Judging was conducted by an international team of experts

HP has announced the winners of the HP Print Excellence Awards, a competition to recognise the best examples of creativity and print quality produced across HP's digital portfolio.

The competition recognises print excellence in 21 categories across Commercial Print, Sign and Display, and Labels and Packaging applications. Submissions were open to users of HP Indigo, Inkjet Web Press, Scitex and Designjet systems. The competition attracted entries from 364 customers from 47 countries.

Judging was conducted by an international team of experts: Yolanda Simonsis, editorial director PFFC-online, USA; Jean Poncet, editor in chief, Etiq & Pack, France; Eric Pierre, creative director, BBDO Paris, France; Stan Kilpin, publisher, Cygnet Publications Pty Ltd, Australia; Boaz Rossano, CEO Video Dubber, Israel; David L Zwang, president, Zwang & Co., USA; Stephen Sonnenfeld, VP advertising & brand integration, Thomson Reuters, USA; Nir Navot, art director, Amdocs Israel, and Sophie Matthews-Paul, independent consultant, UK.

"It was exciting to see the way print service providers and their customers were able to push the envelope with the HP print technologies, especially the Indigo," said judge David Zwang. "Offset print has always been the benchmark that people use to set their expectation for quality print. There is no doubt in my mind that the Indigo print entries we saw not only met that level, but exceeded it."

Yolanda Simonsis, another judge said: "I believe the 'tipping point' for digital in the label and packaging industries will arrive sooner than others anticipated. Digital easily executes complex designs with perfectly registered type so fine you need a loupe to read it, vignettes so subtle and skin tones so lifelike it now certainly surpasses analogue technologies that struggle to replicate effectively without waste."

Judge Sophie Matthews-Paul added: "The HP Print Excellent Awards concentrate on innovation. However, they also look at environmentally responsible printing. We considered how entrants demonstrated creativity and skill. Seeing how the criteria were interpreted in the submissions from different parts of the world was very interesting."

Awards were categorised by device category and by application type. The judges said that after lengthy discussions, the decisions on all winners were unanimous.

François Martin, worldwide marketing director, Graphic Solutions Business, HP said that the response to this competition exceeded HP’s expectations.

“The quality of the submissions reflected how creative agencies and enterprises benefit from a wide range of applications that PSPs are producing on HP digital presses and printers. Receiving submissions from nearly 50 countries demonstrates the spread of digital printing around the world as well as confidence in our technologies and innovations."

HP will present the awards to winners at a celebratory evening in their honour in Düsseldorf on the 3rd of May. First place winners are listed below.

Copyright © 2012, DPNLIVE – All Rights Reserved