Press Preset & Closed Loop. Closed Loop measurement of colourbar and automatic update of all colours in all inkzones within 10 seconds during printing using the IZ Vacuum table and a Myiro colourbar scanner on a 2-up Heidelberg press).

InkZone from the Swiss company Digital Information is suited for most types of printing presses, sheetfed and web presses including Heidelberg, Man Roland, Komori and KBA and many other brands.

Established in 1990 by Mr. Michael Haenni and Christoph Bugs in Zurich, Switzerland, Digital Information is a pioneer and leader in it's field with thousands of installations of their legendary DI PLOT software and consequently hundreds of installations of the InkZone solution which is built on top of DI PLOT worldwide.

We are delighted to present this roburst solution to offset printers worldwide through our unique Pay & Play leasing or financing programme - see www.spot-nordic.com/play enabling even small to medium sized offset print shops to get perfect control of their printing presses by paying much less than they save pr. month in the form of less time wasted pr. make-ready and less paper wasted pr. make-ready.

At the same time they save money from using the system, the quality and consistency goes up, which enables the print shop to go after bigger and better customers, which will help the print shop to grow.

Start saving money today. Contact info@spot-nordic.com with a description of your printing presses (press name and year of manufacture, operating system and what preset (if any) and measurement device you are using. We will be happy to get back to you with a quote and payment plan.

We generally offer the world known TECHKON measurement devices bundled with the InkZone solution - see www.techkon.com for open or closed loop measurement.

Spot-Nordic has been dealer for Digital Information in Iceland since it's foundation in 2015.
InkZone is the most popular Preset and Closed Loop solution in Iceland and we are honoured to be able to offer this amazing solution to quality concious offset print shops everywhere.

If you are looking to ensure a consistent colour from all your printing presses, for all papertypes you work with, the InkZone Preset and Open or Closed Loop is exactly what you need.

Your printers will love this system as well since it shows them the state of their press, the dotgain/TVI for each unit and how close the ink series they are using is to their ISO 12647 standard, be it Fogra or G7.

That will help them to make necessary changes to ensure flawless output on their press.

The InkZone workflow - overview

This amazing product is just about the best investment a printer can make. It has a ROI of as little as a few months and has a proven track record of saving tens of thousands of Euros each year - per press!    

How much it can safe you is something we can help you estimate using your own input from your operation on a press to press basis.

Don't need a Preset - your printers are that good?
If your press(es) already have a preset but it's not really working (takes about as much time for the printers to correct the preset as it would if they had no preset), then it is time for you to replace it. The InkZone preset can be tweaked for as many paper types as you like, as many times as needed to enable correct inking from the start of the run each time.

Already have a Preset?
If your press(es) already have a Preset but it's not really working (takes about as much time for the printers to correct the preset as it would if they had no Preset), then it is time for you to replace it. The InkZone Preset can be tweaked for as many paper types as you like, as many times as needed to enable correct inking from the start of the run each time.

Already have an inline measuring device on your press(es)?
If your presses already have a colourbar reader but no Preset, we can in most cases add the Preset and you can continue to use your measuring device.

If your colourbar reader does not measure reliably anymore then it may be less expensive for you to get a brand new state of the art InkZoneMove software with a new colourbar reader, than it would cost you to replace parts in your old inline measuring instrument.

Last but not least, where do the density targets used for your inline measuring instrument come from?

Do they belong to a standard like the ISO 12647 - or are they just approximate densities set by your printer?

A good Ink Preset is where you safe the most - in the form of paper and time during make ready.

Normal ROI for the InkZone Preset (IZ Perfect) is typically 2-4 months, depending on the press type, format and number of jobs/make-readies pr. day.

So NOT having a preset does not make sense in offset printing.

The Open or Closed Loop / Inline measuring of colourbar / colourbar reader v.s. a handheld device has the main role of quickly getting to OK Sheet and then maintaining the ink balance and consistent density in all colours throughout the run - which is of course a must if your printing company is working or wants to print according to a standard like ISO 12647-2 or G7, as an obligation to your more demanding customers.

Printers that are interested in having their print process formally certified to Ugra PSO, Fogra PSO or G7 standards, are obliged to install an automated colourbar measuring device with on-screen readings as a condition (an offline version - i.e. Open Loop may do but an online/ Closed Loop solution is highly recommended).

The ROI period for Preset + Closed Loop (including a colorbar reader) is normally in the range from 6-12 months - depending again on the press type, format and number of jobs/make-readies pr. day.

If someone told you it was not possible to install Preset and Closed Loop on your press, think again.

We have done installations on presses that only had an old cassette player and recorder on it's console to load and safe jobs, so let us at least take a look.

