ALBANY — A city firm that supplies both Capital Region law enforcement agencies and newspapers is shedding its printing supply operations, finding more growth opportunities with the people who conduct criminal forensic work than those who report their findings.

National Graphic Supply announced Wednesday a restructuring initiative. Wanting to focus on its new law enforcement and professional photography supply divisions, National Graphic Supply last month sold its commercial printing and newspaper supply divisions to the Pitman Company in Totawa, N.J. It also sold its copying machine supply arm to the Mueller Group.

The 81-year-old business also changed its name to Aremac, which is “camera” spelled backwards.

“I want to get to the root of how the business started,” said Aremac President Todd Kletter.

Kletter’s great aunt and uncle founded National Graphic Supply as a company called State Photo Supply. It’s National Newspaper Supply division sold materials such as printing plates, film and chemicals to about 1,000 daily newspapers nationwide. Locally, its customers included the Daily Gazette, Albany Times Union and Troy Record.

Although National Graphic Supply for decades sold photography equipment to area police departments, six years ago it also started selling forensic supplies. Those supplies include such items as digital imaging equipment and crime scene materials.

The company’s National Law Enforcement Supply division sells to 2,200 law enforcement agencies nationwide, including those in Albany, Rensselaer and Schenectady counties. With 46,000 such agencies nationwide, Kletter believes he has a better chance of increasing his customer base with police officers than with newspapers and printers.

The divestments will shrink Aramac’s work force to 15 from 52, but Pitman and Mueller will retain the employees they acquired through the division sales. Some of them will continue working at National Graphic Supply’s 40,000-square-foot headquarters on North Allen Street. The deal will also allow Kletter to drastically reduce his inventory holdings and shut down a 25,000-square-foot cold storage warehouse.

Since 2003, Kletter said, National law Enforcement Supply’s sales have grown by 200 percent. The divestments make Aremac a company with $5 million in annual revenues, but Kletter expects that figure to reach $14 million by 2012.