Création graphique du carnet de stages 2017 - 36 pages - pour l’Atelier des savoir-faire à Ravilloles (39)

Print one more time - 2014

Draft Magazine issue 005, featuring Brangelina by Jon Kessler

Martin Darby explains how Principal Colour set about printing a high quality project such as Draft Magazine. Which just so happens to be our latest giveaway: read on to find out how you can secure your copy of this rare magazine.

Draft is a beautiful high quality art and photography magazine that you printed between 2005 - 2008. It's aim was to publish previously unprinted work by emerging art practitioners, and it features stunning photographic and illustrative artworks. How did you make sure that these were beautifully presented in print? What techniques do you as a printer have at your disposal to ensure the best quality image representation?

We look at the type of pictures that are required for a particular job and then recommend a screen value (the number of dots per inch) that will produce the best result. We are also able to change the plate output (people would refer to this as a curve) depending on what kind of paper is being used. To give an example, for a job to sell houses at auction the reproduction of the houses might not be the most important aspect of printing - it's more important to print the job quickly. On the other hand we recently produced a poster for the Tate Gallery which had three stages of retouching (that’s adjusting the colour) to make sure the images were as close to the original as possible. We always cater for the individual requirements of each customer.

Ladybird books by Chris Brooks.

Photography by David Spero.

You used Fedrigoni papers in the printing of Draft Magazine. When high quality papers are used for a project how much of an advisory role does Principal Colour take on, and how do you steer a project in the right direction? Or do most designers come to you with an already firm idea of what they would like to use?  

It’s a bit of a mix really – some people have a strong idea of what they want, and some people rely on our expertise to advise them about what would work best. We will always suggest suitable papers for particular job types, for instance the job selling house at auction might require a quick turnaround and minimal outlay – so the job would be printed on a standard silk paper which gives good colour reproduction for a good price. However our recent Tate Gallery job was printed on a top of the range triple coated silk (it literally had three stages of coating) because the accuracy of colour reproduction was far more important than the price of the paper.

Artwork by Anthony Burrill.

Nursing Home by Jim Goldberg.

Photography by Matt Burgess.

Unfortunately Draft is no longer in print - did you notice a big drop off in the printing of this kind of publication during the recession? And how has business picked up since then - what kind of publications are you currently printing, and have their print processes or paper stock options changed in that time to accommodate different finances?

We are printing lots of interesting things at the moment but are awaiting permission to talk about them, so watch this space! 2008 was a massive shock to the print industry and we are still struggling to recover (although we are very happy to be busy at the moment). Since that period designers and customers have generally moved away from specifying particular paper stock in favour of the cheapest approach. I am glad to say that this appears to be changing again, so hopefully this is a sign of green shoots in both our trade and industry as a whole. 

Photography by Evan Brownstein.

Principal Colour have 50 copies of Draft Magazine issue 005 (produced during A/W 2007/08) to give away, each originally worth £15. It's a beautiful feast for the eyes, so why not drop Martin an email to secure your copy?

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