Ask them to think of print, and most people can’t help but visualise something small, often rectangular and almost certainly made of paper. Developments in wide-format printing are turning this preconception on its head. Printers can work directly onto a broad range of substrates of all shapes and sizes. Printing technology, especially inkjet, opens up all sorts of odd surfaces, from snowboards to bike wheels, leather to glass, wood to plastics. The sheer breadth of applications is mind-blowing.
Canny printers are coming up with weird and wonderful applications using wide-format equipment; jobs that push the boundaries and wow the clients.
Enhancing on the ceiling
Imagine you run a restaurant with a historic section of ceiling. This timber ceiling is such an attraction that you want to find a way to expand the look throughout other parts of the eatery. The answer? Print, of course.
This was the solution for The School of Seven Bells. The restaurant, based on Melbourne’s fashionable Chapel Street, enlisted All About Graphics, a 16-year-old Melbourne printer, for the project.
The ceiling was photographed using ultra high-resolution imaging and the image was printed on an adhesive substrate. This was then applied to another area of the restaurant to extend the look and ambience. The faux, printed version of the ceiling even has peeling effects added to give it an aged look.
Mark Burley, who runs All About Graphics with business partner Chris Duke, explains the process. “They have a large area where you sit beneath an old timber ceiling. We digitally photographed the ceiling and reproduced that onto HP Wallpaper to be applied to the ceiling of the bathroom.”
HP Wallpaper is a PVC-free substrate that comes pre-pasted and requires only water to install and remove. It is printed using the Latex inks on All About Graphics’ 60-inch HP L26500.
Burley says HP Wallpaper is a relatively new variant on the conventional practice of using adhesive vinyls for these kinds of applications. “We use a combination of the HP Wallpaper or adhesive fabrics. Some jobs are sealed with a liquid laminate; it depends on the job.
“Most of the work is installing it. While it is simple – you just roll it up, place it in your water tray, then place it on the wall – it does expand and move around. If you’re attempting butt joins, it can be difficult, so we tend to use a 10mm overlap.”
Burley says HP Wallpaper is durable and cost-effective for semi-permanent applications, whereas adhesive vinyls lend themselves more to shorter-term applications.
All About Graphics has also applied HP Wallpaper on the floors and walls of a VIP tour bus used in conjunction with major events such as Big Day Out. At the last minute, the order was changed from adhesive vinyls to HP Wallpaper. “They just liked the texture and look of it.”
Another memorable job was at Melbourne art gallery. The client was the Substation in Newport, near the Newport power substation. All about Graphics used HP Wallpaper, and an artist was able to further embellish the wallpaper with creative works. “In certain viewing environments, Wallpaper can actually give a raised 3D look, which is very impressive,” said Burley.
Grief is personal
If looking for an example of a product that can’t be replaced by the internet, coffins would seem a safe bet. Printed coffins are the business of LifeArt, a local operation owned by funeral service giant InvoCare. LifeArt itself is a registered patent of Apogee International.
At first thought, personalised coffins might seem like a stretch. But think again. After all, few things are more personal than a funeral. LifeArt Australasia operation manager Craig Morrison says the funeral industry is increasingly switching on to the potential of personalised coffins. The business has continued to grow since being established in 2004.
Each job starts with the bereaved family, who place the order via a funeral home; LifeArt is a wholesaler only. Clients can choose from LifeArt’s pre-existing range of designs. But print-on-demand technology really comes into its own when people opt for a bespoke coffin.
LifeArt’s graphic designer will work with them to come up with a design. Morrison says images of family members are popular, as are holiday shots, and pictures of the family pet.
“People’s sports and hobbies jump out to me, whether racing car driving, BMX, motocross, fishing, four-wheel drive, surfing – those things are really popular.”
Once the design has been decided, it is printed on Enviroboard using an HP Scitex FB 500. Enviroboard is a type of cardboard fully imported from South Africa through Spicers. LifeArt uses a 10mm stock for its coffins.
Morrison says the material offers two major advantages. “One, it has a beautiful print surface and two, its environmental benefits for the funeral industry are second to none. It is a recycled board and its ash content is much lower when cremated.”
When the bereaved family receive the urn, they don’t want ash from the coffin itself. The most common material in coffin building is MDF, says Morrison – and Enviroboard’s ash content compares favourably. “Cardboard imported from other countries produces a lot of ash, about four times as much as MDF or Enviroboard.”
