While there are dozens of printing techniques and machines in the world, but when the debate comes to the best option for industrial printing and packaging, the two most reliable methods which modern age printers recommend are Gravure and Offset printing. Both the printing methods have their distinct features, Pros and cons. Today we’ll talk about the major differences in designing for gravure and offset, but first let’s see what are the general differentiation in Gravure and Offset, which in turncan help you bring or make changes in designing the labels or packaging.
| Gravure | Offset |
| It’s an intaglio process where Material comes directly in contact with the cylinder or roller. | It’s an offset process where Material does not comes directly in contact with the cylinder or roller |
| It contains a solution known as tolvene for drying the printed substance without heating. | It uses a gas oven to heat for drying the printed substance or a powder to dry the same. |
| Gravure printing can provide an output from 1 kg to tons in a single run as per requirement. | Offset printing is not much capable to do work in tons in small time period like Gravure printing. |
| Coloraccuracy is not that much perfect as compared to offset printing. | Color accuracy 100% |
| Gravure has Diamond or Hexagonal Dots | Offset has Round Dots |
| Gravure printing happens in Roll form | Printing happens in Sheet form |
| High speed rolling or printing | Limited speed of printing |
| Vibration in Gravure Machine is High Due To High Speed, leading to chances to inappropriate printing. | Low Vibration compared to Gravure Machines as the printing speed is less. |
| While printing on thin surfaces or materials gravure printers have more reliability. | Offset printing machines have less durability while printing on thin surfaces or materials. |
| Pricing of Material in Gravure Printing is less than offset printing. | Pricing of Material in Offset Printing is little more that gravure printing. |
Now that you know the broad difference between Gravure and Offset, Let’s get going to the differences occurring while designing the packaging in Gravure and Offset.
Planning the Design as Per Process of Print:
As you know, Gravure printing have the capabilities of providing extensive amount of prints in short run compared to Offset printing, the issue of vibrations are also high due to high speed run of machine. The major problem occurs with the printing of colors. Now here we are going to talk from a very technical view point for better creative execution.
Both Gravure and Offset Printers have CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black) for coloring process. For example, if you are going with offset printing and in that you have a black color in the design and you want to turn that black color into dark natural black color in the print then you can add more combination of colors to get the best dark natural black color in the Print. But you cannot do the same in Gravure!
Due to high speed of rolling and printing mechanism, matter readability gets disturbed. Gravure printers don’t have the capacity to provide that dense natural black color with utmost quality or accuracy with combination of colors like Offset printing, for that in Gravure printing you have to take special color to match required color. To get that accurate result and quality in terms of content readability, one needs to do tiny changes with the design itself. For example, you will need todesign a small box or circle surrounding the area which needs to be engraved.
Setting the Ink in Right Ratio:
Secondly, in Offset printing for bringing dark or light changes into the color through Ink Setting is done by simply setting the percentage of inks directly through Panel. Against which Gravure printinghave intaglio process where the ink directly gets in contact with paper or material as per pressure given to it.Due to this reason, if someone is seeking a particular tone, shade or color in Offset, it will be tough to execute the same. Hence, Gravure printers will be a better option in that criteria or you better get going as per the Offset printer agency.
Further the ratio of change in colors can be in brought to decimals starting from few points to 12, 16 or 18% in Offset. While in Gravure printers it is always rounded up to 30, 40 or 50% due to its natural process of intaglio. Most of the designers consider offset process while designing and then the chaos gets created if the clients enter a gravure agency. So it’s better to inform the designer of the end process before he begins designing the label.
Not Playing With Color Combination:
Thirdly,it’s always recommended to create a particular shade or color through maximum use of two or three colors but not four colors. For example, you want to create a dark brown color then you can take magenta and yellow with combination of cyan or black. Further if you still want dense dark brown and you still have space to print then you must take special colour shade of brown. But you should not add any more color for getting what you desire. This is recommended for a single reason that the more colors more confusions and chances of error in future printing orders. If there are four colors involved then the chances of error are very evident, the print shade would not match in most of the cases.
Fourth and last, due to all the chances of errors of colors and print quality, Gravure printers have to run the machine at lower speed of 70 – 80 instead of 170 – 180, which increases the time of printing the whole order. So it is better recommended to provide the designs for packaging after understanding Gravure machines or else be ready to loosen your pockets for a little more for paying the Gravure agency to resolve your minor printing or designing issue.
But don’t worry! if you are coming after reading this piece of content then we will be happy to help you with one of the above mentioned issues for your printing or packaging challenges for free.
