Launched to the market last month, the Hi-Fi’s colour inkset adds light cyan, light magenta and light black to CMYK, as well as offering white and varnish.

It is intended for applications related to the promotional and retail markets where personalisation on items is in high demand, such as drinks glasses and candle holders.

“The Helix Hi-Fi expands our current portfolio, which is an evolution of the Inkcups’ Helix, the industry’s best-selling printer in its class,” said Inkcups marketing manager Jessica Makrinos. “While the standard Helix already delivers the best image quality in the industry, with the addition of three colours, the Hi-Fi delivers true photorealistic images through skin-tone matching capabilities.

“We noticed there was a market demand in the personalisation category. We responded to this trend by developing the Helix Hi-Fi, which can digitally print finer skin-tones and smoother gradients on several items.

“For now, the Helix Hi-Fi is a single model but can be tailored to meet the needs of our customers. For example, the colour pockets can include primers or not. After some time on the market, we will look into improving the configurations as we do with all of our products over time.”

Using UV-LED ink to print 360 degrees around an item, the Inkcups Helix Hi-Fi has a printable area of 218mm on items up to 305mm long and 51-127mm in diameter with 1,200dpi resolution. It is validated to print onto metal, glass, plastic and ceramic.

It is available to users in a package with software for web-based production, as well as warranty and service coverage from the US-based manufacturer.