Offset Printing
EPC Direct is first 12-colour user to attain Heidelberg ISO 12647 status
Monday 09. May 2011 - "Ease of production and giving customers another reason to shop with us." These are the compelling reasons given by managing director Matthew Trounce for EPC Directs decision to undertake Heidelbergs ISO 12647 certification scheme which it has now successfully completed.
Spawned from a prepress background, the technicalities of colour have always been a focus for EPC Direct which today runs with the very latest technology including a Speedmaster XL 105-12-P, a 12-colour perfector, with inline spectral device Inpress Control and Autoplate XL plate loading. It is a £5.5m, 44 staff business.
Throughout its history EPC Direct has maintained an emphasis on colour control. It was an early adopter of spectrophotometric measurement, initially with CPC 21 which measured greyscale and then CPC 24 which used Lab colour measurement. With Inpress Control it keeps colour under even tighter control with the press automatically adjusting colour on the run relative to a reference Lab defined colour standard – not forgetting that the Inpress Control includes fully automatic on the run register control too.
“By its very nature perfecting with the need to get colour match to the optimum on both sides of a sheet is more challenging than for straight printing but the colour control is so precise on the XL 105 with Inpress Control and with all of the latest workflow connectivity we have the certification process was relatively painless,” says Mr Trounce.
The main focus for the company following an initial audit was pressroom housekeeping. Although the Bristol firm likes to keep everything spotless, clean and fresh sometimes the frenzy of high volume throughput can create challenges. Now it has in place a cycle of housekeeping as well as of maintenance so that standards never slip.
“It is easy to look at ISO 12647 and see what you should achieve but the advantage Heidelberg offers is that it can apply the standard in a practical way in a commercial environment,” says Mr Trounce.
He concedes that many of EPCs customers have their own bespoke standards but he does believe Heidelbergs ISO 12647 certification will have a speedy payback, both in terms of confidence in being able to produce top quality at speed and in having a recognised industry standard that opens the doors to some key pitches.