digital printing

For a decade or more ‘Digital’ has been the buzz word in print. For many applications digital has quickly seen off old ways; large posters are rarely done the old screen print way, now it has to be large format digital. But although digital presses have been around for a while much of the ‘hype’ has been just that. They are capable of very good printing (but not as good as litho); they can offer good running speeds (but a fraction of litho); they can print on some stocks (but most don’t like coated or heavier stocks).

We see Digital Printing as complementary to litho (not competition). We’ve waited for the technology to stabilise and have now invested in an Indigo SRA3 Digital Press. Its not born of a colour copier; the Indigo’s roots are similar to a litho press printing with cyan, magenta, yellow and black liquid inks. The quality of print is excellent and justifies the phrase ‘near litho’. It can handle stock up to 350gsm (i.e. covers or business cards) but the stock must be Indigo compatible. And it will print at 1,000 sheets per hour (unlike some machines which do the same but only on light coverage and lightweight stock).

The Indigo Digital is a great machine for many job types including;

• Short run colour
• Short run colour or black and white books
• Printing Variable data
• Collated jobs
• Small jobs (i.e. Business Cards; Postcards)
• Quick turnaround (the print is dry immediately)

We also have a colour Xerox machine for less demanding work !

Our Indigo Press is ideal for so many jobs. And perhaps for most customers it would be difficult to gauge a meaningful difference from a comparable litho job. It is a different process and so not surprisingly the results differ somewhat also. If you would like a sample output, perhaps of the actual job you have in mind, we’ll be happy to print one for you to assess.

Although the press uses liquid inks, not toners, it operates at high temperatures. This means that there are fewer materials suited for the Indigo compared to litho. If you would like to discuss suitable papers please contact Duncan for help.

Variable Data

Now we’re talking! This is an area where we don’t need to compare with litho. Only digital printing can print every sheet different to the last sheet. And there’s no better machine than the Indigo. A simple variable data example would be printing an address on a flyer (all in one pass). More interesting would be for you to supply a database where every customer could receive a flyer with different information. For example a car dealership could keep a pic of each customer’s car on the database and then once a month send out a service reminder to 100 customers which includes the customers details and a pic of their car! Now that’s personalisation!

If you see potential to differentiate your business by talking more personally to your customers please give Andy a call for more information.