Enfocus Software have just announced the latest release of products in their award-winning automation suite, Switch.
Switch 10 builds on the Switch series’ project of automating repetitive tasks, freeing up staff to progress with more complicated and creative activities. To help you work smarter, not harder, Switch 10 incorporates a workload visualiser which tracks the possibility of a system overload with a simple visual indicator. It also has an improved processing engine, which means that should a problem in one process arise, it won’t affect your work elsewhere. There’s enhanced data security with a Secure File Transfer Protocol, and a SwitchProxy Module is available for FullSwitch and PowerSwitch clients wanting to ensure the smooth running of operations whilst publisher’s servers are undergoing maintainance. Switch 10 also comes with several optional add-ons, including a database connector module allowing Switch to use information from your MIS or ERP systems, and an improved system for managing third-party configurations. Finally, there’s the SwitchClient feature, which allows for improved job filtering, sorting and locking and makes life much easier for operators and customers.
Enfocus Software will be co-presenting with ColourProcess at PrintEx11, May 4-6 in Sydney, so if you’re interested in learning more about the features and benefits of autmation software, be sure to drop by Stand 3216.
Limehouse Creative are a fresh, new, high-end retouching company, who count major international organizations such as Jaguar, Britain’s Channel 4 and Penguin Books amongst their clients.
Duncan Harriss, Creative Partner at Limehouse, recently purchased an Epson Stylus 4880 printer and was looking for someone to help them calibrate their printer hardware and assist in installation of proofing software which would enable them to produce industry quality ISO and 3DAP-v3 certified digital proof. Duncan told us that Proof2Go, the RIP software provided by ColourProcess, “is absolutely topnotch, the best RIP software we’ve used. As we work on a one-on-one basis with art directors, photographers and brands to create eye-catching images and campaigns, it’s essential that the digital proofing tools we use must be easy to use and be scaleable so as to change and support our needs as we grow to meet those of our clients. Proof2Go was all that and more.”
At ColourProcess we believe in tailoring solutions to our clients’ needs, and it was this attention to detail that Duncan and his team appreciated so much. “It was clear that Yves [Roussange, Managing Director] not only had the tools and experience but also the friendly and down-to-earth manner we consider so important. We would not hesitate to recommend his services.”
With the growth of digital printing and client expectations remaining high as ever, it makes sense to invest in software that will help you meet those expectations through digital print. Contact us if you’re interested in moving your business forward with digital.
For the first time at an Australian trade-show, award-winning RIP software developers Caldera Graphics will be co-presenting with ColourProcess at PrintEx11.
Caldera Graphics is a software company specializing in colour management, imaging and driving solutions for large format peripherals. With the experience of 17 years in imaging solutions and technologies, Caldera Graphics has thousands of customers worldwide. In Australia, their clients include MMT Brisbane and GSP-Print Sydney.
Caldera will exhibit a range of products at PrintEx11, including the new interface of CostView 2.0 , three-time award winner of the DPI Best Product of the Year Award in Business Management Software. CostView is the ultimate dashboard for a manager sensitive to production costs. Its web-driven interface can be accessed by any user in your company network using a simple web browser, and is now available for iPad.
Caldera will also exhibit their exclusive Adobe PDF Print Engine, and i1Prism, the new X-Rite Colour Management engine.
Caldera will be co-presenting on Stand 3216 with ColourProcess, their master distributor in Australia. If you want to make the best wide-format printing software work for you, make sure to pay us a visit.
To help you understand and explore how automation can help you, ColourProcess and Enfocus Software are organizing two breakfast seminars. The first will be in Sydney during PrintEx11 on Thursday May 5th and the second in Melbourne on Tuesday May 10th. More details to come soon. Register your interest here and we’ll keep you posted.
Here at ColourProcess, we’ve long been fans of automation software. Our own SwitchBOX, an all-in-one automation product tailored to suit each client’s individual needs, has helped many businesses across the country improve their output and efficiency. This month, we’ll take a closer look at how SwitchBOX can help your business.
Two years ago, one of our Sydney based clients installed a SwitchBOX configuration, built to run 30 jobs. Two years later, they have 90 jobs a day are being processed – all with no increase in staff in their pre-press department. A second SwitchBOX user has multiplied the company’s page output by 300% in the last eighteen months – again with no increase in staff.
As one of our users commented, “If you removed all the SwitchBOX servers in place tomorrow, we would need to increase the price of producing a page ten times [to compensate for the necessary staff increase] and we simply wouldn’t be able to handle the workload.”
From these stories, it should be clear that automation is a fantastic way to increase both the quality of your product and your cost efficiency. The productivity efficiency of a company – and an industry as a whole – depends on investment in innovative technology.