He adds that unlike MDF, Enviroboard contains no formaldehyde to seep into the group or burn off into the atmosphere.
After printing, the job is cut on an Esko flatbed cutting table, then glued with hot melt glue and assembled. From order to finished product, LifeArt Australasia can create a coffin in under two hours. The Wetherill Park factory has capacity to produce up to 2,500 units per year.
The funeral business is a traditional industry. LifeArt poses a relatively radical idea, which isn’t always the easiest sell, says Morrison. As a wholesaler, LifeArt needs to have funeral homes onside before they will suggest it to clients. They aren’t always open to new ideas. “It is their reputation on the line.”
He adds that things are changing and says LifeArt has seen year-on-year growth since being established. Even the funeral industry has to move with the times. “Ten years ago, no one knew about PowerPoint presentations. Now they have them at every second or third funeral.”
Teamwear that clicks
A school or sporting club could wait up to four months for a volume order of uniforms. Or it could go online to order personalised uniforms, complete with bespoke message and branding and receive the goods in six weeks.
Uniform City, a 25-year-old Hobart company, is looking to web ordering as a means to expand its market nationally and internationally.
Digital printing allows custom-made hoodies or polo tops for a team or school to be delivered in a matter of weeks with quantities as low as 20. Uniform City’s redesigned web-to-print service makes ordering a cost-effective, says managing director Charles Cook.
Digital also strikes a blow against cheap imports, which require old-fashioned bulk buying. This means any changes in the branding or message on the garment will require a whole new order, says Cook.
If a customer orders a huge batch of football uniforms, there’s no way to change a minor detail, say, if the club’s name is modified. Micro-orders, made and delivered locally, guard against this.
The new web new portal, titled UC Leavers, is designed to be easy to use. Its target market is school leavers who can design their top or jersey in three steps. UC Leavers is even configured so students can introduce friends into the design process via social media.
Cook says the personalised teamwear online ordering service works in tandem with Uniform City’s recent investment in new dye-sublimation technologies. The company has acquired the SubliM RS-640 64-inch dye-sub system, which comprises a Roland RS640 printer with Sawgrass Industrial’s SubliM dye transfer ink and an ErgoSoft PosterPrint RIP, all of it sourced from GJS Machinery.
SubliM inks are aimed at high-speed digital printing of sublimation heat transfers for both polyester fabrics and polyester-coated hard surfaces, claiming superior colour vibrancy, image quality and ink yield, as well as reduced maintenance.
The orders are processed at Uniform City’s state-of-the-art Hobart facility, which has staff of 15. It is a far cry from the business Charles and Diane Cook began in their garage in 1988. Over the years, they have seen stiff competition from cheap imports threaten their markets. But the company recently gained assistance from AusIndustry’s Textile Clothing & Footwear grant, which enabled it to invest in the new online software and the dye-sub hardware.
Smoking hot idea
Box Wrap started life in that crucible of inspiration: a couple of mates, sitting around, drinking beers. Anthony Do Rozario founded the company with friend Joel Whittaker, who runs vehicle graphics printer Five Three Designs in Yatala, near the Gold Coast.
They came up with an idea to produce sticky labels to cover the graphic health warnings and drab plain packaging that legally must now cover tobacco products. It started out as an idea for a mail order business – smokers could register with Box Wrap, which would send them a steady supply of wraps to cover their cigarette packets.
Soon after launch, they realised they had a bigger business on their hands. The response was “overwhelming”, says Do Rozario. A non-smoker, Do Rozario isn’t necessarily against plain packaging, but says Aussies should have a choice. He saw an opportunity and ran with it.
If anything, the inevitable backlash helped the business by generating free marketing. “We knew it was a controversial product and obviously it would be newsworthy but not to this extent. We have made news in Belgium. It hit the Times in the UK. We are really pleased with the response,” says Do Rozario.
While the original business plan was just to sell the labels online, the pair “didn’t expect the retail demand. Once we got on the national news, the emails started flooding in from national retailers,” he adds. Box Wrap has been receiving orders from tobacconists, variety stores and service stations chains – “anyone who sells cigarettes”.
Production is a straightforward affair. The company had produced a decent stockpile of labels prior to launch, and has been running 24 hours a day to keep up with demand.
The labels are produced on a pair of Roland DG machines at Five Three Designs, a VersaCamm 540 and a VersaCamm 640, both supplied by AVS.
