Arizona printers with the Varnish Option can overprint varnish on top of a printed image in selected areas in a print job or as a flood coat. The printing of varnish applies only to flatbed printing and is not available with the RMO.
NOTE
The Varnish option is not available for print jobs that use the High Definition print mode. Varnish can be used with all other print modes.
Printing varnish creates a high value-added special effect. However, since this is an additional process after printing image data, it also decreases productivity. Due to the low productivity of printing large areas of varnish, it is best to concentrate the use of this feature on spot decoration. Fortunately, the Arizona printer "blank space" skipping feature skips over areas in the print that do not contain varnish, and greatly improves the net productivity of spot applications.
Varnish is printed as a second process after the CMYK(W) image is printed. Immediately after printing a CMYK(W) image. The gantry moves to the start of image position and prints a varnish spot or printer generated flood data using three additional passes.
NOTE
Varnish is actually "clear ink" and is for decorative purposes only. It does not provide additional protection to the printed image.
Varnish data can be applied to a print job in two ways: Printer Flood Fill or Spot Data.
A Printer Flood Fill is like an auto-fill that is done by the printer, where varnish data fills the entire bounding box (the rectangular area that defines the total perimeter) of the image.
Varnish Spot data can be defined in image editing applications such as Adobe Illustrator® or with the Spot Layer tool in the ONYX workflow.
The Spot Data can be defined as either Spot 1 or Spot 2. The same spot data can be used to print either varnish or white ink, or both.
There are three primary methods:
Printer Flood Fill Layer Configuration
An ONYX workflow that does not require any pre-rip file preparation and is the easiest method of achieving varnish output. All that is required is to set up the Layer Configuration to include a printer flood layer. The printer flood layer encompasses the bounding box (the outer border of the image) of the file being processed. See Varnish QuickStart for information about creating a Printer Flood Fill Layer.
ONYX Spot Layer Tool
It offers many options to process an image, and thus allows various possible configuration choices. You can save these configurations as Filters and place them in a Quick Set and this makes it possible to re-create with minimal effort settings that are often used. All work with the Spot Layer tool requires an ONYX media profile with at least one spot color. See Create Spot Data with the Spot Layer Tool.
Spot Data Image Preparation
The varnish data is prepared in image editing programs such as Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop. You must use specific naming conventions and image use protocols in order for the ONYX RIP-Queue software to process the data as desired. This method may be the best choice if the desired varnish spot data includes complicated selections or if data is being created for outsourcing. A reasonable level of proficiency in these programs is recommended to use this technique. See Create Spot Data in Adobe Illustrator or Create Spot Data in Photoshop.