In addition to ribbon printers (about which we talked here and here ), the Epson product range includes the so-called Color Label Printers. Or simply - Epson ColorWorks .
This post will be interesting to you if:
- You are a small manufacturer of a wide (and not very) product range and are looking for a way to label it with labels, with the ability to print small copies on the spot and as needed . Or do you work in the fields of HoReCa or trade and plan to print badges, tickets and issue price tags (drawing attention to the action, for example).
- you just wonder what the main printing technologies are used today for making color labels, business cards, tickets and how they differ from digital inkjet printing , which Epson ColorWorks printers actually offer.
The most important concept I mentioned in the last paragraph is “ inkjet digital printing ”. Under the cut, I’ll try not to be boring and consistently talking about what kind of animal it is, why Epson presents this product line as a panacea for solving label printing tasks for small businesses, and how the SCP technology differs from classic flexography and offset.
I invite under the cat. (caution: traffic!) .
First of all - why
The main question we are asked when it comes to label printers is: “to whom and why should such a printer be needed when you can order printing labels in a printing house?”
It can be quite. And then, having ordered a large batch of ready-made stickers (and it’s profitable to order large batches at a printing house, this is well known to everyone), along with the circulation, get the risk of being left with a certain number of unclaimed labels. For example, if the information on the label changes, the composition of the product / the contents of the box changes, or the information printed earlier becomes irrelevant. In addition, printed products need to be stored somewhere, registered, taken into account, developed new layouts and coordinated with the printing house, etc. etc. Everytime.
Unlike large companies, local brands can not afford to freeze significant funds in large orders for the label. This is where a digital label printer can come to the rescue, capable of quickly producing small print runs — for action, special offers, article changes, and so on — that is, to print labels “on demand”. Such a device provides complete control over the process - at any time you can print one or at least a few hundred labels, make changes to the layout yourself (or even automate it using templates — the same figure !) And print more.
Three technologies
Today, we briefly consider three technologies of print production:
- Inkjet digital printing (our case)
- Flexographic printing (or simply “flexography”)
- Offset printing ("offset")
Inkjet Digital Printing - Epson ColorWorks
Oddly enough, let's start by listing the main features of modern digital inkjet printing. We will need them in the future for comparison with offset and flexo printing.
- Prototyping On an inkjet printer, you can carry out a test print before the start of production of the circulation and get an idea of how the final product will look. Immediately, if necessary, you can make any changes, because the whole process of preparation takes place on a computer.
- Efficiency. The printer is in your back, you can at any time print stickers for a specific product that will attract the attention of the buyer. In some moment. Or, for example, a new item came to your warehouse - print labels with logistic data right there, place product photos on the box - it will be much easier for warehouse workers to find it. This is just one example of how prompt label printing saves time, nerves and money.
- Low cost. Unlike offset and flexography (about them below) digital label printing does not require a set of prepress works , as well as the use of printed forms. This reduces the cost of printing and eliminates the possibility of image distortion in prepress. As they say, “what you see is what you get,” or rather, what you printed first, print it a hundred more times by changing the number in the “number of copies” field in the print window.
- High quality color printing , accurate color reproduction. Inkjet technology is the same.
- Personalize your labels! Not only can labels be changed on demand, using special software, you can create templates in which the values in certain lines will be automatically replaced during printing (especially valuable when printing coupons or tickets with unique codes, for example). For example, you can urgently make a personalized label on ketchup in a single copy, as happened in this entertaining story .
To be on the safe side, I’ll immediately clarify that we basically mean label printing when we are talking specifically about Epson ColorWorks.
Case Studies
On our YouTube channel, you can find a couple of stories localized in Russian from our foreign clients:
Printing labels in the shop finishing materials - the history of AKI Bricolaje Espana
Label printing - Epson ColorWorks C3500 in the service of Mercedes AMG Petronas Motorsports
Particularly fun: the Epson ColorWorks C3500 label printer is used for on-line printing at the pit stop.
Maybe a lot, but not all
In general, you understand my point: inkjet labels can do a lot.
So why then everyone will not give up on offset and flexographic printing?
The fact is that all labels cannot be made only by flex-printing, only by offset or only by ink-jet printing. For example, paper self-adhesive labels or film stickers required in large industrial volumes cannot be made by offset or inkjet, and large-scale production of dry paper labels is not yet available for flexography. Limitations lie in the design features of flexographic and offset equipment.
