Judging Digital’s Best

Published: September 13, 2010, By Yolanda Simonsis

A mere month ago on August 16, I had the distinct pleasure of joining four other expert judges at HP Indigo’s headquarters in Nes Ziona, Israel, to evaluate the best entries among submissions to HP Indigo’s Fourth Digital Labels & Packaging Awards Contest.

It goes without saying that I was impressed by the wealth of entries, but even more so by their complexity–not just from a design sense but from a printing/production sense. I found it intriguing that HP invited a printer to act as one of the judges–not just any printer, mind you, but one who actually did NOT own an HP Indigo press! “What could be the point of that?” I thought somewhat amazed. Printer Adi Levy is the general manager of Peer Print Ltd. in Ness-Ziona, Israel, and he seemed frequently surprised by the level of complexity and spot-on intricacies of the printed pieces we all reviewed.

Now I have no idea whether Adi’s been “won over” to digital and plans to purchase a new press, but I think HP proved something by also inviting Dr. Samuel T. Ingram, professor/department chair of the Dept. of Graphic Communications at Clemson Univ. in Clemson, SC. Talk about someone who’s taught and seen the highs and lows of traditional printing . . . well he’s your man. He was our loupe/registration expert, defining the precision of the printed piece.

Another welcome addition to the judging team was an actual graphic designer–Hanni Abudy of Graphic Design Studio (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) in Rishon-Lezion, Israel. Her eye for detail and level of difficulty to execute a design was an asset to the judging team.

Rounding out the team was Jean Poncet, editor in chief of France-based Itiqetpack, and myself from PFFC–each of us feeling that we’d been around the block as an editor covering the packaging and printing industry for more years than we care to admit.

The HP awards will be bestowed during Labelexpo on September 15th at a ceremony planned at Fountain Blue Banquets & Conference Ctr. in Des Plaines, IL, from 5:30–10 P.M., so look for the names of the winners following soon after the event. And I offer an early CONGRATULATIONS to the winners!

Photo captions: Judges included (from left to right)Yolanda Simonsis, Dr. Samuel T. Ingram, Adi Levy, Hanni Abudy, and Jean Poncet.

Judges at work, led and hosted by Retha Petruzates (far right), segment marketing mgr. of HP.