Vivid Laminating Technologies in-house design team have made the Matrix truly modular by designing and launching two new innovations; SpotUV/Foiling and Flatbook, making the Matrix systems even more cost effective.
SPOT UV & FOILING
Prints that add special effects during the finishing process can give that extra ‘wow’ factor, including foiling, holographic and Spot UV effects. This also includes tremendous saving in time and money compared to outsourcing. Great for bespoke print jobs & proofing.
Foiling and Spot UV is typically used for:
Packaging Business cards & stationery High end, bespoke print Security print Wedding Stationery Book Covers
Since the beginning of the year, Vivid’s Engineering & Design teams have worked together on a new project, resulting in the Matrix now able to create beautifully finished prints using foils in all kinds of colours.
Gavin Ward, Vivid’s Technical Manager, explains more “The Matrix doesn’t require special dies to create these new effects. It’s achievable due to the extra pressure from the pneumatic rollers.
The Matrix can now produce foiling on all kinds of bespoke print, from business cards & book covers, to wedding invitations & greetings cards. It also has huge cost and time savings, as one-off jobs and print proofs can be produced in-house in seconds”.
Once the foiling technology had been perfected, Vivid then turned it’s attention to other special finishes. A gloss effect on an individual area of the print can also be achieved, creating an identical finish to Spot UV. Holographic films can also be used on individual cut-out areas of the print, opening up all kinds of possibilities for security printing and packaging.
The process to create such effects on-demand still works by using heat transfer technology, but at a fraction of the cost of producing individual dies for each job.
For those with a Pneumatic Matrix already finishing in-house, being able to offer a foiling, holographic or Spot UV finish to customers offers huge cost savings and even a new source of revenue for these type of effects, which were previously only the remit of specialist print finishing firms.
The Matrix is now a truly modular system, replacing old foiling technology, making the process quick & easy, increasing revenues and customer base.
FLATBOOK
The Flatbook is a significant development from Vivid’s design team. The Technology enables Perfect Bound / PUR book covers to be laminated both sides and stay perfectly flat. The Flatbook creation has ensured you can use standard OPP film, on all types of stock.
Curl on book covers was a significant problem in the industry, mainly overcome by using expensive specialist films. The Flatbook cuts out a channel of film as it laminates, leaving the inside spine unlaminated.
This allows the adhesive to stick to the spine and not the laminate. The result is a perfectly bound flat book. The width of the spine can be adjusted quickly and easily, meaning that books can be created whether they have 50 pages or 500.
Gavin Ward said, “Flatbook will revolutionise the way that PUR and Perfectly Bound book covers are created. We realised that printers had major issues with bound books “curling” and the solution of specialist films was too expensive. With the Flatbook, there is a significant saving in the OPP film used and paper stock, but most importantly, the end result is a perfectly bound “Flatbook”.
Flatbook is also a multifunctional device, as it can add a perforation to laminating film to aid sheet separation and will also cut film to a bespoke size. Perforation and cutting blades are included as standard and the unit can be easily adjusted in just a few minutes
The Vivid Design team brief was to make the Matrix systems truly modular; this has been achieved with these 2 new developments. A Take-Up unit can be added, making the process even easier for the user.
There are thousands of Matrix Systems already in use around the world, with end-users benefitting from the cost-savings of laminating in-house. The addition of both the Flatbook and Foiling, Spot UV & holographic technologies means an even greater amount of work can be finished without the need to outsource, providing the user with greater profits and a faster turnaround of jobs.
