By Melissa Donovan
Black, magenta, yellow, and cyan—the four basic colors associated with printing. Countless hues are repeatedly produced and have been for years thanks to endless combinations. Specialty inks, however, up the game, enhancing color further for vibrant digital flatbed printing.
Above: The Epson SureColor V7000 features ten-color UltraChrome UV ink, including white ink, vivid red ink, and varnish.
Beyond CMYK
White, clear or varnish, light cyan, light magenta, light black, orange, green, violet, red, gray, and neon or fluorescents inks are available.
Each is color is used for specific performance reasons, according to Rob Firestone, applications specialist, Fluid Color.
“These inks provide critical functional elements to underpin high-quality output and expand the range of applications available to wide format printers,” notes Dieter Jancart, segment manager high-end systems DPS, Agfa.
Hugo Gonzalez, senior segment specialist, Mimaki USA, Inc., says across the industry, common additions beyond CMYK are white and clear. “White ink is critical because it allows print providers to print on any color media. They are no longer limited to white or light-colored substrates. Its opacity is key, as it maintains consistent color across different materials without requiring multiple passes to build density, which would impact productivity.”
Clear ink or varnish meets specific demands of high-value applications. “Visual impact is enhanced through varnish, which is used to create sophisticated high-gloss spot finishes or durable protective layers that elevate the print’s aesthetic,” shares Patrick Donigain, senior manager, product marketing, DGS solutions strategy, Canon U.S.A., Inc.
Lon Riley, founder/CEO, Catalyst Printers by the DPI Laboratory, believes there are two sets of inks used to augment standard CMYK. The first includes light cyan, light magenta, and light black, which are often added to the base ink configuration. “This addition does not expand the color gamut but results in smoother half tones and grayscale neutrality. So, these colors are used for fine art, portraits, and other higher end retail graphics.”
“Light black helps further smooth gradients, reduce graininess, achieve clean pastels, and improve highlight detail—particularly in shadows and for monochrome prints,” adds Ted Pierpont, national sales manager – large format print, Durst North America.
The other set of ink colors, according to Riley, include orange, green, red, and violet, which expand the color gamut of CMYK.
“Orange, green, and violet are used in some extended gamut systems to expand the printable color space and improve reproduction of saturated reds, oranges, and greens, which are often critical for brand colors,” notes Mark Crawford, product and business development manager, Vanguard Digital Printing Systems, a Durst Group Company.
“Red is commonly used in branded products and can be difficult to accurately reproduce with composite CMYK alone. Adding a dedicated red ink enables closer matching for accurate brand colors and customer satisfaction,” says Mike Pruitt, product manager, Professional Imaging, Epson America, Inc.
Further, according to the team at DigiTech, gray helps to enable smoother gradations, subtle transitions, and hard solid colors like blacks and blues.
Neon or fluorescent inks like pink and yellow are also popular. “Neon inks respond to market demand for high impact graphics that stand out in retail and event environments,” shares Erik Norman, president, swissQprint America.
“Fluorescent pink and yellow enhance differentiation delivering bright, vibrant colors in daylight and a glowing effect under black light,” explains Pierpont.
Improving Accuracy
Expanded ink sets enhance gamut and color. The end result, “branded colors and high-resolution image creation insures print providers meet customers’ needs,” says the DigiTech team.
“The general rule is that the addition of light inks in CMYK improve quality of tone within the gamut, and the addition of different colors such as orange and green expand the range of available colors,” reiterates Riley.
Light colors enhance tonal transitions and subtle color gradations. “Light cyan and light magenta soften the edges of highlight tones and pastel shades, and light black helps to maintain a neutral gray balance, especially in monochrome or low-saturation areas. This can minimize color casts that appear with standard CMYK builds. Together, these extensions provide a finer tonal structure and a broader gamut in the lighter regions of the color spectrum,” explains Jancart.
Firestone says thanks to grayscale printhead technology used in modern flatbed printers, the need for light cyan and light magenta is eliminated. “Grayscale variable droplet technology achieves smooth gradients and subtle tonal transitions using standard CMYK, reducing ink channel requirements while maintaining—or improving—perceived image quality,” continues Firestone.
