From its site in Albany on Auckland’s North Shore, Skyline Print produces a range of retail printed products and trade services for the printing industry.
In August, Skyline Print installed an ApeosPro C750 digital press, supplied through Fujifilm Business Innovation New Zealand (FBNZ). Company founder and director Ray Beacham says, “The ApeosPro C750 was an excellent choice. It is easy to operate and gives us good print quality and good colour work. Our operators are experiencing improved turnover with few issues when operating this machine.
“With the ApeosPro C750, we can create a variety of products from business cards and flyers to posters and booklets. It prints well.”
Printing at up to 75 pages per minute, the ApeosPro C750 supports a wide range of paper sizes and thicknesses, printing at 330mm x 1,300mm simplex and 330mm x 762mm duplex. Using Super EA Eco toner, which has the industry’s smallest toner particles for smoother gradation, the ApeosPro C750 printer handles stock weights from 52gsm to 350gsm.
Skyline Print specialises in carbonless NCR printing; book stitching, padding and finishing; die-cutting and embossing; CTP platemaking and supplying offset blankets; as well as digitally printed booklets and variable data printing.
Garage brand
When Ray and Susan Beacham established Skyline Print in 1988, they did not envisage being directors working in the business 44 years later. Ray says, “It started in a Skyline garage, hence the name. As the business grew over the years, we had to move it into larger premises. We now employ two staff members.”
Skyline has partnered with FBNZ for six years. Ray says, “Our contract with FBNZ has been excellent, especially with the service we receive. Our account manager Paul Thomas has kept us well informed and is available and easy to talk with.”
Over the years, Skyline Print has helped four apprentices qualify as printers including their son Mike, who is Skyline Print’s main point of contact as sales manager. The company has begun expanding into other sectors, such as packaging.
Mike says, “We enjoy supplying trade services to the printing industry but we can also see the benefits in broadening our offering, especially using our digital capability with the ApeosPro C750.
“We also find that keeping as much work as possible in house makes everything easier. We can control the quality and turnaround times.”
The ApeosPro C750 printer has the world’s first LED printhead to achieve 2400 dpi x 2400 dpi high resolution. These compact printheads deliver high image quality, having evolved to be sharper and higher definition.
The ApeosPro C750 printer also handles textured stock with ease. By adjusting the force applied to the paper, according to the paper thickness, it performs a stable paper feed even with cardstock paper.
High image quality
Offering ease of operation, the ApeosPro C750 printer comes standard with Simple Image Quality Adjustment (SIQA). This enables you to maintain print quality by scanning dedicated charts to automatically calculate the appropriate adjustment values. This quick and simple user operation removes the need to remember fine calibration values.
Paul Thomas, graphic arts account manager for FBNZ, says, “The ApeosPro C750 Graphic Print (GP) Controller provides high image quality and productivity with 1200 dpi × 1200 dpi high-resolution RIP processing and 10-bit smooth gradation correction for reproducing text, thin lines, and gradations.
“It also has a 3D calibration that allows for colour adjustment of CMYK single colours and for a mixture of colours. It automatically detects if RGB images, such as photos, are ‘Portrait’ or ‘Scenery’ and corrects them to match the characteristics.”
