Color consistency is a challenge.  From monitor to printed page or mobile screen, colors often appear different across mediums. This is partly because of the different ways we create colors. Displays create colors by combining lights while printers combine ink to create different colors. You take away light to affect changes in color on a screen while you apply more ink to affect changes in color on the page. With different display settings, printer capabilities, and types of paper, what you see on the screen is often NOT what appears on paper or on a mobile device. Consistency is important, however, both for your branding and product output. Use the following guide for ultimate color consistency.

Tips for Better Printer Color Management

Challenging as it is, color consistency is vitally important.  It’s crucial to your brand, your products, and any other graphic output your business produces. You want to make sure from initial image to final printing, your image color integrity remains intact. Use the following tips to maintain greater printer color consistency.

High Quality, High-resolution Printer

Your print quality limitations are determined by your printer fleet. Resolution in printing is just as important as it is for displaying your work on monitors. Printer resolution is measured in dots per inch (DPI). The higher the DPI, the higher the resolution. A higher resolution printer produces cleaner, crisper output. Make sure to equip your fleet with high quality, high-resolution copiersand printers. Also, pay attention to the number of inks available for your printers. Do they only use the standard cyan, magenta, yellow, and black? Or do they also have other options available such as orange, green, red, and blue? More ink colors mean greater precision. Printer and copier leasing is a great option for maintaining the highest quality fleet.

Color Calibrated Monitors

If your color output is consistently different than what you see on the screen, your display is likely the problem. The only way to ensure consistency between displayed and printed images is monitor calibration. Your operating system likely comes with a built in calibration tool and there are others available online. For truly professional output, however, consider investing in professional calibration hardware. Keep in mind, too, that laptops have a smaller color gamut than quality graphics displays.

High-resolution Images

The resolution of the graphic you are working with is just as important as the printer resolution. A higher resolution graphic means space contains more information. This creates a sharper, crisper, and much more vibrant image. Nuances and transitions between colors are captured better and each color is better defined than with lower resolution images. Make sure you’re using software that generates high-resolution images.

Consider Professional Products

There are software products you can purchase for your business that will allow you to create and manage display profiles. You can manage and store profiles, adjust settings, and maintain optimal color consistency for multiple monitors. This will save you time and provide optimal consistency. Also look into color matching services to ensure your printer inks match your images. The two methods of color matching are process and spot colors. Process colors are the standard cyan, magenta, yellow and black whereas spot colors use premixed ink and can be more precise and consistent. Make sure you also buy quality paper that is optimized for each type of printer and each print job.

Printer Profiling 

Your goal is to have consistency and predictability in printing across different types of printers. The best way have professional printing consistency and predictability is printer profiles. Some printers have ready-to-use profiles that may only need fine-tuning by a tech. If your color needs are more critical, find out if your printer came with profiling software and consider purchasing a spectrophotometer for optimal color potential.

Equip Your Business for Success

Quality printing is vital to your business but can be a headache to maintain. For consistent professional output, you need more than stock tools at your disposal. Use this guide to printer color management to achieve your ultimate color quality and consistency. For more information on using high-quality Sharp products, Contact Platinum Copier Solutions today.