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| About G7® |
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G7® is the newest and most useful process-printing calibration ever developed, but there is still some confusion about what it is and what it isn't.
Take Advantage of SGIA’s G7 Resources
1. SGIA Journal, First Quarter 2010, "Maximize Print Profitability with G7"
2. Introduction to G7®
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The Benefits G7® Can Bring Your Sales Department
4. Single Color Build to Neutral Gray in Screen Printing
5. Why a Common Appearance is Better Than a Match
6. G7 in Action: A Panel Discussion
G7 How To Book
This book describes how to calibrate any CMYK device using the G7 method.
Member Price: $10
Non Member Price: $15
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 G7, an innovative calibration methodology developed by IDEAlliance, enables different proofers, screen presses and digital printers to produce a very similar appearance regardless of substrate, line count, ink type or printing condition.
IDEAlliance (International Digital Enterprise Alliance) is promoting the G7 method as a constant component of all future print specifications, and has offered it openly for adoption by all standards associations for all types of imaging or media, worldwide. SGIA has joined forces with IDEAlliance to enhance standardization and best practices of color management and workflow in screen and digital printing and is playing a crucial role to facilitate G7 methodologies.
G7 is a method for a media-independent, universal grayscale appearance that is applicable to all color imaging processes. G7 manages gray balance and tonality using simple CMYK calibration curves and provides a basis for “shared appearance” that aligns multiple printing platforms as closely as possible to each other without additional color management.
With G7, you can achieve a common visual appearance in your prints — even if you are using different materials.
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In my 30 years of printing experience, G7 was the best 4-color process printing method I have ever used. It eliminates the guessing of what color should be adjusted during the setup procedure. With this new knowledge and the improvements in setup, we estimate that our company has a setup time savings of three hours per week. This will result in about $500,000 in additional sales per year. ”
Ralph Rhein, Vice President of Operations, Duracolor |
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| How it Works |
G7 adjusts the device via typical CMYK RIP curves, or other device calibration utilities, to match a pre-defined NPDC (Neutral Print Density Curve) and gray balance. Calibrating a device to G7 valves will give it the same neutral gray scale appearance as all other G7 devices.
This is the secret of the G7 method — achieving a common visual appearance, regardless of what colorants you use or how they are applied to the substrate. What’s more — there’s no need for additional color management.
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Over the last couple of years we have come across the growing popularity of GRACol and G7. At the same time, our customer base line has become more educated about different print methods and technologies offered. Brand integrity is critical to our clients, and as a result, a majority of our clients and brand owners are now requesting G7 by name. Some of our bigger clients will not even deal with you if you are not G7 Certified. This has created greater opportunities for Graphic Trends clients who want to maintain brand integrity elect to award large projects to a facility such as ours that is equipped to print an entire project. ”
Jose Puentes, Print Production Manager, Graphic Trends |
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What it’s Not
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Now that you know what G7 is, take a look at what it isn’t.
- G7 is not an ICC color management system, nor does it replace it.
- G7 is not an ISO standard, but rather a specification to help printers meet those standards.
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| G7 vs. GRACol 7 |
| G7 is not the same as the GRACoL 7 print specification. G7 is a calibration method; the 'G' refers to calibrating Gray values, while the '7' refers to the seven primary color values defined in the ISO 12647-2 printing standard: Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black (K), Red (M+Y), Green (C+Y) and Blue (C+M). Although originally intended for commercial offset printing, the G7 method is applicable to virtually any CMYK imaging process and has been successfully tested on a wide range of processes, including screen, offset, newsprint, gravure, flexography, dye-sublimation, ink-jet and electrophotography, as well as a wide range of AM and FM screening methods. |
| Benefits of G7 |
G7 may sound too good to be true — but it isn’t! There are real benefits to using the G7 methodology.
G7 fulfills the need for a non-subjective specification of standardized process color output. Standardizing to a common neutral gray produces a file with no cast. This means the print truly represents the file because no color cast is added to it. This allows printers to have confidence that the print is correct, repeatable and non-subjective, saving them both the cost and time of reprinting.
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I have a customer that simply provides me with GRACol/G7 proofs. They do not care what method of printing I choose, they just want color consistency throughout and the most cost effective price. Using G7 has allowed me to match their supplied proofs very well using multiple print methods which affords the client a much reduced bill. This client also used to press check every single screen-printed job. With G7 in place, I simply send them a report showing how close we were on each screen fun from pulled samples and they no longer fly in for press checks, saving them thousands of dollars per year. ”
Mark Landrowski, Vice President, NGS Printing, Inc. |
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