The Soft Parade - The Big Picture Trade Publication

THE BIG PICTURE
The Business of Wide Format
February 2010 Issue

The Soft Parade - Soft Signage and Fabric Graphics evoke a tactile buying response.
In today's world of sensory overload, it's important for print providers to create graphics that will help your clients' work stand out in the crowd. Nothing may do a better job at this than printing on fabrics. Whether you opt for direct or dye-sublimation output, printed fabrics exhibit a flow and feel unlike any other materials - inviting your clients' clients as well as passersby - to not just view the graphics, but also touch them. It's a tactile experience they simply aren't afforded otherwise, which is designed to turn into a buying response.

The Big Picture has tracked down several recent projects created using digitally printed fabrics...

Sock it to me
When the management team at Port Columbus International Airport in Ohio wanted to implement an airport-wide re-branding ad campaign using a variety of different wide-format pieces, the company's ad agency knew just who to call: Columbus's own Solar Imaging (solarimaging.com). Solar Imaging specialized in retail, tradeshow, point-of-purchase, and customized finishing and installations.

For this particular ad campaign, Solar produced 40 Vista System displays (for shuttle buses), 4 adhesive-vinyl wall murals measuring 205 square-feet each, 2 vestibule wall murals at 200 square-feet each, and, of particular note here, 6 fabric "column socks" that zipped up one side.


"These column socks were definitely out of the ordinary for us," says Gina Spring, sales representative for Solar. "We are so used to doing fabric banners with a standard pole pocket that the chance to do some problem solving for the column socks - as well as testing to make sure they fit - was a refreshing change to our daily routine."

Each column sock had to be specially sewn with a heavy-duty separating zipper with exact accuracy. The socks had to be stretched just enough to ensure they would be taut around the columns. "The seamstress at our finishing partner, Banners Extreme in Columbus, showed her skills once again on the sewing part of this project. She had all six done in about a day and a half - no small feat for the amount of work she had to do," Spring says.

Solar produced the column socks using its 80-inch Durst Rho 600 Presto flatbed printer. The company direct printed onto Fisher Textiles' Symmetry Fabric using Durst's UV-curable inks and Cheetah software RIP.

"We used this particular fabric because of the stretch factor and overall look and feel of the fabric, and we used this printer because we could print in one pass without having an extra seam in the column socks," Spring says. The six column socks ranged in size from 103 inches tall x 73 inches in circumference to 110 inches tall x 78 inches in circumference. Solar performed the install in three days.