Rochester Institute of Technology - Xerographic printing production of color images is matching the quality of offset lithography for the first time. The trade publication, Technology Watch, has selected Rochester Institute of Technology and Xerox to demonstrate how the two processes are indistinguishable. Test Prints to be Reproduced in Magazine RIT Alumnus Henry Freedman '75 (printing and photographic science) will document the prints side by side in an upcoming issue of Technology Watch—allowing readers to judge the process matching for themselves. “We are at a major crossroads today where digital printing processes can substitute for traditional printing processes closer to production speeds of 80 pages a minute,” says Freedman, editor of Technology Watch and creator of the comparison demonstration. “It took over 450 years for offset lithography to substitute for relief letter press imaging. Now just 50 years or so later we have the start of color Xerography substituting for offset.” In the test, the offset color printing of an image was produced at RIT's Printing Applications Laboratory. “The Printing Applications Laboratory is the ideal setting for this demonstration because RIT has more than 60 years experience working with industry on application issues,” says Bill Garno, director of the Printing Applications Laboratory. For the second part of the demonstration, Xerox will run the identical image through its new 8000 digital color press. RIT's School of Print Media, considered among the best of its kind in the world, offers undergraduate programs in graphic media and new media publishing, and a graduate program in print media. RIT is also internationally recognized as a leader in computing, imaging technology, fine and applied arts, and education of the deaf, enrolling 15,300 full- and part-time students in more than 340 career-oriented and professional programs. For well over a decade, U.S. News and World Report has ranked RIT as one of the nation's leading comprehensive universities. RIT is also included in The Fiske Guide to Colleges and Barron's Best Buys in Education. Technology Watch has published more than 400 scientific and technical articles about printing and the information industry for more than 20 years. It has become one of the leading technical sources on the future of technologies in printing and publishing. Many technologies used today were first described years ago in Technology Watch, whose international base of subscribers read as a Who's Who of the imaging industry. For more information about the demonstrations, contact Henry Freedman at 703-764-5206 or [email protected].