Tuebingen – Morgan Impresores has recently installed a wide range of GMG solutions, including GMG ColorProof, GMG ColorServer, GMG SmartProfiler and GMG InkOptimizer, to print much more color-consistent and accurate materials on press, and offer customers more stable proofs.

Morgan Impresores, with its 500 employees, is one of the largest printers in Chile, producing a number of major retail catalogs and magazines, newspaper inserts, and hardcover books. Morgan attributes its success to working with the most advanced printing technology along with a staff of technical and professional experts that makes the most of these technologies. Morgan's service always responds to the needs of its clients, offering them innovation, creativity and superior quality. With its prepress services, the experience of its press operators, and its rotating and finishing units, it is no surprise that Morgan does some of the best advertising, direct marketing, publishing and industrial production in Chile.

Before they invested in their GMG solution, Morgan had a full PDF workflow in a mixed RGB/CMYK image environment. Third party designers produced some content, while Morgan produced the rest in-house. When content was complete, Morgan processed the color separations and proofs manually within Adobe PhotoShop, using its workflow system along with third-party solutions for preflight, and PDF generation. Because they operate a number of sheetfed and web presses, they tried to standardize the process to minimize the number of variables.

Recently, the company decided it needed to upgrade to a real, centralized color management system. "Our primary goal was to reduce the setup and approval process on press. It takes valuable makeready time to resolve complex issues, such as optimizing the appearance of the job, along with technical issues like printing to a color standard, so that repetitive jobs can be completed promptly," says Roberto Alegr'a, Operations Manager, Morgan Impresores. "By improving the print process with reliable color management software, we knew that we could incur savings." For proofing, Morgan had been using a laser printer with a third party RIP that was generating inaccurate color - and stability of the printing was an issue, too. They had so many presses, there was no way to assure that color would be consistent between any of them. They had no way to 'condition' files for each press.

Morgan was looking for a centralized color management system that offered specialization, reliability and performance. They wanted to utilize their unused resources, such as CIP3/CIP4 for their pre-inking system and send color information to the many operators who were operating those consoles. They could not use their pre-inking system accurately because information about the plates was not compatible among pages. Unfortunately, the color was separated with different settings. "If you do not transform color on pages properly by normalizing them with a color management system, even facing pages on the plate will not match," notes Alegria. "While the press crew had access to inking tools, they insisted that density readings did not always lead to good printing - so, in many cases they used instruments just a little, or not at all."

Morgan used to rely on the ability of the prepress operator to modify CMYK files, and Alegria knew that they needed a solution that would allow them to take advantage of a modern viewing station. The RGB workflow also needed these same tools. "We were looking for software that provided a good amount of automation, which we felt would minimize errors because of limited human intervention," remembers Alegria. "We wanted to utilize our operators for other, more relevant or specific tasks that our workflow system can't do."

Morgan talked with a number color management companies, but none of them convinced him that they could address Morgan's needs. According to Alegria, the other systems were quite aggressive, but they had no levels of optimization. Then, Alegria saw a GMG ColorServer and InkOptimizer color management system running at another print facility. After some rigorous testing on press with very stringent goals, the company decided to install a complete GMG color management system, including GMG ColorProof, GMG ColorServer, GMG SmartProfiler and GMG InkOptimizer.

"The implementation went well. We learned that while installing a color management system is a demanding task, it's not impossible. It just takes a while to make the most of it," explains Alegria. "We needed to improve and standardize our press procedures and consumables, and train our crew - not only in the prepress department, but press as well. Our integrator, Saul Arana, was very helpful planning our project. Without him, it might have put the project at risk. He helped us analyze specific topics that could arise during the installation."

Morgan has been using the system for about ten months. The system ensures that it offers all the color information each person in production needs to deliver accurate color. Proofs from GMG ColorProof are much more accurate, tied to a specific printing condition on press – transferring a raw file for every condition - with the right file from GMG ColorServer. Thus, Morgan no longer has to print many proofs to get an OK from the customer. This has streamlined the workflow considerably and delivered faster makereadies. Morgan is about to install a third-party workflow, which can easily connect to ColorServer, ColorProof and InkOptimizer.

"With GMG ColorProof, our proof quality has been improved 100%, because now we have a stable, reliable and certified proof. However, much of the credit really goes to GMG ColorServer, which is able to deliver accurate, consistent normalized files. Now, I feel like I'm protected by the proof, not only with the customer, but with the press crew," comments Alegria. "In fact, it's very encouraging that the press crew is very motivated by the results we are getting. They are much more upbeat about color management."

With GMG ColorServer, Morgan's color information delivers better quality control for the pre-inking department. "We love it," enthuses Alegria. "After GMG file transformation, our CIP3 and CIP4 data is more accurate to pre-inking and automatic spectrodensitometer readings. Now they print by the numbers, because they are assured the numbers will be read correctly."

"We also save ink with GMG InkOptimizer. We are no longer taking down jobs on press and wasting time. We get the press to create accurate color, faster," explains Algeria. "Resolving makeready time was the primary issue. The next step, for us, is to measure our ink savings."

"We had a retail customer that changed its print run from 150,000 to 300,000 catalogs for the Christmas season. The job overwhelmed our capacity, so decided to use our semi commercial Roland Uniset web press to print a lightweight coated (LWC) offset print job the way the customer was accustomed to," recalls Alegria. "We performed all of the color management procedures on GMG ColorServer to transform the file for the sheetfed press, and prepared all the pages according to the integrator's advice. We tested some of the pages at the beginning of the print job and the press crew printed only by the numbers - without looking at any proof. The results were very good, taking account that we never had printed LWC well on that press. With those results, we decided to complete the catalog print run - and the customer was very happy with the results."

"With GMG, we no longer have color issues. GMG ColorServer allows us to make sure that any job, printed on any of our presses, will be consistent from one another. And, with GMG InkOptimizer, color is much more stable on press with much less color movement during the job and faster makereadies. The proofs and press runs are also consistently good," concludes Alegria. "I would recommend GMG color management products without any hesitation."