Inkjet & Digital Printing
Pureprint Group Prints Art Book for the National Gallery Company on its HP Indigo 10000 Digital Press
Friday 19. April 2013 - Digital reprint saves four weeks over conventional production
HP today announced that Pureprint Group Ltd, of Uckfield, East Sussex, used its HP Indigo 10000 Digital Press to print a commemorative fine art and poetry book for the National Gallery Company, turning the job around in two weeks and ensuring stocks to meet customer demand.
When the National Gallery acquired several new paintings by the Renaissance painter Titian, it decided to commemorate it with the publication of a book of poetry inspired by the art. Unsure of demand, it was decided to print 2,400 copies of Metamorphosis: Poems Inspired by Titian.
“The book proved highly successful and quickly sold out,” said Jane Hyne, production manager, National Gallery Company. “The lead time for a conventional re-print was more than six weeks and we didn’t want to miss the opportunity to capitalise on the interest and momentum.”
The National Gallery Company turned to Pureprint Group to see if a cost-effective digitally printed run of the book could be produced quickly and to the same high quality standard as the conventional edition. For each reprint, it took a mere two weeks from receipt of the order to delivery, a speed which ensured that the book was never out of stock.
The contents of the second edition of 1,250 copies was printed by Pureprint on its HP Indigo 7500 Digital Press, while the covers were printed conventionally due to the size, which included flaps and made them too large for the press’s SRA3 format. The success of the book continued and when a third edition was needed, Pureprint utilised the B2 format the HP Indigo 10000 Digital Press.
Metamorphosis is a 56-pages, soft-covered book with sewn binding and a 210 x 148mm finished format.
“This was a great project for demonstrating the capabilities of our HP Indigo 10000 Digital Press,” said Aaron Archer, technical director, Pureprint Group. “The B2 format meant that we could impose as classic 16pp folding sections, making production faster and more cost-effective. While printing on a traditional publishing material, 150g/m2 Hello matt, ensured an exact match.”
While Pureprint had previous experience of book printing on its other HP Indigo presses, this was the first to be printed commercially on the HP Indigo 10000 Digital Press which it has been beta-testing since November 2012.
“The print quality more than matched the original litho run,” said Jane Hyne. “We didn’t want there to be any compromise, and there wasn’t. It worked incredibly well and was very well received. Nobody noticed the difference.”
The ability of HP Indigo presses to print on the same coated and uncoated stocks (in matt, gloss and semi-gloss finishes) as litho gives publishers great flexibility to use both technologies to help meet the printing requirements of a book throughout its life cycle. Digitally printing books also means that quantities produced can more closely match demand, helping to reduce warehousing costs, and will never be “out of print.”
“The Indigo solution, particularly with the greater coverage of trim sizes and binding options, now gives us the capability to produce these books in shorter runs of, for instance, 300 copies, and then refreshing the titles as needed, delivering a far more effective and lower-cost solution,” concluded Jane Hyne.