,000 yuan and the annual savings are over 1.5 million yuan. Of course, the improvement in production and quality has not been counted.
Finally, the ability to print the same or even better colors, save ink, reduce expenses, and take into account the cost and environmental protection is the biggest gain of this test.