Picnic Print achieves unique quality as first adopter of the Konica Minolta AccurioPress C83hc in Australia
Picnic Print provides high quality digital printing for all areas of the print industry such as sheet fed digital print, visual display solutions including point of sale, window decals, and 3D static displays, and other materials including hanging box / poster frames, box framed prints, light boxes, and much more. Picnic Print has long been established as a preferred provider for premium fashion brands, providing a full range of printing for products, event invitations, look books, point of sale, and sales collateral.
- Nick Pettaras, owner, Picnic Print
Picnic Print works with fashion brands and photographers, producing high quality promotional materials. Fashion photographers shoot in RGB, which loses its quality and resolution when reproduced using CMYK printing. Picnic Print found that the depth and detail was being lost in the fashion photographs when they were being reproduced and wanted to find a machine that could print both in RGB and CMYK.
Furthermore, Picnic Print prints a lot of invitations, menus, booklets, signs and installations, and colour-matching is an important part of that process. Being able to match colours perfectly would give Picnic Print a competitive advantage.
These challenges led Picnic Print’s owner, Nick Pettaras, to research potential options. His strong customer focus meant that Nick needed a solution that would provide exceptional quality and reduce costs for his clients.
Nick Pettaras, owner, Picnic Print, said, “When fashion photography comes in with a high level of detail, it looks amazing on screen. However, as soon as it’s converted to CMYK, the images look flooded and flat, which is a traditional problem with printing. Clients don’t want to lose the detail and quality in these pictures, so it was important to find a printer that could reproduce the images more faithfully.”
Picnic Print chose the Konica Minolta AccurioPress C83hc, making it the first new-generation high chroma digital print system installed in Australia. This press, unlike most conventional CMYK digital toner print systems, has a wider colour gamut and is able to accurately reproduce colours as seen on screen as RGB.
Nick Pettaras said, “Having worked with Konica Minolta for the past six years or so, I was confident that the machine would be what Picnic Print needed. The future of printing lies in being able to switch easily between colour profiles and the AccurioPress C83hc provides that. I was surprised to be the first adopter in Australia because it seems like an obvious choice.”
The Konica Minolta high chroma machine lets users switch between high chroma, RGB, and CMYK depending on the finish they’re looking for. Users can print proofs of each, then let the client choose which profile to use.
Because the AccurioPress C83hc offers a wider colour gamut than other CMYK toner print systems, it can produce printed colours that other print systems can’t. It can produce a large range of Pantone colours and spot colours to accurately match client logos and designs. It also provides the ability to match other larger format prints with ease, keeping the colour consistent across all outputs.
This print system is unique as it can print RGB with no file conversion required to print colours that come to life, more accurately representing the colour designers would see on the monitor.
With the Konica Minolta AccurioPress C83hc, Picnic Print has astonished customers with the high quality and exceptional detail it can now reproduce.
Nick Pettaras said, “The feedback from clients since using this machine has been incredible. I’ve had printers come and ask if we can match their digital proofs, and we’ve been able to match them perfectly, first time every time. We can choose between different colour profiles and the colour matches exactly. I haven’t seen anything like it in 25 years in the business. It’s incredible.
“Being able to colour-match so accurately is a huge advantage. Normally, a printing job might require 15 to 25 sheets going up and down with colour to match but this machine matches first time and we only have to calibrate colour consistency once a week, which is fantastic.
“This is the best machine I’ve ever seen. It saves time and hassle, and gives customers an outstanding result without adding unnecessary cost.”
The reduction in set-up times is expected to increase productivity by over 30 per cent while reducing labour time by 30 to 40 per cent. By taking their colour quality to the next level, Picnic Print anticipates it will grow its clientele and print jobs by up to 30 per cent.