HELSINKI, Finland—An Expanded Gamut Printing (EGP) partnership certificate was awarded to the ink supplier Siegwerk in May, in recognition of introducing new ways to use flexo and offset inks on packaging cartons and fiber and plastic materials, among others. The certificate was awarded by Marvaco, a pioneer in EGP technology.
Siegwerk has developed new EGP printing ink series for offset printing and flexography. With the new inks, packages can be made more colorful while the printing process becomes more flexible and setup times are shortened. EGP also reduces the environmental load of printing as waste and solvent usage are reduced, and inks are used more effectively.
EGP has improved the quality of prints and enabled new, more diverse printing solutions, confirmed Jukka Tervakoski from Siegwerk Finland. Siegwerk’s constant development of inks ensures a successful packaging printing process, and the EGP technology offers clear advantages for Siegwerk’s printing partners and brand owners, said Satu Autio from Siegwerk Finland.
Expanded gamut is a color separation method where prints are implemented with digitally assisted ink blending in a more predictable, precise and cleaner manner. The CMYK color gamut is enriched with OGV (orange, green, violet) process inks, which more than doubles the number of available color shades compared to the Pantone+ color series, without needing to change the colors and using only seven standard colors.
EGP is booming in Europe as packaging printing companies are investing in new printing machines and adopting the EGP technology. Machine manufacturers also have an active role in providing machines that support the latest technology.
Marvaco is a pioneer in EGP, implementing the technology together with ink suppliers and packaging printing companies in Finland and internationally. Siegwerk and Marvaco have implemented EGP solutions for flexography companies using solvent-based and water-based inks and for carton printing companies using offset inks.