White and Metallic Silver inks continue to be the go-to "specialty" inks in the wide-format market, noted Matt McCausland, product manager, Professional Imaging, Epson America, Inc. These inks allow PSPs to differentiate from the local competition by widening their service offerings.
Specialty inks are typically used for short-term indoor signage due to the limited outdoor durability associated with White and Metallic Silver. White ink is typically seen with clear adhesive materials such as window clings, while Metallic Silver can be used for decals, stickers, custom T-shirts, posters, or specialty marketing pieces.
Metallic color effects are in high demand for label, decal, POP displays, and package prototyping applications. They are also used to create custom vehicle graphics, such as an embellished identity sign on the side of a company's delivery van. Dye-sublimation inks are used for producing a wide range of textiles, apparel, soft signage and hard goods.
Silver ink is getting more attention these days as print service providers are seeing the benefits of adding metallic ink effects to their offerings, especially as the Silver ink offerings have improved significantly over the years. "Early editions of silver inks were more gray, and didn't offer that 'pop' of color," said Ken VanHorn, Director, Marketing and Business Development, Mimaki USA.
"New formulations as in Mimaki's original SS21 eco-solvent inks for use in CJV Series cut-and-print devices, produce that desired 'shine.' This formulation delivers a greater than 50% improvement on refraction over conventional Silver ink, delivering brilliant mirror-effect results that are not diminished even if overlaminated," he noted.
Silver helps businesses to create high value-added print products. To create metallic color effects using silver ink, Mimaki RasterLink6 RIP software – standard with CJV300 Series units – includes a swatch palette of 648 metallic colors selectable from Illustrator software and can be utilized in a near-endless combination of custom colors, VanHorn said.
Roland has offered White and Metallic specialty inks for quite some time now, noted Eric Zimmerman, Product Manager, Color products - Roland DGA. "These eco-solvent inks have greatly expanded the realm of creative possibilities, allowing users to incorporate eye-catching effects into their prints that really make the graphics 'pop.' More recently, Roland has introduced a new generation of Eco-Sol MAX 2 inks, which include higher opacity White and an even more reflective Metallic Silver than original Eco-Sol MAX."
Roland also offers ECO-UV specialty inks, including Clear and White, for use with its VersaUV series printers and printer/cutters, which can be printed directly on virtually any type of substrate, reported Daniel Valade, Product Manager, VersaUV, VersaStudio and Vinyl Cutters - Roland DGA. "The flexibility of these inks allows for printing on curved and three-dimensional objects without cracking or peeling," he said.
Last year, Roland introduced new Texart SBL3 inks for dye-sublimation applications. These specialty inks, designed for use with Roland's new Texart RT-640 and XT-640 inkjet printers, produce vibrant, colorful sublimated graphics for producing apparel, textiles, hard goods, and more, said Lily Hunter, Product Manager, Textiles and Consumables – Roland DGA. "Recent advancements in inks, such as Roland's Texart formulations, include richer, bolder colors, higher opacity, and better suspension of dyes in the liquid. This improved suspension of the dyes helps prevent settling and separation that can lead to color shifts and clogged print heads."
In addition to White and Metallic Silver specialty colors, Epson recently announced a unique Red ink as part of the SureColor S80600 64-inch roll-to-roll signage printer, remarked McCausland.
"Red is one of the most popular, and hardest to hit, colors in the signage market and this revolutionary Red ink will dramatically expand the capabilities of PSPs," he said. "Epson's new Red ink in the SureColor S80600 will allow PSPs to provide the highest image quality in the market, while also being able to match those tricky red brand colors that other roll-to-roll printers can't hit."
Mimaki printers use an expanded gamut to different effect.
Orange ink (available for Mimaki eco-solvent and latex printers) increases the color gamut and delivers more vivid output and the ability to reproduce approximately 94% of the Pantone color chart, said VanHorn. This is particularly applicable when reproducing corporate colors for campaigns across a range of media. "In the Mimaki system, orange is added as a process color – there is no need for designers to prepare artwork in the hexachrome color space," he noted.
Green ink (available for Mimaki latex printers) is often used in combination with Orange ink. This combination produces an expanded gamut that is ideal for producing POOP displays, company logos, and package prototypes that are color-critical, said VanHorn.
Light Black ink (available for Mimaki eco-solvent printers) produces high quality monochrome color reproduction, resulting in gray tones without a red undercast. In combination with Orange ink – along with Light Magenta and Light Cyan in an eight-color configuration on a Mimaki CJV Series printer– Light Black can also be used to serve the high-end, fine art market where prints command premium prices.