It is not news that the Australian print industry is going through challenging times. The most recent ABS figures for the three months to December 2010 show a 2.7% decline in industry growth compared to the same period in 2009. In such a climate, it is the first instinct of many companies to restrict change and focus on staying afloat. However, such times are actually ideal opportunities to be looking outside the day-to-day running of a business for ways to improve and innovate. Automation software might mean an initial financial outlay, but the return on the investment is significant. You will save money by being able to assign your staff more complex tasks while your automation software takes care of the repetitive jobs that would have previously occupied the majority of their working day. This shift in workload will also allow you to take on more jobs and produce them faster, which, in turn, could lead to an increase in profits. Smart printers will embrace automation to streamline production and keep production costs down. To learn more about how SwitchBOX and ColourProcess can help you move your business forward, contact us.
Rebecca Wolkenstein is the Editor and Creative Director of SoHi Magazine, a beautiful quarterly profiling the best in life and style in the NSW Southern Highlands. She was experiencing problems with the printing of her magazine and was referred by some high-end retouching contacts in Sydney to ColourProcess. Before she spoke with us, Rebecca says, “I was getting a dreadful result from the printing of my uncoated magazine. It was very flat looking and every image looked as thought it was from a different source – which they were!” ColourProcess consulted on the printing of the magazine, recommended training for Rebecca and her head designer and supplied them with printer profiles and monitor calibrations. Now, she says, the problem has “definitely been solved” – and she and her team know how to avoid similar problems in future. “Before ColourProcess I was literally losing sleep wondering what would come back from the printers. Now I feel in control of my print production,” she told us.
SoHi magazine publishes quarterly – check out their website here. We’re sure you’ll agree it’s a beautiful publication. If you want your future printing results to look as good as hers, contact us!
Hello to all our readers and welcome back for an exciting 2011! We hope you enjoyed your Christmas and New Year – even if they seem like a long time ago now. We enjoyed the holiday, but we’re back at work and looking forward to a great year ahead.
PRINTEX11
Even though it’s still four months away, we are already getting very excited about PrintEx11, which lands in Sydney from the 4th-6th of May. PrintEx11 is Australia’s premier print and design exhibition, held every four years. ColourProcess will be present with a 27sqm stand, so come on down to Stall 3216 the Darling Harbour Convention Centre and let the ColourProcess team explain how our products can help your business.
AN INDUSTRY PERSPECTIVE
On January 6 this year, The Australian published an article entitled, “Dollar’s rise takes toll on factories”. The article reports that, due to the strong Australian dollar, our manufacturing industry is currently the second-worst performing in the industrialized or emerging world. As a consequence, manufacturers are being forced to slash production and employment.
By contrast, Germany and Switzerland — both countries with an even stronger currency against the American dollar — are currently the two most productive countries in the world.
One reason for this continued high growth is the willingness of businesses in these countries to adapt various innovative technologies. For instance, Enfocus and Caldera, two products supplied by ColourProcess here in Australia, have both seem exponential growth in sales in Switzerland and Germany in the last year. For instance, between 2009 and 2010, sales of Enfocus’s Switch automation software grew by 100%. Caldera, meanwhile, increased sales of their grand-format RIP workflow software by 110%. It is not too much to conclude that the use of such innovative technologies is a contributing factor in the manufacturing success and growth in these two countries.
ColourProcess is the master distributor of Caldera in Australia, and we are considered Australian market leaders in the installation and integration of Enfocus Switch software. We’ve been using these innovative technologies to increase the competitiveness of Australian businesses for the last three years. To find out how we can use these products and more to help increase your output and reduce production costs, please contact us.
That’s all from us this month! We’ll be back in March with more of the latest news from the world of printing and publishing, as well as some great success stories from ColourProcess clients and some very exciting news from Enfocus Switch!
Latest NEC Price Updates Available Now From ColourProcess
The final newsletter for 2010 promotes the recent change in NEC monitor prices from ColourProcess. A number of NEC products available from ColourProcess have been reduced in price now offering clients highly competitive monitor prices. The recent launch of the new Google image format WebP will rival the old favourite, the jpeg. image format. How will this new Google innovation change the image format market and the photography industry?
Latest NEC Pricing From ColourProcess
The new pricing of NEC monitors at ColourProcess ensures clients are getting a competitive price for their NEC products.
The new NEC SpectraView Profiler bundle and the SpectraView Reference line pricing ensures ColourProcess clients receive superior monitor pricing. These two products also offer customers the highest monitor quality performance when compared to any EIZO monitor. The pricing for both the Profiler bundle and the Reference monitor have been updated in October and now ensure that ColourProcess clients receive competitive NEC monitor prices.
ColourProcess prides itself on offering clients superior products, at market competitive prices, with comprehensive after sales support. Don’t miss out on this latest NEC offer available at ColourProcess which comes with superior support and knowledge assistance.
Google has recently launched the WebP, pronounced ‘weppy’, which it hopes will revolutionise the way we transfer images via remote connection.
Google’s latest addition to the image format library allows users to compress image files to up to 40% smaller than a jpeg. format. This is not only set to change the way we send image files but, as over 60% of web content is made up of images this new, highly compressed image format is likely to enhance image transfer speed and significantly reduce required storage space. This new format joins WebM, a multimedia film container format already launched by Google in early 2010.
