HP continues to lead the digital printing revolution with the inclusion of the industry’s first embedded spectrophotometer in the new HP Designjet Z2100 and Z3100 Photo Printer series, which boasts the ability to provide breakthrough colour on large-format prints and proofs thanks to the ability to manage colour through automatic creation and installation of ICC profiles on preferred substrates.

According to Don Tan, colour consultant, Enterprise & Specialty Printing, Imaging and Printing Group, HP Asia Pacific and Japan: “The immediate reward of managed colour is the reduction in waste, including the creative professional’s time in re-running print jobs, and paper thrown in the bin. Success in managed colour requires discipline and effort.”

The new HP Designjet Z2100 and Z3100 Photo Printer series were created with the specific goal of improving productivity through an embedded spectrophotometer that allows for fully automated colour calibration and media profiling, potentially saving one to two days per month of time lost to manual calibration. These two printer series are ideal for graphic designers, pre-press/proofing specialists, social wedding photographers, digital fine artists and other print professionals who require consistent and accurate colours on large formats.

A key element of consistent and accurate colour management is printer calibration, media profiling and colour maintenance. The average professional photographer or creative user will perform eight separate steps to calibrate a colour output device; each traditional calibration exercise can take up to 30 minutes. To maintain accurate and consistent colour, daily calibration is highly recommended by professional users, which can add up to six to eight hours per month – nearly one full day lost to calibration alone. By embedding a spectrophotometer in the HP Designjet Z2100 and Z3100 Photo Printer series, much of this work can be done automatically by the printer. The printer will automatically handle the manual work of printing, drying, preparation for measurement, colour patch measurement, as well as computing and updating printer firmware, freeing the user to do other tasks.

Apart from having the printer always calibrated, it is necessary to control and track all colour devices for variations in temperature, humidity, environmental changes and printing behaviour – like changes in hardware through wear and tear, inks and media. For this reason, it is also important to re-profile the media that is being used regularly to maintain colour accuracy. Today, this could require as many as 28 manual steps from base linearisation to final colour profile creation for each medium used – a process that can take up to three hours per media. Since most colour professionals will use at least three different media, this can add six to nine hours of additional, unproductive work. Again, the embedded spectrophotometer, in the new HP Designjet Z2100 and Z3100 Photo Printer series, in combination with the HP Color Center (this is included in the printer’s software), automates much of this process.

“Colour profiling on an inkjet printer requires the user to print lots of colour patches, wait for them to dry, manually measure the colour, and then enter and compute the profiles. Measuring a large number of colour patches can be very tedious and tiring, and mistakes in measuring are common. The addition of an embedded spectrophotometer in these new printers will dramatically reduce that burden,” said Mr Tan.

Mistakes mean wasted time and resources to photo professionals. Not only time is wasted, but also inks and media, since each colour error requires re-profiling until the profile is correct. This wastage can increase business costs and decrease profit margins – which are often already tight in today’s ultra-competitive market.

In addition to the embedded spectrophotometer, the HP Designjet Z2100 and Z3100 Photo Printer series boast an impressive array of technology designed to help graphic arts professionals define their digital difference and set themselves and their businesses apart from their competition. Products in the HP Designjet Z2100 Photo Printer series are 8-ink large format printers, and those in the HP Designjet Z3100 Photo Printer series are 12-ink large format printers. Both series produce high-quality prints using HP Vivera pigment inks designed to achieve consistently outstanding image quality. Other key features include:

· Ability to simulate over 80% of the PANTONE colours2

· Large format prints in either 24 inch (60.96 cm) or 44 inch (111.76cm) wide, roll or sheet fed

· High-speed prints, with A1 colour image on coated paper, normal mode printing at 4.2 min/page

· High-quality colour and real black-and-white proofs

· Colour and black and white prints which resist fading for over 200 years3

· Consistent colour from print to print through quick calibration, ensuring delivery of print-to-print and printer-to-printer repeatability

· Ideally suitable with HP’s portfolio of eight photo papers, 10 digital fine art papers, three proofing papers and more than 35 other commercially available media.

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