Contact info@spot-nordic.com if you are interested. Please include the name and age of your printing press(es), serial numbers and operating system on each press, type of press (sheetfed/web) and number of printing units, perfector or not, along with the name of your workflow and it's current features. We also need to know the average price pr. sheet and average size pr. sheet for each press and finally we need to know how many days pr. year the press is running and the approx. number of make readies pr. day. If you have a preset or automated measurement and feeding of ink data on the press, please include that. We may be able to use parts of your system, as long as they work.

We can log on to your workflow via Teamviewer to see if it has the necessary hardware components for InkZone and then send you a quote for a recommended solution for your press(es).

The InkZone system consists of the following components:

 You can add components over time without additional cost apart from installation cost at your own discretion:

The DI PLOT software runs on the workflow server and automatically grabs all ripped files ready for platesetting in the workflow, calculates the inkzone settings from the ripped data and then converts them into CIP4 files that are sent to the InkZone Perfect software running on the press PC.

DI PLOT can also be used for printing out a proof from the already ripped data to ensure that layout and content are as they should be - a sort of a blueprint - final check before outputting the job to plate.

You can also "Print to PDF" if you prefer not to waste your ink.
 

More info about DI PLOT here: http://digiinfo.com/products/di-plot.

The same DI PLOT software can be set up to send data to as many devices as needed, - so this is a one time investment.

This is the Ink Preset software. Here the printer can select the printing form, view it's thumbnail preview and the drop it onto the press (or to the "upper" or "lower" units in the case of web presses). Here the printer also selects the paper profile he wants to use for the job (ISO 12647 standard types or a custom paper profile he has created.

Here, the preset of all ink zones takes about one minute and the presetting should be accurate enough to start printing as soon as the job is in register.

This v.s. spending 10 - 15 minutes or more pr. run in pre-adjusting and the re-adjusting the ink zones for all colours, wasting 100-150 sheets of virgin paper or so before printing can begin with an OK SHEET.

The printer can read-back the final adjustment of the ink zones after printing a job to tweak the preset to perfection for each job or each papertype. Thus gradually the make ready time will go down. 

InkZone MOVE is a convenient software application that "talks" to InkZone PERFECT. The target density attached to the paper profile in InkZone PERFECT is sent to InkZone MOVE with the target LAB, Density and Dotgain/TVI values.

InkZone MOVE connects to a scanning instrument, such as the Techkon Spectrodrive which is set up right on the viewing console to measure individual sheets.

The instrument measures both Density, TVI and LAB of a colourbar on an 8 up sheet in a matter of 12 seconds or so and the density/spectral data along with dotgain, slur etc. is displayed and compared on-screen to the target values.

Here the printer can react quickly by making first corrections where the density is way out of target and then adjusting the ink zones where only slight adjustment is required (Open Loop, Offline System, manual adjustment).

InkZone MOVE with a single measuring device is available to be set up to measure and send data to as many as 4 presses.

At this stage you have your complete InkZone Open Loop / Offline system set up.

InkZone LOOP  InkZone LOOP is the hardware connection from the Press PC to the press bundled with software that is usually projected to a second monitor, right next to the IZ MOVE/IZ PERFECT monitor. After each measurement, IZ LOOP collects the target and actual measurement data from the MOVE software and automatically displays a suggested change to the ink zones for all units of the press on-screen.

Here the printer/press operator can choose to take a moment to look at the printed sheet and evaluate the result of the proposed changes in all colours before manually pressing an OK button to "Approve Changes" (this is normal, especially while printers are getting used to using the software). After a couple of weeks of using and once the printer/operator trusts the IZ LOOP software and the measuring device, the printer/operator can set up his system to not wait for him/her to press the OK button but to go right ahead and adjust ink automatically right after the IZ LOOP has calculated it's proposed changes in density, for all units of the press.

Optionally an inline instrument can be set up inside the printing press to measure and constantly make changes to keep the ink density perfect throughout the printrun without user intervention - IZ Inline.

 
At this stage you have your complete InkZone Closed Loop / Online system set up.

Additionally you might want to consider:

InkZone TVI: Standard quality control in modern offset printing involves measuring colour bars using sophisticated scanning spectrophotometers. These scanners collect color information data over one or several press runs, including Tonal Value Increase (TVI).

InkZone TVI takes this information and calculates the ideal tonal value curves for every prepress workflow resulting in perfectly calibrated offset plates.

This is highly useful on offset presses where blankets wear slightly everytime you print and ink series are sometimes changed, which will affect the tonal value. The printer can choose when he or she wants to update the plate curves. When printing to a certain standard - say Fogra or G7 standards, this is necessary to ensure that the TVI is within the standard.

InkZone REPORT is the perfect tool for Production and Quality Managers to keep track of how each press doing - how closely it is printing to the target standard. Demanding customers can also be offered to get a printout of their job to see for themselves that the job was in fact printed within his standards.

More details on the InkZone family of products here.

Contact info@spot-nordic.com for more information on InkZone or to order.

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