Its adoption of the magazine system follows its and its preferred repro suppliers adopting Colorbus newspaper proofing system a year ago.

At around 9,000 for an Epson 10000 CF and the magazine option for its Colorbus RIP, the whole system cost less than the 13,000 The Guardian was paying each year on servicing its DuPont Digital Cromalin.

Following its initial use on The Observers monthly magazine covers The Guardian has since proofed a 56pp Fashion Handbook supplement for the 2 March edition of its Weekend magazine, which was printed at Polestar Purnell.

"Quality is key for fashion so we needed an accurate proofer," said Guardian technical production manager David Kirwan. "The printers were very impressed with the match."

Following its success with editorial pages in-house and with the Colorbus newspaper system at its preferred pre-press suppliers, The Guardian is looking at moving its magazine ad proofing over to the Colorbus.

"Colorbus is quicker and cheaper and the colour management is arguably better than Digital Cromalin and it is open and ICC-based," he said.

When it switched from Digital Cromalin to Colorbus for proofing newspaper pages it found its running costs were 25-30% lower, which Colorbus claims is the typical figure for all its customers.

"Colorbus has gone from being a RIP vendor for low-end corporate to high-end proofing applications," said vice president and general manager of international operations Nick Gilmore.