Recently we've been working with a brand that sells its products all over the world, and also licenses products for other brands. They work with Print Service Providers (PSPs — packaging printers) in Canada, Mexico, and China, and were looking for a better way to communicate color with them. They chose Alder Color Solutions because we offer the world's best cloud-based conformance platform, and we've helped other brands implement it — saving them significant time, money, and headaches. The platform provides "inspectors" for checking accuracy and conformance — generally to ISO standards — across a wide range of things tied to the printing process: The list goes on. But one of the most powerful is the Project Inspector. Project Inspector lets the brand define all of the specifications for a print job, including: The PSP receives an invitation to the Project and uploads color measurement data as specified — which generates, in effect, a scorecard back to the brand. And this all happens in real time, while the job is on press — eliminating the need for in-person press checks. For a brand managing printers across three countries, that alone changes the economics of quality control. The Project Inspector functionality is worth the investment by itself. But there are other features with a huge impact. One of those is Color Match. Using an inexpensive inkjet printer, we can generate remarkably accurate spot color references — just like the fan guides most people use, except more accurate and more repeatable. "I've been completely consumed with color matching a complete rebrand for our toughest brand partner. I've had excellent results. This one feature is worth the purchase for us. To give you an idea of what this will do for us: we have been working with a vendor to get ink drawdown color matches done off of brand-supplied ink drawdowns. You'd think that would be a simple process for an ink lab, but we did not have a single set of color approved for any one of this brand's, and we have been working on it for about 2 months. I was beyond frustrated. I was able to get 13 color matches approved using the Color Match feature in one week (I actually had to create a number of the colors manually because they didn't supply targets large enough to get a measurement off of). And now I will be sending the color reports out to vendors, along with CxF files for them to run to as standards. This is good stuff. We will cut a TON of time out of this process moving forward. This feature is gold for us." Two months of frustration, versus 13 approved matches in a single week. That's the difference between negotiating color and measuring it. If you work for a brand company in the package printing space, we'd encourage you to get in touch. We're happy to provide demonstrations and trials for qualified prospects. It's time to use the power of color science, conformance standards, and cloud computing to streamline your procurement process entirely. Email us to connect and see the platform in action. Director of Technical Services, Alder Color Solutions Dan has spent more than three decades helping printers, converters, publishers, packaging companies, and photographers get control of their color — across offset, flexo, wide-format, digital, and packaging production. He founded the color consultancy ColorGeek Inc. in 1999 and joined Alder in 2018. A certified G7 Expert since the inaugural 2006 class, he has spent nearly twenty years implementing G7 and international print standards in real production environments, and was one of the few certified instructors for the SGIA Digital Color Professional program. He's also a professional photographer — which keeps him fluent in both the artistic and technical sides of imaging.What the Inspectors Do
Project Inspector: The Brand Defines the Spec
Color Match: Accurate Spot Color References
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info@aldertech.comAbout the Author
Dan Gillespie