First of all, you need to understand that each of the technologies has its own characteristics and advantages. Therefore, in each case it is necessary to make a decision on the choice of a particular printing technology.
Flexo printing technology. What is flexographic printing?
In short, flexographic printing is a printing method that is a rotary printing of fast-drying liquid inks fixed on various (more often flexible) materials using elastic printing plates that can be installed on form cylinders with different circumference.
Video relayed:
Preparing for flexo printing is a whole quest:
Stage 1. Design, preparation
In each case, the design goes hand in hand with the process of setting up the equipment to display the colors correctly. All this takes a long time. Even at MGUP opened a separate specialty and hold seminars for flexographic printing designers training.
Stage 2. Production of flexo forms.
Flexoform (also called “printing plate” or “cliché”) is such a flexible plate with protruding parts. In most cases, it is made from a special light-sensitive polymer. Speakers create an impression on the material when printing.
And this is how the main stages of creating flexographic forms ( for each print ) look like:
- Exposure of the reverse side of the photopolymer plate.
- The main exposure of the front side of the photopolymer plate.
- Flushing photopolymer flexo forms.
- Drying flexographic forms.
- Flexa flexing.
- Additional light treatment (finishing).
You can imagine about how much effort, time and money will be needed if it becomes necessary to make changes to the print.
Stage 3. Printing.
Flexography itself produces the finished product immediately and does not imply subsequent actions to consolidate the result. Well, provided that you have everything prepared and adjusted for printing circulation at this point.
Advantages of flex printing
- flex printing provides high quality prints;
- provides high performance and quick setup of printing on sheet materials of various thickness and format;
- allows you to achieve low cost, especially at really large runs;
- provides for the use of a wide variety of colors;
- provides the possibility of obtaining multi-color images for several runs when using equipment with a small number of printing sections.
Disadvantages of flexography:
- the equipment has a complex structure;
- problems may arise when working with non-absorbent materials (for example, when printing on foil and plastic films);
- Sheet format is not fully used;
- It is impossible to combine several finishing operations in one device;
- large-scale printing requires large equipment;
- additional space is required for the placement of machines and storage of materials, of which there are very, very many;
- higher label cost (as compared to offset), flexography is absolutely unprofitable to use in small print runs ;
- The technology is extremely complex and requires the participation of high-level specialists, otherwise, instead of the normal circulation, you can get a pumpkin.
Offset printing technology. What is offset printing
... this is such a printing technology, in which the ink from the printing form is transferred first to an elastic intermediate carrier - a rubber-fabric canvas (usually on a cylinder), and then to a printed material. Wikipedia .
Using the technology described above, it is possible to obtain an image of only one color - the color of the paint used in each of the paint rollers. In order to get a color image, images of different colors are successively put on the printed material. Printing of all colors occurs either in one pass, if the machine is multicolored, or in several passes, if the printing machine, for example, monochromatic.
The design of the color offset machine is quite complicated: it is a well-established system for feeding and aligning sheets. Also there are several dozens of rollers (12-20 rollers for coloring matter and 3-6 rollers for moisturizing solution), a system for posting sheet materials through cylinders, as well as a receiving-output device for leveling and stacking printed impressions.
This is how it works:
In general, the principle of operation and the device itself, of course, is much simpler than in the case of flex printing.
Advantages of offset printing:
- provides high quality printing (limited only by the quality of manufacturing shafts with printing forms);
- printing is possible on any type of paper and involves any postprinting preparation. For example, to send a circulation further for a reprint already into a digital printing machine , which will apply, say, unique numbers or printing time, which for obvious reasons cannot be realized only with an offset;
- offset printing is much more profitable than digital over large runs both in time and in cost.
Disadvantages of offset printing:
- pre-press preparation is required (color separation, color proof, further creation of forms, printing of forms, press preparation, color balancing), which significantly affects the speed of order execution - the offset is not suitable for operational printing ;
- printing of small circulations due to prepress preparation is simply unprofitable .
And what with small circulations?
You may have noticed that in the minuses of both technologies, flexography and offset, there is one common factor that is very important: unprofitability when printing small runs .
With offset printing, flexographic printing is more suitable for the manufacture of large print runs (10,000 copies or more) with sufficient time for the production of printed products. If circulation is needed here and now , it would be most reasonable to use digital printing technology.
And then - bam! - Epson label printers are entering the arena.
At the moment this is Epson ColorWorks C3500 and Epson ColorWorks C7500 (and its version is Epson ColorWorks C7500G ).
