Retiring the densitometer: to color in half the time, on two offset presses

The challenge

Custom Printing has been a customer of ours for many years — and, as many people know, Alder Color Solutions is a division of Great Western Ink, which manufactures both offset and flexo inks. Custom runs three offset presses: two 40″ Mitsubishis and one 28″ Komori.

One of the Mitsubishis was already outfitted with an X-Rite IntelliTrax and closed-loop color control. On the other two presses, make-ready was still being done with a very old handheld densitometer — giving the operators no way to see whether a job was passing conformance, and no way to predict what adjustments would get it there. They decided to upgrade those two presses.

The solution — Alder Press Control

The Alder Press Control package they installed includes:

• A manual scanning spectrophotometer (CSS110)
• A 29″ or 40″ track/scan ruler
• Both PrintMeasure and ChromaChecker software
• Three days of on-site installation and operator training

The package doesn't include a PC or display, but we provide minimum requirements and recommendations. Before we arrived, we worked with the client to get the computers installed and the TV displays mounted in their existing consoles. We also modified their existing color bar for the new system, output a proof of it, and confirmed we could measure it properly before committing it to any new plates.

A 40″ color bar in ten seconds

With PrintMeasure installed, licensed, and configured — and the ChromaChecker account set up so operators can log in directly inside PrintMeasure — they can now measure every patch in their 40″ color bar in ten seconds. It isn't automated: the operator presses the button on the instrument and slides it slowly across the scan ruler. Every patch value then appears on screen, showing exactly what to adjust for each color and ink zone.

It is not a closed-loop system that adjusts the ink keys automatically — but it's a huge leap over how they'd worked for decades.

Why density isn't the goal anymore

With the new software the operators can still look at density values, the way they're used to. But here's the thing: density values haven't been part of any worldwide printing specification since before 2006. In North America we typically target the regional reference conditions for SWOP or GRACoL, which are defined colorimetrically.

What a press operator should focus on isn't density — it's passing conformance to whichever spec they're targeting. The old system gave them no way to see whether they were passing, and no way to predict what would get them there. Now they scan the whole bar in ten seconds and the software shows immediately whether they're passing, or exactly what to adjust to get into conformance.

The cloud side — data management

Every measurement also goes to the cloud, and the data management side is where it compounds. Upper management now has the data for every job and can log into the online dashboard from anywhere to monitor jobs and conformance. Data can automatically populate reports, so they can see how well they're printing and improve — and share that conformance data with the client or print buyer. They can even create or revise G7 plate curves from the same platform.

Beyond the presses, the platform lets them monitor every aspect of the manufacturing process for conformance — instruments, lighting, environmental conditions, fountain solution, NIP pressures per cylinder, and any papers or substrates they print — all included with the subscription that comes with the package.