White ink (available for Mimaki UV-LED, eco-solvent, and latex printers) is becoming more common, though Mimaki is the only company to offer white latex ink in the wide format inkjet space, said VanHorn. "Mimaki's ability to circulate the white ink to avoid sedimentation (leading to nozzle clogs) is one of the technology advances in the JV400LX Series latex printers," he remarked.
"Clear ink (available for Mimaki UV-LED printers) can be used as an overall 'varnish' for protecting a printed surface, or can be used as a spot color to enhance a printed piece," VanHorn said. "With the precise dot placement of the new UJF-7151 plus printer, clear inks can be used to create 'lensless' lenticular panels for movement effects in signage.
On the horizon, in the digital textile segment, Mimaki will soon be making available two new Neon/Fluorescent inks for its TS300P-1800 inkjet textile printers. These new Neon/Fluorescent inks, available in yellow and pink, are for applications in fashion, sportswear, swimwear, and shoes and are specially made for use in the low-volume, high-quality sublimation paper transfer market.
Special effect varnishes, water-based inks, and LED-curing UV inks are all poised for more use on the basis that all add value to the printed output or in the case of LED reduced energy consumption, said Peter Saunders, Business Director – Digital, Sun Chemical.
Water-based inks with film functionality that is the same as UV inks but with lower film weight are being developed. SunJet, the global inkjet division of Sun Chemical, is focusing on its Aquacure technology platform. Aquacure technology delivers adhesion to a broad range of media, offers superb flexibility, is odor free, and has an extensive color gamut, said Saunders. The technology delivers significant advantages in the graphics sector but is not limited to this sector as it can achieve migration limits and compliance for primary food packaging, in combination with appropriate press design.
There is also development in UV varnishes for special effects. The varnishes are being used for 3D effects in high-end graphics and for highlight standout images.
"PSPs can benefit from using water-based inks to reduce odor and have print output which looks like offset quality," said Saunders. "The specialty varnishes speak for themselves – the images just stand out!"
UV-LED printers and specially-formulated UV inks represent one of the fastest-growing market segments in the industry, notes Valade. "One of the reasons for this growth is the availability of more affordable benchtop UV printers, such as those within Roland's VersaUV LEF series. These printers are helping smaller 'mom and pop' type PSPs to generate additional revenue by allowing them to accept customized short-run jobs, which in the past, may have been sent out to a larger screen printer or pad printer. UV curable inks enable users to print directly onto virtually any type of substrate with amazing color and resolution. Users can enhance these results by using ECO-UV gloss ink to create custom textures and raised special effects that add dimension to graphics."
HP Scitex has developed the HP HDR230 Scitex ink for the fast growing digitally printed paperboard and corrugated applications market, said HP's Eyal Duzy, Marketing Segment Manager at Hewlett-Packard. To support that market, he added, an ink that enables fast curing, high productivity is required. "The HP HDR230 Scitex ink is of the fastest UV curable inks in the market, enabling throughput of up to 1000 sqm/hour and curing under both UV arc lamp and UV LED illumination," he stated.
In order to enable seamless integration of digital technology into existing corrugated displays and corrugated boxes workflow environments and their respective finishing processes, the prints need to enable stacking high stacks of printed media; folding with no cracking; creasing with no scratching or smearing; and cutting with no chipping
To enable high stacks (meaning high pressure) and scratch resistance of the printed surface, the ink has to have very durable surface properties. However, high surface durability usually means low flexibility, and flexibility is required to avoid cracking and chipping when cutting and folding, explained Duzy.
"To enable both at the same time, a breakthrough technological innovation was required," he said. "HP HDR230 Scitex inks, developed for the paperboard applications, deliver great surface durability and high flexibility at the same time, and with no sacrifice on throughput. This innovation enables HP Scitex to effectively penetrate the market with its HP Scitex 15500 and 17000 corrugated presses."
Digitally printed applications such as in-store displays and free-standing-display-units (FSDU) created with HP HDR230 Scitex inks are typically used at the retail and point-of-sale/point-of-purchase environment. As such, they must be able to draw customer attention and protect the brand identity at the same time.
"In order to achieve that, the HP HDR230 Scitex inks are using high pigment loads in order to achieve high optical density and broad color gamut," said Duzy. "Due to those properties, the color gamut generated by the HP HDR230 Scitex inks is exceptionally large. In gloss appearance it gets to more than 70% of the Pantone color space and is meeting the ISO 12647-7 proofing standard. The high gloss level that can be achieved with these inks helps eliminate the need for an extra gloss varnish overcoat – saving printers and their customers labor, time, and extra costs."
