Wide Format Imaging

The solvent inkjet revolution, which gave shops the ability print on uncoated vinyl media, has gone beyond its origins of creating outdoor banners. Solvent is making its way indoors, and now provides the ability to create a growing variety of applications such as point-of-purchase displays, trade show graphics, and interior decoration applications. In this article, we?ll take a look at emerging solvent technologies and the wide range of specialty media now available.

A Quick History

The development of piezo inkjet print heads opened the door to using inks that did not require water as the principal carrier liquid. Solvent-based inks were developed to create a mechanism that would allow direct printing onto PVC-based films. Some of the first applications of this new technology were billboard prints. The cost advantages, photorealistic graphics, and general benefits of short run "narrowcasting" were tremendous. Low-cost PVC banner materials and solvent inks, outdoor durability, fast throughput, and the flexibility of digital systems (over analog printing methods or less-optimized aqueous digital print systems) fuelled the growth of solvent-based printing systems. Print quality and resolution were not as critical for billboard applications, as the viewing distance was hundreds of yards.

Technology Changes

Over the last few years, solvent inkjet printers have begun to encroach on the traditional turf of aqueous-based inkjet printers, to the extent that stalwarts of aqueous wide-format printing are now offering solvent machines. This transformation has been made possible by the advancements in printer technology and accessibility.

Resolution: The resolution has increased from less than 100 dpi to 720x720 dpi and 1440x1440 dpi. The implication of this change is that the viewing distance has been shortened from hundreds of yards to a few feet. It is now possible for solvent-based inkjet printers to create signage for short-distance viewing and even photorealistic images.

Color: Solvent printers have adopted the trend of adding colors beyond the traditional CMYK. Most boast six color print heads that include light cyan and light magenta. This effectively broadens the color space the printer can reproduce and delivers better reproduction of flesh tones and corporate colors. It also boosts the "color pop" that is so important in retail messaging.

Size: Solvent printers have shrunk from 10+ foot behemoths down to five to six foot lengths, with widths as narrow as 30 inches. The smaller printer footprint now gives shops with limited floor space the ability to consider the addition of a solvent printer.

Inks: Most of the new generation of wide-format solvent printers use less aggressive inks (referred to as "eco" inks), which has nearly eliminated the need to install dedicated venting for the printers. The advantage is that the initial investment needed to set up a solvent printer has been lowered. However, the less aggressive solvents may have trouble adhering to heavily plasticized PVC banners.