A part of Sun Chemical’s DigiProof service, the new metal deco digital proofing solution allows canmakers to dispense with physical aluminium wet proofs
Image: The new metal deco digital proofing solution is designed for two-piece beverage cans. Photo: courtesy of skeeze from Pixabay.
US-based printing inks and pigments manufacturer Sun Chemical has partnered with CGS Publishing Technologies, a digital proofing provider for the professional graphic arts market, to provide new metal deco digital proofing solution for two-piece beverage cans.
Intended for the metal packaging industry, the new digital proofing solution forms part of Sun Chemical’s DigiProof service within its SunColorBox colour management toolkit.
The solution has been designed to allow canmakers, designers and brand owners to dispense with physical aluminium wet proofs, thus significantly reduce the packaging design process time.
Sun Chemical metal deco inks global champion Iñaki Llona said: “With the launch of this digital proofing solution, which can create colour-correct and designed samples without the need to print on a can, customers will have far greater creative options because of the very short time and low cost required to produce the colour-accurate digital prints.
“Designs can be created in one location and digitally printed at multiple locations across the world, without the need for slow and costly couriers to convey physical print samples.
“As a result, they will be able to develop new designs in much less time and radically reduce the overall time to market for new products.”
The new digital proofing solution features two metal deco colour libraries
The solution features CGS ORIS software which is linked to two new metal deco dependent colour libraries for PantoneLIVE, a cloud-based, digital colour standard ecosystem.
The two metal deco libraries, one for opaque and one for transparent applications, comprises over 4,000 achievable colour options.
Llona added: “Having created the metal deco PantoneLIVE libraries, we’ve then worked with CGS to link the libraries to their software to offer the market a unique solution that can produce a digital inkjet simulation of PantoneLIVE metal deco colours and immediately print them on-demand from the CGS system.”
CGS Europe key account director Heiner Mueller said: “Apart from specific colour management software, CGS has developed a gamut extending ink set and corresponding custom media, which are solely aimed at the requirements of the packaging market.
“We are excited to cooperate closely with a partner like Sun Chemical to create a standard for metal decoration, which is probably the most challenging segment in the packaging industry.”
In September 2019, Sun Chemical has teamed up with German printing inks manufacturer Epple Druckfarben to provide sheetfed offset inks for direct food contact applications.
As per the terms of the exclusive agreement, the companies agreed to combine their resources to supply Epple’s BoFood Organic sheetfed offset inks for global customers.