Sydney’s Easy Signs, servicing clients nationally, has solved its colour management consistency issues with the help of Colour Graphic Services and its Mellow Colour PrintSpec analysis software plus Color Logic Copra and ColorAnt ICC profiling applications.
Located on the outer fringes of Sydney, at Ingleburn; Easy Signs has conquered colour consistency by calling in the Colour Doctor – David Crowther of Colour Graphic Services. Easy Signs was established in 2006 at Miranda and moved to sparkling new premises in November 2014. Staff count has risen to 36.
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| David Crowther with Easy Signs’ Mark McInnes |
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| Easy Signs HP Latex printroom |
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| One of Easy Signs’ SwissQprint Nyalas with Andy Fryer inspecting the print |
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| Easy Signs directors Andy Fryer (r) and Adam Parnell (l) |
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| All the staff |
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| Easy Signs’ smart new building at Ingleburn, NSW |
Easy Signs’ reach is Australia-wide because they have fully embraced online commerce. Their website is clear and quick to navigate with all pricing calculations transparently online for both resellers and end users. The majority of orders are shipped within 24 hours of receipt, so there is little time for lengthy colour adjustments or re-dos.
Director Andy Fryer, with high school colleague Adam Parnell, established the company following a venture in online commerce. “I have an IT and web design background while Adam is all about finance, so it’s a great combination.”
Demand for colour control
As an IT professional, Fryer is used to using measured data metrics to know exactly where the business is at. After several attempts, this was not the case with colour management and re-prints were not uncommon.
“We basically needed colour consistency between machines, substrates and between repeat jobs. Customers expect to see the same colour on a job printed this month as they did last month and the month before. Until our new CIO - Chief Innovation Officer - Mark McInnes joined in late 2016, we were experiencing colour shifts and, despite investing in an expensive chart-reading spectrophotometer, were unable to get colour completely under control. Mark introduced us to David Crowther, who he had worked with in the past. David performed a free colour health check using a special target print, measured it through Mellow Colour’s PrintSpec and produced a numerical report that identified the root causes of our colour variations.”
Crowther says: “Following the colour health check measurements, PrintSpec was able to reveal colour vagaries across Easy Signs’ two SwissQPrint Nyalas, two HP Latex 360s and recently acquired HP Latex 3100. We started with training in printer calibration and ICC profiling and, in conjunction with this training, I advocated using Color Logic’s ColorAnt for measuring, analyzing and optimising to profile chart measurement data, and Copra for creating very high quality ICC profiles themselves.”
Complete colour confidence
He continues: “Further training covering monitoring and evaluation of on-going colour quality took place. With this, I advocated Mellow Colour’s PrintSpec which produces clear and accurate reports on how a print organisation’s colour is tracking. PrintSpec identifies issues before they become problems and saves a great deal of time and money in re-prints and consumables. The fact that we can utilise ISO 12647 as a standard reference point for any print process, offset, flexo, digital and wide format is of great benefit.”
Apart from the recently-installed HP Latex 3100, Easy Sign’s has recently become the first company in Australia to upgrade one of their 2 SwissQPrint Nyala 2 UV Flatbed printers to the newly released 4x4 printhead configuration, giving them nearly double the previous print speed to cope with demand.
“One thing for certain,” says Andy Fryer, “whatever production direction we head into in the future, we know that we will have colour quality totally under control, thanks to David and Colour Graphic Services.”
Easy Signs
www.easysigns.com.au
Colour Graphic Services
www.colourgraphicservices.com.au
