Digital vs. Offset explained.

Printing has come a long way since it's beginnings. Today's graphic designers will quickly tell you that offset printing is the best choice for your new print project, but has anyone described why (or why not) it is the best option for you? I am not going to get uber-technical, but will just quickly cover the difference between digital and offset.

What is digital printing?

In a way, digital printing works a lot like your color copier. It doesn't move incredibly fast, but there is no setup, and it is fairly inexpensive to use. Digital is always the discount option for smaller quantity projects.

What is offset printing?

Offset printing is more a chemical process than a computer process. In an offset job there are four rollers that have etched metal plates on them. These four rollers typically represent the CMYK you hear about. C = Cyan, M = Magenta, Y = Yellow, K = Black. (K is used to avoid possible confusion as Blue) The paper runs through these four (or more) rollers at lighting fast speeds and "offsets" the image from the plate to the paper. There are more technical details here, but why bore you? Offset also offers spot color ability to better match your PANTONE. This guarantees perfect color representation. (More on PANTONE and SPOT colors later)

What is the difference?

Avoiding technical jargon, offset is traditionally used for high volume projects, and digital is used for short run projects on a budget. The offset press provides the highest quality printing, most accurate color and runs at the fastest rate, so typically this is the best option. Because offset printing is done through a beast of a machine, it does take significant time to set up, and this is where most of your cost comes in. If you are printing thousands of sheets, this cost isn't as significant, but if you are printing a short run, the set-up alone could be half (or more) of the entire project.

Digital on the other hand, requires little set-up other than throwing the paper in. This means for short runs, there is not nearly as much manual labor, resulting in lower cost. This money saving option does have it's downsides such as color-accuracy loss, image quality loss, and limited paper options. (It is important to note that recent advancements have made digital quality and color representation nearly indistinguishable from offset. Some digital printers even claim 99% PANTONE accuracy!)

What does this mean for you?

If you are printing thousands of pieces, the obvious answer is offset, no contest. If you are printing a smaller run project you may want digital, but keep in mind unless your printer has one of the new state-of-the-art digital presses (3 in Iowa, 2 of which are private) your digital project mind end up looking like a desktop printer production, specifically when you match specific colors.

Do you have a personal experience negative or positive? Do you have something to add? Let me hear you, please comment!

The death of Paper and Ink?

Concerns are being voiced that traditional graphic design methods using paper and printing are on the way out as a result of new technologies and green efforts aimed at reducing paper use. These are legitimate concerns and they will certainly change graphic design methods, but don't freak out yet, I do not believe traditional paper methods, and printing will end for a very long time, if at all.

I am not going to go on the record like IBM saying the computer will never be smaller than a room, but I will say that paper and printing disappearing altogether is unlikely.

Let's rocket ahead about 100 years. [Whoosh!] Now we have digital flexible screens that refresh when you plug them into your USB port (developed). We have magnetic paper and inks that can be put through the printer again and again with the magnetic ink simply re-arranging. Can you imagine libraries with books that can be plugged in and refreshed into new books? Did I mention that no energy is required to read these books (developed)? Let's even dare to say this paper can be cut and packaged without changing it's properties.

If this was the case, I would agree that paper use would decrease substantially form an office use standpoint, but why will ink and paper not completely disappear? One very simply reason is how cheap paper is. From a green standpoint, paper companies make more profit when they find new ways to develop more paper using less trees. They are using better recycling methods and they are even re-planting forests faster than they come down. (Who wants to cut them-self out of a job?) Despite these facts, there is still one more time-tried reason why graphic design using paper and printing simply won't disappear for quite some time.

This reason is that of basic humanity. I am not getting all weird on you, just hear me out. As humans we like to interact with different environments using our senses. Consider the reason we enjoy foods from different cultures or different restaurants. You could eat a nutrient cube, take vitamins, and drink only water, saving you lots of time. For some strange reason though we like to interact with necessary activities in life, and we absolutely love to enjoy new tastes and textures. In food we find taste appealing! In graphic design taste is translated into tactility. Tactility plays a huge role in how we wow our audiences and get our message across. It is why we use different paper options, emboss, scratch and sniff, use textures, and die-cut. Tactility is very important, and we enjoy surfaces and textures. We find it fun and interesting to interact with these graphic design works of art. When you introduce magnetic paper and screens, we lose the element of tactility, and thus we succumb to digitally eating nutrient cubes. Ick!

What have we learned today? I believe there is no validity to paper and ink disappearing altogether, and I doubt that it will ever disappear.