Film Dictionary
- A-PET
- Acetate films
- Acrylate pre-treatment
- AEO Certificate
- Anti-fog film
- Antistatic films
- Bio-based films
- Calibration
- Cellophane films
- Compostability of films
- Corona pretreatment
- DI acetate films
- Digital transfer printing
- DYE inks
- Filing tab for Fastback, glossary
- Food-safe films
- Ink fountain films for Heidelberg presses
- Ink fountain films for König und Bauer presses
- Inkjet
- Laminating films
- Liquid toner
- MELINEX film
- Mirror films
- Mounting films
- Mylar film
- MYLAR-A films
- Oeko-Tex
- Offset printing
- optimont® 500-A-PET
- optimont® 501
- optimont® 501-R
- optimont® AF
- optimont® CDA
- optimont® copy-laser-film
- optimont® IPF
- optimont® Laserfilm
- optimont® MF AS AC
- optimont® MF-MW film
- optimont® Syntheticpaper
- optimont® TRM
- optimont® Visor Film Nova
- optimont® VTM-0
- optimont® Z2M
- PA / Polyamide
- pick and place
- Pigment inks
- PLA / Polylactic acid, Polyactide
- Polycarbonate / PC
- Polyethylene / PE
- Polyethylenterephalat (PET)
- PP / Polypropylene
- PS / Polystyrene
- PU pretreatment
- RFID
- Screen printing
- Solid inks
- Surface tension
- Syntheticpaper
- TCA pretreatment
- Transfer films
- Visible window backsplash
- Window film
Calibration
What is meant by calibration?
Professional printers must meet the highest standards when printing photos, texts or colour prints. To reliably ensure high print quality, a printer should always be calibrated. For calibration, a test print is printed using a specific type of ink and the desired print substrate. During calibration, it is important that colour management is switched off both on the printer and on the PC. This ensures that the test print is created entirely via the hardware.
The printout contains predefined colour fields that are measured using a so-called spectrophotometer. This is a specific measuring device that can be used to assess colours based on their colour density and colour intensity. Spectrophotometers split the visible light spectrum into several measuring channels or into around 20 to 40 narrow bands and determine a light intensity value for each band or channel, which is then digitized. The measuring system then multiplies the individual measured values by the standard values. This allows the corresponding colour values to be calculated.
An ICC profile as the basis for calibration
The aim of calibration is to prevent unwanted colour casts and optimize the displayed colour image. For successful calibration, all devices involved must be coordinated with one another. The interaction between printer, monitor and scanner is the main focus here. This is an essential prerequisite for visually convincing printouts. In this context, it is advisable to create an ICC profile as the basis for calibrating the printer or printer software and for the targeted correction of colour deviations.
When is calibration recommended?
Calibration should always be used when an image is to be reproduced by a printer as colour-accurately as possible in terms of colour richness and tonal range. This is not possible without creating an exact colour profile. The profile depends on the printer used, as well as on the ink and paper used for the printout.
What must always be considered during calibration?
In order to successfully calibrate a printing system, various factors must be taken into account. For example, each paper requires its own colour profile. This is important because papers have different shades of white and absorb printer ink differently. This has different effects on the colour profile. If, for example, you use paper with strong optical brighteners, the printouts usually have a bluish tone. The colour tone changes depending on the paper.
Creating high-quality colour profiles using software solutions
If a truly high-quality and meaningful colour profile is to be created as part of calibration, software solutions in combination with the measuring device used provide the best possible basis. However, it is essential to ensure that the colour rendering is also aligned with the monitor and not only with the printer or printer software.
The profiles created by high-quality programs usually work more precisely than the applications preinstalled by the manufacturers. There are also programs that use one colour profile as a template in order to convert it into another colour profile. In professional use, the printouts should always be as colorimetric or perceptual as possible.
This can be set in the menu of the respective software. With such a setting, the printer uses a wide colour gamut and strong tones for the printout. These are important factors, especially for professional photographers, for example.
How does calibration work in detail?
Calibration is therefore used to coordinate the printer or printer software with inks and paper or another print substrate. In the first step, a standardized colour scale is printed and then measured by the spectrophotometer in terms of colour values and colour densities. The respective values are then transferred to the calibration software.
The software converts the data into a printer profile and then transfers the profile to the raster image processor, or RIP for short. The RIP then converts the profile data into a raster graphic. If the same parameters or components are used again during the next printing process, the RIP software automatically performs the corresponding colour corrections.
