Quality Up at Pride In Print

Quality Up at Pride In Print

Judges at Pride In Print have given a resounding thumb’s up to the quality of entries received for this year’s Awards, suggesting the NZ print industry is forging ahead after the economic gloom of recent years.

The team of judges has recently completed three days of intense scrutiny of entries across eight categories comprising publications, business print, packaging, labels, display print, promotional print, specialty products and industry development.

Feedback from the judging team leaders is that there has been a marked rise in standards compared to recent years, with quality jump in a number of areas. Some printers have even entered improved reprints of jobs done in previous years — having first corrected faults that were noted on the comments sheets returned by the judges the previous year, indicating they have learned from the Pride In Print process.

Sheetfed offset judge Damian Fleming summarised the general feeling by saying: “Comments from the judging tables were noticeably positive with a marked improvement seen in registration and colour consistency. We are seeing leaps in reproduction quality across the industry, with flexographic, screen and newsprint in particular proving that NZ printers are still striving to improve and innovate.”

Labels judge Mark Sullivan said that in his category, the rise in standards was noticeable.

“Once again the quality of entries has improved on previous years. While the complexity of the printing appeared to be less, the attention to detail was impressive. It was an absolute pleasure to see and it made a very difficult task for the judges.”

Pre press judge Bill Ashworth agreed that judging was tougher because of the quality of entries: “Considering that there were a similar number of entries to the previous year and preliminary judging this year had to be extended well into the Tuesday evening, it was testament to the fact that it was much harder to remove entries for finals considerations.

“The quality of entries this year was higher making the judging process a more prolonged exercise.”

Print Finishing specialist Chris Woodhead was another who felt that the quality of entries had risen from last year.

“Far more attention is being taken to ensure that print blemishes are kept to a minimum along with detail being paid to the finishing. Areas that let a lot of entries down in previous years such as bad trimming (chips in knives) and poor folding and gluing were for the better part absent this year.

“All in all a far better standard.”

Flexible printing judge Frank Brokken was so impressed by some of the entries he viewed that he commented: “If this is the minimum standard that we can expect to see next year then flexo printing will continue to have a great future.

“There was consistent control over the process variables. The high-quality craftsmanship we have seen this year will help flexo continue its challenge to minimise the amount of cheaper imported printing landing on our shores.”

From the design perspective, Kerenza Smith said major improvements were seen in a number of areas. “The quality of the label category as a whole was significantly higher than previous years. Strong design and a combination of printing processes and embellishments, created several superb examples of world-best printing."

She said other trends that were noticeable across the print categories were the mixing of processes creating more unique results, and differentiating from what is achievable with (inhouse/office) digital printing.

“The digital printing process has been refined now to the point where some entries are (literally) without fault.

“There were more interesting and unique stock choices too. The trend is continuing where designers and printers are working closely together to achieve a quite ambitious result."

On the downside, judges noted a disappointing lack of back-up documentation, particularly for some of the innovation category entries.And one area where some entrants let themselves down was the old problem of not checking their entry for blemishes. One job in particular had gained the judges’ eye until a major ink smudge was found on an inside page. A careful check of the entry before submitting it would have made the entrant realise another copy should be selected.

The Pride in Print Awards Night will be held in the Langham Hotel,

Auckland, on Friday, June 29.

ENDS

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