Photos courtesy Avery Dennison Graphic Solutions
By Ken Halford
Most sign shops today that can digitally print wide-format graphics are also equipped to finish them in-house using a laminator. While some shops specialize in either hot (thermal-set) or cold (pressure-sensitive) lamination, it is fairly rare for them to need to outsource the work. Indeed, a laminator is one of the first pieces of equipment signmakers tend to buy when they start to transition into wide-format graphics.
Even before then, there is usually at least one smaller laminator somewhere in their shop. So, when signmakers buy both a wider printer and a wider laminator, they typically do not need much additional training, as the machines call for the same skill set to oversee the same procedures. And the new owners are usually already well-aware of the benefits—including improved durability, gloss and clarity—of the lamination films available to them.
This is because digital overlaminates are typically formulated to match specific printable films, including cast and calendered varieties. Vinyl-based billboards, for example, can be finished with general vinyl laminates, applied panel by panel.
Floor graphics need an anti-slip coating.
Many of today’s general digital overlaminates are also quite flexible, enabling them to support a lot of different types of applications. A sign shop might just order one outdoor-durable lamination film for vehicle graphics, for example, and another for exhibits, backlit posters, wall murals, point-of-purchase (POP) displays, wayfinding signs, floor graphics (albeit with an anti-slip coating added) and other popular indoor applications.
Specialty products
Beyond these straightforward short- or long-term products designed for indoor or outdoor use with removable or permanent adhesives, there are also many specialty lamination films for less common jobs.
Optically clear laminates, for example, are designed for finishing perforated window film graphics, to prevent water from collecting in any of the perforation holes. Graffiti-resistant films, meanwhile, contain special coatings that enable vandalized graphics to be rubbed clean with isopropyl alcohol (IPA) or even just soap and water.
Wall murals may use the same laminate as exhibits, POP displays and backlit posters.
Polyurethane (PU) films and fluoropolymer-based formulations have also been introduced that are both easier to clean than other laminates and more durable against impact. Some sign shops are now wrapping graphics on vehicles like fast boats, tractors and all-terrain vehicles (ATVs) that can get quickly ‘beaten up’ by bumps against docks, rocks or tree stumps, so they need these tougher laminates to protect the graphics.
Another growing opportunity is the ‘paint replacement’ market, where personally owned vehicles are wrapped not with printed graphics, but with colour-change ‘tuning films’ for a new, customized look. These films come with clear, protective laminates fused to them, as they do not need to go through a printer first.
There is even an emerging market in amateur racing helmets, which used to be hand-painted with graphics but now can be wrapped with a single printed graphic panel and an overlaminate film. To install such a mini-wrap, one person uses a heat gun while another stretches the material around the helmet’s contours.
New opportunities like these are why is important to pay attention to the market with regard to how customers need signmakers’ products to work.
