GRAND RAPIDS, Michigan – X-Rite, Inc. with its wholly owned subsidiary Pantone LLC will demonstrate new solutions for the measurement and management of color at the INFO*FLEX 2014 Show to be held April 28-29 in Baltimore.

X-Rite Pantone representatives at booth 1009 at the Baltimore Convention Center will explain features of newly introduced hardware and software solutions that range from the X-Rite eXact™ Scan that enables pressroom personnel to improve color workflows to the ColorCert®: X-Rite Edition software that greatly simplifies color communication from the artwork phase of projects through separation, ink room and pressroom.

The eXact brings to the supply chain a precise, yet simple-to-use, flexible spectrophotometer that is fully compliant with ISO 13655:2009 measurement standards. It enables printers to save time and reduce costs and make-ready by accurately measuring and communicating color. It is the only device to support all M Standards and take into account the complexity of optical brighteners in ink or paper. 

With the new Scan option, the eXact spectrophotometer becomes even more cost effective, allowing the pressroom personnel to smoothly read multiple color bars on a variety of printed materials. The accessory extends the sophisticated measuring system of eXact to a wide array of printing equipment, including older offset presses with no automated color controls, helping customers hold onto large capital investments longer. Using eXact Scan, less experienced pressroom operators can take reliable readings for color control that can be used to compose the audit trails necessary for service level agreements with customers.

“Printers want to hold onto their presses as long as possible,” said X-Rite Director of Market Communications Shoshana Burgett. “Our eXact Scan and InkKeyControl software give printers an affordable way to apply advanced technology found on new presses to their older offset equipment.” 

InkKeyControl software allows commercial printers to achieve faster make-ready and improve quality control through control of ink keys.  The solution displays real-time measurement results in a graphical “traffic light” report that enables press operators to make changes as they print.

ColorCert: X-Rite Edition is a comprehensive, scalable solution that has applications for large converters or those printers that want to drive consistency across several sites. The package allows printers to gain instant visibility on performance of their operations in real time on something as simple as an individual job to more complex analysis that uses a dashboard system to aggregate information across multiple jobs, equipment or locations. 

Along with eXact Scan and ColorCert: X-Rite Edition, company representatives will be demonstrating how  PantoneLIVE™ makes it easy for customers, packaging designers and packaging converters to access data that precisely defines brand colors via a secure, centralized cloud ecosystem.

By incorporating ColorCert: X-Rite Edition into the PantoneLIVE workflow, brand owners have a complete, end-to-end, closed-loop solution for determining that color is right the first time, every time, regardless of printing technology or substrate.  

With PantoneLIVE, converters can access the 22 PantoneLIVE libraries that cover a majority of the substrates used in the packaging industry, including corrugated brown kraft, transparent film, carton board and labels. PantoneLIVE provides customers a means to clearly, and digitally communicate color standards across the supply chain.  

Working hand-in-hand with the eXact is NetProfiler 3.0. All spectrophotometers experience some data drift over time due to age and use, and NetProfiler 3.0 makes it easy for eXact customers to regularly optimize, verify and ascertain their instruments are calibrated to a single virtual standard with handheld and benchtop spectrophotometers used at locations globally.

Another highlight of the show is X-Rite's InkFormulation 6, which helps printers to rapidly calculate the optimal and most cost-effective recipe based on the printing process, ink, illumination, pigment pricing, and number of components and materials to be used. The software helps printers and ink suppliers to speed up the ink formulation workflow process (including liquid inks and special inks), with consistent, reproducible results on a broad variety of substrates and ink film thicknesses, including transparent films and metalized substrates.

For more information, please refer to the http://www.xrite.com website.