There has been some heavy criticism of the latest file format innovation with industry experts pointing out that hardware equipment, print facilities and image editing software do not have a built in WebP function thus preventing its use by the masses, for the time being. Furthermore, the quality results from converting files, with such significant compression, leaves much scope for improvement as images often appear blurred.
Thus, the question still remains regarding the significance of Google’s launch of the WebP and how it will stand up against of the much loved jpeg. format.
ColourProcess will watch the development of this new image format closely, analysing all its strengths and weaknesses. This latest format addition continues the downward spiral of file quality importance by reducing the image quality (300 dpi.) and print page quality (2 400 dpi.) to the minimal web browser quality level (72 dpi.). It’s anyones guess how far this downward print quality spiral will go.
ColourProcess will be back in early 2011
ColourProcess wishes everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and will be returning in February 2011 after an extended holiday break.
Tip of the Month
Converting PDF files to black and white with pdfToolbox 4.5 by callas software.
Recent Hot Topics in the Australian Print Industry
The final printer newsletter from ColourProcess in 2010 looks at another tool available to users of the pdfToolbox 4.5 by callas software. This latest software product allows you to convert PDF files to black and white simply and easily. Furthermore, following on from our digital domination newsletter trend we discuss the final issue further in the last of our three part digital newsletter series.
How can pdfToolbox 4.5 meet your black and white PDF needs?
ColourProcess previews another outstanding tool from the latest PDF innovation software pdfToolbox 4.5 by callas software.
Digital printers, printing black and white documents on colour print engines have been challenged with the cost of click charges; one black click charge or a four colour click charge. callas pdfToolBox 4.5 can, with one click, transform a colour PDF into a black and white document or remove four colour crop marks from a black and white document which ensures users only get charged for a single black.
The purchase of a pdfToolBox 4.5 plug-in will be paid off after producing 5,000 copies of four colour black and white documents which have been corrected.
A recent ProPrint article has further cemented opinions about the digital revolution of print. The digital print industry is continuing to grow despite concerns over a double-dip recession. The main unanswered question is how have digital printers been able to continue to grow in 2010 whilst others have struggled?
Printers are being forced to change their job runs as clients cut down on their print demands. Clients are requesting print orders more impulsively to match a single, specific purpose with very short turn around times and small print quantities. Gone are the days when clients ordered two years worth of print brochures.
This new way of ordering print is having a big impact on offset printers as they are unable to meet the impulsive print demands of clients. Digital printers offer a more flexible print solution to offset allowing for smaller jobs quantities and shorter run times which remain cost efficient.
In August’s print newsletter Yves spoke about his experience of the digital domination at IPEX 2010. It is no surprise that digital is moving into a more dominant position in the print market as the industry changes its buying habits.
ColourProcess has long predicted this progressing trend towards digital print domination. We have a number of key software products available to support printers as client ordering becomes more impulsive. The latest automation software from ColourProcess, the standard application with ready-to-use workflows, DFlux, and the more sophisticated, customised workflow technology, SwitchBOX, can ensure printers enhanced flexibility which is being demanded in the industry.
This month sees the update of the majority of NEC monitor prices by ColourProcess. Preview the new prices in this month’s newsletter. pdfToolbox 4.5 by callas software offers users the chance to ensure 100% compliance with pdf industry standards. Learn more about how this product can assist you in reaching the highest pdf quality for all your documents.
Latest NEC SpectraView Pricing from ColourProcess
The pricing of the majority of NEC monitors sold by ColourProcess have been changed and reduced this month.
NEC MultiSync PA241 monitor = $1,930.50 (inc. GST)
NEC MultiSync PA271 monitor = $2,573.00 (inc. GST)
NEC SpectraView Reference PA241W = $2,877.60 (inc. GST)
NEC SpectraView Reference PA271W = $3,325.30 (inc. GST)
How sure are you that your PDFs are compliant with the PDF-X1a Industry Standard?
Are you struggling to ensure your pdfs meet the strict industry standards? Learn more about the latest pdfToolbox 4.5 by callas software available from ColourProcess can ensure your pdfs will always be of the highest standard.
pdfToolbox 4.5 by callas software offers users the chance to repair, with an automatic fix-up tool, any pdfs that do not comply with the X1a industry standard. As discussed in last months newsletter, a key feature of the new software from callas is the built in PDF-X1a profiles for Adobe Indesign which allow users to create superior pdfs with a simple click. These profile formats offer users the chance to ensure 100% of all pdfs are X-1a compliant.
ColourProcess has developed a comprehensive support portal on its website. Latest months newsletter featured a number of ColourProcess produced videos which have been created specifically for pdfToolbox 4.5 users. ColourProcess prides itself on offering its client superior after sales support. This website page offers ColourProcess clients comprehensive support for a number of its innovative products. Check the page out now for pdfToolbpx 4.5 product assistance.