Whittaker, who was a signwriter by trade, says Box Wraps are printed on a “basic run of the mill” MacJet material, also supplied by AVS. He says that the order book is so strong, the company is considering putting in more machines to keep up with demand.
The skinny on skins
Making the most of a legislative must-do has propelled one of the more colourful phenomena of our city streetscapes. By law, all scaffolding on building sites must be skinned in order to prevent harm to construction workers and passers-by. This has created the ideal canvas on which advertisers can write their message large.
Dais Construction Media deals exclusively with the construction industry. It liaises between builders and local councils to turn construction-site eyesores into lucrative advertising platforms.
For construction companies and councils alike, camouflaging the visual pollution of construction sites is a non-core activity. It was just waiting for a specialist enterprise to come along and relieve these parties of what they were relegating to the fringe of their services.
Dais director Andrew Doenicke says construction site skins are extremely popular advertising canvas in Europe. “I wish there was more opportunity for us to do them here.”
The advantage of jumbo-sized advertising is that it takes the consumer unawares. For instance, a Commonwealth Bank advertisement on a skin in the Sydney CBD received a significant response, he tells ProPrint.
With its genesis in Australia’s construction boom, Dais’ streetscape management concept is based on what the company calls “the three Cs”, namely, councils, construction companies and communities.
The process has been attempted before by councils, ad agencies and graphics companies. But it was always an adjunct to the core business. Dais Construction Media is solely focused on delivering results to all its partners and it closely manages all parts of the process.
Skins are printed digitally, some produced internally on the company’s HP UV machines and some outsourced to partner companies such as Cactus Imaging, which has an HP XP2700 UV printer in its line-up.
UV stabilised inks that resist degradation, even in constant strong sunlight, and rugged substrates, such as the company’s internally developed mesh product, are part of the Dais mix.
Mesh Direct, a division of Dais, specialises in all types of construction mesh from entire building skins to printed fence mesh and safety signage. Dais says it ensures that its shadecloth, mesh and alu-panels meet or exceed Australian building codes and standards.
One recent project by Dais was at a Sydney construction site, where a historic brewery was being demolished to make way for the One Central Park precinct of rapidly gentrifying Chippendale.
Opportunity in the frame
When Marshall Beaumont decided it was time to diversify, he realised new technology was the solution. Direct-to-fabric printing is being touted as the next big thing and a replacement technology for dye-sublimation. The managing director of Visual Solutions Australia decided it would be the next big thing for the Melbourne wide-format enterprise.
Beaumont founded Visual Solutions in 2006 at Braeside after his former company, Full Impact, was acquired by Brite Solutions. The new company was his gateway into hands-on printing after spending several years as a print broker.
Now with 12 staff and a brand-new, larger location at Moorabbin, Visual Solutions prints display systems, exhibition graphics, flags and vehicle graphics. Beaumont became interested in direct-to-fabric aqueous printing last year. At Drupa, he compared various machines, finally investing in a South Korean-made D Gen Grande, which was installed late last year.
Beaumont says direct-to-fabric printing saves time, money and the environment, because, unlike dye-sub, it does not use paper transfer. The 3.2-metre format is ideal for display graphics, point of sale, and exhibitions. The Grande prints at a snappy 110m2 per hour, making it extremely productive as well. Ricoh piezo inkjets apply the water-based ink and an onboard heat unit does the curing. The results have wowed clients. “The colours are vibrant, the facial skin tones are all fantastic.”
The new machine, the first and only one of its kind in Australia, takes its place on the production floor beside a flatbed Vutek and two solvent machines. It has enabled Visual Solutions to become
more competitive in the print market for displays, banners, flags and fence mesh. Clients include City of Melbourne for municipal flags.
Silicon-treated double-sided frames are in particular demand. The unit consists of an aluminium frame around a banner finished with a silicon edging. The edging joins the frame, tensioning the display, much like a stretched-fabric display.
“A lot of the retailers like Myer are getting into it because it’s easy to change over the poster prints in-store. We use matt polyester stock imported direct from Germany. It’s good quality and non-reflective,” says Beaumont.
In December last year, Visual Solutions completed 1,200 framed fabric banners for a major automotive retailer, which Beaumont describes as “a good little job that kept the machine going for around a month and a half”.
The client already had the double-sided frames at its dealerships, so Visual Solutions delivered the finished banners with silicon edging to a mailhouse for distribution to the car giant’s vast network around Australia.
Beaumont says: “The dealerships simply take the old ones out and push the new ones into the frames in-store.”
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