What are Specialty Inks?

Specialty Inks are spot inks that are used to produce a specific effect that cannot be achieved using traditional CMYKSystem for describing colors based on a combination of values for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black; the ink colors used in four-color process printing. In theory, 100% of Cyan, Magenta, and Yellow create Black. In practice, the addition of Black ink is necessary to print a true Black. See also RGBSystem for describing colors based on a combination of values for Red, Green, and Blue—the additive primaries. RGB is the basic additive color model used for color video display. Mixing various percentages of red, green, and blue light can recreate most of the spectrum; combining 100% of all three creates white light. See CMYK, Additive Color.. inks. There are a variety of specialty inks becoming readily available for the Inkjet market.

A few examples of spot inks include:

• White Ink
• Varnishes, Liquid Laminates, and GlossA measure of the degree to which a coated surface approaches a perfect specular surface or mirror in its ability to reflect light. Gloss contributes to the perception of photo quality. Enhancers
• PANTONE®A system for identifying colors based on CMYK values as they appear on the printed page. Inks

Specialty Ink Tools were created to handle these specialty inks. This feature is available within JobAn image coupled with RIP-Queue settings. Editor for RIP products and Thrive workflow users. See Spot Layer Tool for more information.

The tools are enabled for those devices that support spot channels and multi-layer printing either as a two-stage process or with staggered heads. File mode printers that support spot printing may also have this capability.

Printers with gloss enhancers can be configured for a full flood fill as a mode option with other ink configuration, or as a spot similar to white.

How do Specialty Ink Tools work?

First, you must create a media in version 12 that uses a spot ink configurations (i.e. CMYKSS) and create a profile that includes the spot channel with configured layers. Specialty Ink Tools within Job Editor allows you to customize the separate layers of your image data and control how the layers are printed.

[Spot layer Tool] is a color correction tool that allow you to customize and auto-generate spot layers directly from your image without any additional file preparation.

Not only can you customize how and where you want the spot layers to be generated, you can also define the print order of your newly generated layers giving you added capabilities for a variety of output combinations.