Color Management Planning - Help!

[JohnT]

Hello All-
I need help! I'm looking for suggestions so that we can have success. I'm not exactly sure where to start??
I've listed me specs below:
I have a small printing shop and I want optimize how we are printing. I'm looking to put together a plan of action as to how we can print and get accurate and consistent color utilizing the equipment we already have. I feel we are all over the place. We NEED to have standards. I personally am tired of not knowing what kind of results we are going to get.

The current printing equipment we have is the following:

Traditional Ink Presses:
4 Color Heidelberg DI Press with a Harlequin RIP v 4.7 (Residing on an older PC) - (Used frequently for 4 color work) Printing at 175 LS
2 Color Hamada C248 - (Used frequently for 1 and 2 color work) Printing at 175 LS
2 Color 29" Harris Seybold - (Used pretty infrequently - 1, 2 and 4 color work) Printing at 175 LS

Toner Based Equipment:
Konica Minolta C6500 - Color - (Used frequently for 4 color work)
Konica Minolta 1050 – B/W

Inkjet equipment:
Epson 10000 - (Used frequently for Color work)
HPZ 6100 - (Used frequently for Color work)

Prepress
Film Image-setter – Scitex Dolev 450 with a PSM RIP (Used frequently for film output for the Hamada and Harris press)

Software:
Mac Based -Computers
CS 4 Creative Suite
Other Misc Software

Inks Used:
Toyo - Waterless for the DI
Gan’s - For the 2 traditional presses

House Papers Used Most Frequent:
Topkote Gloss Cover – 95#, 111# (FSC Certified)
Topkote Gloss Text – 100# (FSC Certified)
Cougar Opaque Cover – 80#, 100#
Cougar Opaque Text – 70#

Thanks in advance to those who help.

[Ian Mackenzie]

You will get many answers here.
Your problem(s) will not be solved through forums and blogs.

You need to hire a professional color management consultant.
There are 2 ways of doing this, IMO:

1. Pay for it yourself
2. leverage all of your consummable usage (plates, paper, inkjet paper, misc. supplies) and ask that your current - ahem, or future - graphic arts supplier put a plan together to solve your problems. In return, they get, or maintain, your business.

If that is not viable, then call Bruce Bayne at Alder Technologies in Portland.
He is one of the best in the country.

Color Management, Support and Training Solutions

It sounds to me that your issues are very deep and include both employee knowledge/training and core color management of your multiple devices. Add to that a (presumed) lack of quality control processes and I would imagine it causes you to lose sleep at night.

With MIS, Web2Print, G7 and VDP all on the proverbial radar screen, you need to get your manufacturing operation under control so that you then plan for growth and further profitability.

You have some good iron and a mish-mash in prepress. Some OLD stuff, some really old stuff and some new stuff. Before you buy more stuff, budget $10 - $15K for someone to help you use the stuff you have. Put a plan together. get ready to modernize your facility. Get your sales people excited. Tell your accounts something new about your compnay.

Or sell your business now before your competitors steal your customers....;-)

[mattbeals]

Have you talked with Chromix? You're only a few miles from them and they're one of the best!

[Correct Color]

Ian is right.

The issue is that you need a complete and comprehensive color workflow solution from inception to completion. And while all the information you might need to "do it yourself" is out there, there are two problems with that approach: First is that while good information is out there, there is also tons and tons and tons of bad information out there.

Just going in, how do you know which is which? But take enough bad information, and it can wind up killing you.

Second and more importantly: Your time is all you have to make your business successful. You wind up devoting the time it's going to take to learn all the in's and out's of getting control of your color workflow on the street, and that's time you're not selling, not running your business...what's that time really worth to you?

So allow me to introduce Correct Color.

We're aways away but we've got the tools, we've got the talent and we've got to travel. We've even got customers in Seattle and sure wouldn't mind coming back. We fix problems just ike yours for a living every day--and have for four years now with perhaps the most ironclad guarantee you'll ever find in any industry: If, on completion of our work, you don't think the money we charge you is the best money you've ever spent, you don't have to pay.

Good luck, and please feel free to follow the link for more info.


Mike Adams
Correct Color