The best practice guidelines are designed to be far-reaching, covering all sectors ranging from print to photography. According to chairman of the IQA digital group Michael Upstone, there was a "pressing need" for the introduction of the standards.

"In the decade or so since digital imaging became widespread, there has been no attempt to get the many industries working with digital images to adopt the same practice," said Upstone. "There have been cases where multi-million pound contracts have been lost because something had gone wrong with the digital images at some stage."

The best practice guidelines cover the four stages of image production: capture, display or edit, proofing and output or printing.
Manufacturers that include Kodak, Fujifilm, Adobe and Epson co-operated in drawing up the guide. A launch event was held in central London last week, which was attended by representatives of industry bodies, including the BPIF.

"Major manufacturers take the issues around best practice very seriously and we are fortunate to have them on board," said Upstone. "We are very much working with organisations such as the PPA, which has its own standard for digital workflow for publishing, Pass4press."

To download a copy of the guidelines go to www.iqa.org/digital.

IQA guideline stages
- The capture of the data in digital format

- The display or editing of image data

- Proofing

- Printing