High-Definition Impact

Earlier this year, Heidelberg kicked off a new print marketing campaign designed to demonstrate the capabilities of its latest printing systems. The first piece in the campaign, a colorful poster with the tagline "High Definition," showcases a range of advanced sheetfed printing techniques.

"With this piece," says Marian Williams, graphic designer for Chicago-based Leo Burnett USA, Heidelberg's ad agency, "we decided to go with the concept of 'high definition' and seek out images with a lot of detail, because we knew that would be a great way for Heidelberg to show that its equipment can print highly detailed images with no loss of integrity. We selected certain images to highlight even more, using spot varnish techniques and metallic inks."

Williams, who served as the lead designer on the project, says the manufacturer requested a piece that would be "visually arresting."

"We wanted to educate, but also spark the imagination and creativity of our customers by giving them something they could physically use as an example for clients and other employees," says Steen Jensen, senior vice president for Heidelberg USA's sheetfed division.

Indeed, the poster is designed to impress both the untrained and professional eye. Featuring 12 boxes, each with a separate image or abstract design, and overlaid with colorful butterflies, the piece was printed front and back on a translucent Yupo synthetic substrate, so that certain images can be seen through the sheet.

In addition, metallic inks, UV coating, and varnishes make certain images and features stand out even more. The butterflies, for instance, are slightly raised off the page, and other elements in the poster also demonstrate texture.

According to Mark Heimerl, an account manager for Cenveo-Anderson Lithograph, which printed the poster at its plant in Commerce, Calif., "There were some real challenges and tricks to making it all add up." The piece called for a press that could meet the demands of the substrate, use UV inks, and work within an extremely tight register. Cenveo-Anderson was able to meet these challenges using its eight- and 10-color Speedmaster CD 102 UV presses. "The new 10-color machine has a very advanced automatic registering system," Heimerl says. "Also, the combination of the UV interdeck curing system, which cures the ink on press, and the in-line UV system, make it a very unique press."

Heimerl says the first challenge from a production standpoint was proofing. This process had to be done in layers, he notes. Printing began on the reverse side of the poster. After pre-treating the sheet, "On the back side we printed opaque white, then silver, and then four-color process," he explains. Since everything had to register to the 12-square design, "The color was then set for the rest of the run," he notes.

On the right-facing side of the poster, he continues, "We took two passes, again putting down opaque white, process, metallic silver, and one of the two raised UVs." For the raised UV inks, which had two different textures, Heimerl notes, "We had to do the lower-raised one first so it wouldn't get crushed and flatten out when it went through the press."

On another pass, he says, "We then put in our higher-raised UV, a spot UV, and ran a spot varnish. All told, we had eight colors on the front side of the sheet, plus two different spot UVs."

Not only did the piece hit all its registration marks, Heimerl notes, but it also hit its mark with viewers, becoming a must-have at the recent Drupa and Print Buyers Online Print Oasis Conference events this year.