Donigain agrees, citing advanced jetting technologies like Canon VariaDot variable droplet technology. “In conjunction with light colors and Active Pixel Placement Compensation, this enables density uniformity across solid color areas, helping pixels to land with precision.”
Colors such as orange, green, and violet add to the printable color gamut. “This allows closer reproduction of brand specific spot colors and reduces the need for compromise when matching corporate identities,” explains Norman.
“Red and orange ink expand the gamut and make a huge difference when it comes to hitting desired colors, especially when it comes to ‘warmer’ hues. The extended gamut with red and orange also makes matching PMS colors much easier, helping with the warmth and depth of those colors,” explains Philip Chu, UV product manager, Roland DGA Corp.
Pierpont says orange and violet inks expand gamut up to 20 percent over CMYK alone. “This enables color matching on jobs that could previously only be done with spot colors in analog processes like lithography or screen printing.”
“Additional ink colors result in more vivid, true-to-life colors, allow for closer Pantone matching, and improve overall image quality. This results in more precise, vibrant, and versatile output, and typically expands the color gamut by ten to 15 points and supports a range that can be verified +/- 2 deltaE 2000,” shares Pruitt.
Gonzalez points out that consistency is just as important as gamut. “This is where some manufacturers have emphasized stable ink behavior and repeatable output, especially in multi-layer print applications.”
“Achieving true color accuracy still depends heavily on a strong CMYK base. In my experience, if the core CMYK performance is not solid, simply adding more color channels will not necessarily solve accuracy challenges,” admits Emilio Rangel, product manager, Mutoh America, Inc.
It also depends on the ink set. Thomas Giglio, HP Latex Segment Manager, North America, HP Inc., points out that ink chemistries, like water-based HP Latex, allow for an expanded gamut within the standard CMYK ink set. “We estimate that HP Latex inks have around 30 percent more color gamut than most UV ink formulations.”
Technical Challenges
The benefits of these ink sets are not without challenges. Configuring a flatbed printer’s color channels with additional options can present difficulties.
Luckily, modern flatbeds are built with modularity in mind, making them easily configurable to include additional color options in the future, shares the DigiTech team.
“The key is flexibility. Customers should not be locked into a fixed ink configuration. A modular approach allows businesses to adapt their setup to evolving market demands without unnecessary compromise,” advises Norman.
From a hardware standpoint, “each additional ink channel requires dedicated printhead capacity, ink delivery components, and associated maintenance systems, which increases overall printer complexity,” states Crawford.
Admittedly more maintenance is involved when more ink colors are used. “Adding ink channels increases both system complexity and maintenance requirements. Each color requires dedicated ink delivery components, including plumbing and, in some cases, additional printheads depending on the configuration,” explains Gonzalez.
Take white ink for instance. “Because titanium dioxide is the primary pigment used to achieve opacity, white ink must be properly agitated and circulated to maintain consistency and prevent settling. Without proper ink management, output quality can be affected,” says Rangel.
“Overall, while these challenges are manageable and often handled behind the scenes by modern systems, proper profiling and regular calibration remain key to getting the full benefit of an expanded ink set,” suggests Pruitt.
Chu believes users should be aware that printing with colors like white, gloss, red, and orange are slightly slower than with CMYK, because they require additional printing passes.
Software-wise color management can be more complex, but advanced systems are in place to combat this. “To manage the inherent complexity of multi-layered workflows without ballooning prepress time, modern systems rely on advanced software that utilizes documented application ‘recipes’ and intelligent sampling, allowing operators to transition between diverse job types while allowing for first-time-right accuracy,” explains Donigain.
Specialty Options
In summary, white ink and even varnish is accepted as standard on wide format flatbed printers, especially as more print providers branch out and print directly to other objects. Extended colors like orange, green, red, and violet; light cyan, magenta, and black; gray; and neon are more commonly used with a specific application in mind.
Jun2026, Digital Output
