METHOD OF RELIEF PRINTING AND A RELIEF PRINTER AND A SOFTWARE PRODUCT

A printing method for printing a digital image on a substantially flat substrate, the printing method comprising the steps of providing the digital image comprising a raster of a plurality of pixels, the digital image comprising colour information for each pixel, providing a height channel to the digital image defining a height for each pixel, the height having a minimum value, discriminating in the digital image for each pixel a relief part, a white part and a skin part, the parts constituting the height of the pixel and the relief part comprising an arbitrary colorant composition, the white part comprising a number of colorants including a white colorant and the skin part comprising colorants according to a colour as defined by the colour information for each pixel, providing an inking mask comprising a binary image of areas of the substrate to be finished and areas of the substrate not to be finished, image processing of the digital image by applying the inking mask to the image, wherein the height of a pixel within an area of the substrate to be finished is reduced by substantially reducing a height of the relief part of said pixel, and wherein the height of a pixel within an area of a substrate not to be finished is left unchanged, and printing the processed image obtained in the image processing step on the substrate.