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Laser printing
A laser printer is a common type of computer printer that rapidly produces high quality text and graphics on plain paper. Like photocopiers, laser printers employ a xerographic printing process but differ from analog photocopiers in that the image is produced by the direct scanning of a laser beam across the printer's photoreceptor.
Color laser printers add colored toner (typically but not always cyan, yellow, and magenta -- see CMYK) in three additional steps or passes. Color adds complexity to the printing process because very slight misalignments known as registration errors can occur between printing each color, causing unintended color fringing, blurring, or light/dark streaking along the edges of colored regions.
However, the quality of laser printer now is almost touch the standard of offset printing which is very useful for business that time and money have come first.
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Print On Demand
Color laser printers is used as a way of printing items for a fixed cost per copy, irrespective of the size of the order. While the unit price of each physical copy printed is higher than with offset printing, when setup costs are taken into account digital print on demand provides lower per unit costs for very small print runs than offset printing methods.
While the unit cost of a book or print produced using POD is usually higher than one produced as part of a longer print run, POD does bring some key business benefits:
1) Large inventories of a book or print do not need to be kept in stock,
2) The technical set-up is usually quicker and less expensive than for offset printing.
3) There is little or no waste from unused products.
These advantages reduce the risks associated with publishing books and prints and can lead to increased choice for consumers. However, the reduced risks for the publisher can also mean that quality control is less rigorous than usual.
Digital technology is ideally suited to publish small print runs of posters (often as a single copy) as and when they are needed. The introduction of UV-curable inks and media for large format inkjet printers has allowed artists, photographers and owners of image collections to take advantage of print on demand.
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