INSTEAD OF PAPER, THINK CD AND DVD
Is paper dying? As a columnist, I've been receiving an alarming
number of similar requests from people in all sorts of businesses,
educators, and even social groups. It seems they share a frustration
in trying to communicate using paper. In fact, printing anything on
paper these days just doesn't seem to have the communications impact
it used to have only a few short years ago. Perhaps it¹s a byproduct
of our electronic age. More and more of us are corresponding via email
and seeing everything via the Internet. Yes, you may be reading this
column in a newspaper but there's a good chance you may be reading it
on your newspaper's website. Here's a thought for the next time you
consider using old fashioned paper. Don't. Forget sending your mail or
newsletter. Try an alternative to printing out brochures or using just
about any other kind of paper media. Consider that all of these things
can be delivered more efficiently and most importantly, more
effectively if it's served up on optical media.
 The
one obstacle to overcome is mass production. The cost of having a CD
or DVD professionally mastered and printed used to be prohibitive. But
one device has made the entire process of CD and DVD duplication easy
and affordable. The Bravo is an all-in-one CD and DVD burner and color
printer from Primera Technology. Using special disks, the Bravo can
print full color images directly onto the disk without any labels. The
results are spectacular and the disks look as if they were
professionally printed. What's even better is that the cost of these
special printable disks are no more than the non-printable kind.
The other consideration is labor and the Bravo handles that nicely
as well. The Bravo uses a little robotic arm to move each disk from
the stack to the burner, then to the printer, and to the finished
stack. Normally, you can stack up to 25 blank disks at a time for
unattended duplication. However the company has just introduced their
Kiosk Mode that expands the Bravo's capacity to 50 disks per job by
converting both of the Bravo's 25 disk stacks to hold blank disks. A
metal tray and output bin attaches to the front of the Bravo to catch
and hold all 50 of the finished disks. This special enhancement
includes new software as well.
Company brochures usually get tossed in the trash. But imagine your
company delivering its message on a professionally printed CD or DVD.
Chances are whatever business you're in, the message can be more
effectively presented with an attention-catching multimedia display.
Potential customers are less inclined to toss a quality disk into the
trash. Travel agencies, real estate offices, even restaurants are
displaying their wares on colorfully labeled disks.
Churches are offering up CDs for their pastoral ministries, burning
services to disc for those parishioners who can't make it into church.
Some record their choir recitals onto CDs and sell them as fund
raisers. Social groups are using CDs and DVDs as a form of
distribution, displaying their newsletters, along with photos of group
activities and parties.
Schools use these disks to distribute licensed software. School
activities such as music department concerts, sporting events, the big
prom and even the entire yearbook can be recorded and distributed on
CD and DVD. Some schools sell the DVD as a supplement to the year
book. Wouldn't it be very cool to be able to look back at a DVD of
your own prom and not only see, but even hear the events.
The Bravo comes with its own publishing software, but you can use
most any CD and DVD printing applications you may already have. The
Bravo comes in two models. One burns CDs only ($1995), the other burns
both CD and DVD disks ($2495). The Bravo works with Windows-based PCs
as well as Macintosh OS 9 and OS X.
If you're looking for a better way to get your message across in a
manner that is both unique and memorable, then optical publishing is
the "write" way to go.
www.primera.com |