Disadvantages of digital printing
Before you finish the story with a brief overview of the devices, I’ll emphasize that the Epson's task is not to “push” the product, but to offer it to someone who really needs it. Therefore, we will be objective and mention, among other things, the disadvantages of digital printing:
- the main one is the higher cost of printing as compared to the offset method or flexo printing in the manufacture of large print runs ;
- limited width of the carrier (our line of devices currently is 112 mm)
Traditionally (before the popularization of digital printing), the cost of a label with other types of printing has always depended on the circulation: the higher the circulation, the cheaper the unit of production. The difference in the level of costs is due to the fact that the initial financial costs of pre-press preparation are more or less constant and constitute a significant part of the cost of the entire circulation. The difference in the cost of the label in the first edition and subsequent costs associated with the manufacture of forms for printing. Therefore, when switching to a new label or with a large number of items, additional costs arise ...
... if it is not a digital print. In the case of digital printing, you can print anything, anytime. Simply put, short runs of labels on a digital machine are quality as on a flex, but much, much cheaper.
Briefly about the devices themselves
In order not to overload the already rather big post, I will tell you the most important features of the device line. For details, I invite to the site .
Epson ColorWorks C3500
The most popular of our products is a line of color label printers:
- resolution up to 720 DPI;
- it is calculated on loading to 2000 prints a day;
- print speed up to 103 mm per second;
- pigment inks resistant to a variety of operating conditions: a brief video presentation ;
- Included is a software for creating labels NiceLabel (only this model).
- device cost ~ $ 2000
These, by the way, are used in the notorious Yeltsin-center for printing tickets.
Epson ColorWorks C3500 on our website.
Epson ColorWorks C7500
Flagship model, option number 1. Designed for printing on matte media. From his brother with the letter "G" differs used ink.
- print resolution up to 1200 DPI ;
- up to 40,000 prints per day ;
- print speed up to 300 mm / s ;
- uses Epson UltraChrome resistant pigment inks resistant to very different operating conditions. I emphasize that the C7500 (not “G”) is intended primarily for those who require the most resistant prints that can be obtained using inkjet printing .
- device cost ~ $ 10500
Epson ColorWorks C7500 on our website.
Epson ColorWorks C7500G
Flagship model, option number 2. Designed for printing
on glossy media . From his brother without the letter "G" differs used ink. Otherwise, everything is the same, except that:
- uses Epson UltraChrome DL durable pigment inks to produce bright and long-lasting prints on glossy media.
- The cost of the device is the same ~ $ 10500
Epson ColorWorks C7500G on our website.
Urgently in the room!
Finally, a couple of interesting successful experiments that we conducted in the office, using our label managers last week.
First, it turned out that printers print great on a so-called. photographic paper such as "metallic", which is characterized by the "metallic luster" of its gloss. As if, as a substrate, it does not have paper, but a sheet of metal polished to a high gloss.
We managed to make such a photo of the result (it’s not easy to transfer metallic in one photo)
But this is not the most interesting. From the depths of Europe, we finally brought a roll of textile carrier of the desired width. Synthetic textiles, such with a small corrugated structure. As a result, we found out that printers print without any problems on such a carrier (in the photo it is specially twisted and twisted to demonstrate the “textile” of the material):
I tried as best I could to photograph the structure of the surface of the carrier so that it would be easier to understand what it was about:
Printing on textiles opens up new possibilities for replicating, for example, clothing tags. But that's another story.
Well, enough for today ...
I briefly summarize who might be interested in Epson ColorWorks series printers:
- manufacturers of their own products, especially if there is a wide range of products that need to be labeled (for this purpose digital inkjet fits just perfect);
- service companies ( HoReCa ) who need to print badges and tickets;
- trading companies - for registration of price tags (highlighting under the share, for example);
- logistics - to improve the visualization and facilitate the search for boxes in the warehouse;
- and to all those who have the need to print labels (stickers) on demand with a minimum period for printing copies.
Of course, this is not all possible uses of the device, but I hope this post was more or less able to tell about what these printers are capable of.
Together with product managers and our representatives, we simultaneously prepared an addendum to this (already rather big) publication with the most frequently asked questions and answers on this line of devices. Unfortunately, we did not have time to complete it by the publication of this post, so soon we will publish it as an additional follow-up .
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Of course, if you have questions about this product line, write them either in lichku, or better - directly in the comments. I will add answers to them in a future post.