This article was contributed by Dr. Mark Bohan, vice president, Technology and Research, Printing Industries of America, who is presenting “Jazzing Up Your Brand with Cool Varnishes, Inks, and Substrates” at the 2013 Color Management Conference, December 7–10, in Phoenix, AZ. The communications industry today is highly competitive with different message forms used to communicate with customers from mass media and electronic communications to printed material. In recent years we’ve seen many new technological developments to enhance the impact of printed material visually, as well as addressing our other senses, like touch and smell.  These developments also allow print to interact with electronic devices. With these new approaches, brands and companies can differentiate their products to increase customer awareness and satisfaction. I have the great pleasure of witnessing many of these new technologies in product demonstrations, trade shows, open houses, and from visits to printers using the different solutions. I look forward to sharing these findings with you in this session at the 2013 Color Management Conference this December in Phoenix, AZ. Here is a list of ten different technologies* your company can use to differentiate your product: Raised coatingsProduced inline on an offset or digital printing press, raised coatings create textures that can be from one micron to well in excess 100. New solutions offline allow great register to the pre-printed product and can introduce secondary sparkling or metallic effects, for instance. Lenticular printingIntroduce depth and movement with images produced on lenticular lenses. Interlace the images and print using many different print processes. Metallic effectsMake the print shiny, be it through the use of metallic inks, substrates, or the introduction of foiling in the production. This can easily be designed and visualized to go mainstream. Scented coatingMimic the smell of the product or location with scents in either a coating or ink. Whatever your desire, there will be the scents available to use! 3D texture with inkjetBuild up a 3D image using flatbed inkjet, create a wood-paneling effect, reproduce an old master, or create highly personalized wall coverings. Reticulated coatingsCreate that special look by using coatings that do not fully flow on the substrate producing a textured feel to the coated area. Thermochromic inksThe temperature changes and so does the color—have your drink tell you when it’s ice cold! Laser diecuttingUsing lasers to create individualized patterns in printed sheets, these can vaporize the substrate to provide great detail and impact. Inks for thermoformingPrint it on a flat surface and then use thermoforming to create three-dimensional items in many different run lengths—personalize each of the items with digital. Fluorescent coatings and inksEither as a spot or flood, this will fluoresce under different lighting conditions; it could be for security...

This article was contributed by Dr. Mark Bohan, vice president, Technology and Research, Printing Industries of America, who is presenting “Jazzing Up Your Brand with Cool Varnishes, Inks, and Substrates” at the 2013 Color Management Conference, December 7–10, in Phoenix, AZ. The communications industry today is highly competitive with different message forms used to communicate with customers from mass media and electronic communications to printed material. In recent years we’ve seen many new technological developments to enhance the impact of printed material visually, as well as addressing our other senses, like touch and smell.  These developments also allow print to interact with electronic devices. With these new approaches, brands and companies can differentiate their products to increase customer awareness and satisfaction. I have the great pleasure of witnessing many of these new technologies in product demonstrations, trade shows, open houses, and from visits to printers using the different solutions. I look forward to sharing these findings with you in this session at the 2013 Color Management Conference this December in Phoenix, AZ. Here is a list of ten different technologies* your company can use to differentiate your product: Raised coatingsProduced inline on an offset or digital printing press, raised coatings create textures that can be from one micron to well in excess 100. New solutions offline allow great register to the pre-printed product and can introduce secondary sparkling or metallic effects, for instance. Lenticular printingIntroduce depth and movement with images produced on lenticular lenses. Interlace the images and print using many different print processes. Metallic effectsMake the print shiny, be it through the use of metallic inks, substrates, or the introduction of foiling in the production. This can easily be designed and visualized to go mainstream. Scented coatingMimic the smell of the product or location with scents in either a coating or ink. Whatever your desire, there will be the scents available to use! 3D texture with inkjetBuild up a 3D image using flatbed inkjet, create a wood-paneling effect, reproduce an old master, or create highly personalized wall coverings. Reticulated coatingsCreate that special look by using coatings that do not fully flow on the substrate producing a textured feel to the coated area. Thermochromic inksThe temperature changes and so does the color—have your drink tell you when it’s ice cold! Laser diecuttingUsing lasers to create individualized patterns in printed sheets, these can vaporize the substrate to provide great detail and impact. Inks for thermoformingPrint it on a flat surface and then use thermoforming to create three-dimensional items in many different run lengths—personalize each of the items with digital. Fluorescent coatings and inksEither as a spot or flood, this will fluoresce under different lighting conditions; it could be for security...

This guest blog was submitted by Bill Wagner, CEO, CSP, and Co-Founder, Accord Management Systems. As a consultant, presenter, and author for more than 20 years, he has been at the forefront of leadership and entrepreneurial practice. Printing industry professionals live in a world of trim sizes, PMS colors, and amazing attention to detail with the exception of the “C Level” and sales. It’s clearly an industry that depends on metrics. Our industry, human resources consulting, shares this mission-critical imperative with the printing industry. We also depend on tools of measurement; however, the item being measured is behavior. Using a well-proven system, we conduct surveys that measure whether an individual’s behavior fits with the behavioral requirements of a particular position. For the sake of example, consider any printing job you’ve worked on recently. If an error occurred, then a number of obstacles were created. For instance, the error may now compromise the envelope planned for the mailing. Or, the color may be darker than the color used in other campaigns. Either way, the decision must be made to reprint the job or somehow make it work with the error. Unfortunately, it’s not as easy to fix a bad hire; hiring decisions typically have longer lasting repercussions and impressions. Over the past decade, my company surveyed the personalities of 3000+ successful entrepreneurs, business owners, and leaders. What have we learned? We’ve learned that success is based more on behavior than it is on skill, education, and/or experience. Our research shows that specific personalities actually perform at higher levels for sustained periods of time. So, if you’ve struggled with people decisions in the past, think about it this way: A person who does well in a line position may not possess the personality to succeed as a department head. The best customer service representative may fail as a manager. And, your most profitable salesperson might stink in the role of sales manager because of too much of a competitive edge. Each scenario may end in failure not because of skills, but because they don’t have the personality necessary for the job. If you want to learn more about effective leadership, Bill Wagner will be presenting Managing the Gap: A 3600 Leadership Survey at the 2012 LPIA Innovation Conference, November 7–9, 2012, in Coronado (San Diego),...

Attendees at the upcoming Automation Solutions Network meeting, May 2-3 in Las Vegas, NV, will hear Bill Wieners, president of Digital Lizard, describe his company’s remarkable use of automation. Digital Lizard’s experience should make every company take notice.Its workflow automation boosted productivity from an average of 175 orders to over 400 orders per day, while still meeting its promise—all orders placed by 10:30 PST are delivered the next day across the country. Wieners attributes their Web-2-print software for the company’s productivity increase. Digital Lizard chose their software based on capabilities not only with their existing facility, but with future expansion in mind. The software allowed them to customize modules and optimize settings. The result for its bottom line was an additional revenue stream – from storefronts. They have customized 190 storefront solutions, and their experts will take about two hours to have a live storefront up and running for their customers. Listen and discuss at the meeting as he explains how the company manages to get a job on press eight minutes after the order is received and to complete the job in less than one hour. The ability for this software to reduce human interaction and touchpoints along the process allows for profitability. It churns out that production with 14 digital presses but only 27 total employees. For more information about the meeting and to register, visit the Automation Solutions Network Meeting...

The Call for Papers for the 65th Annual Technical Conference has begun, and papers for both Technical Papers and the NEW Technical Innovations Papers. The conference will be held February 3-6, 2013, in Portland, Oregon. John Seymour of the TAGA Technical Program Committee and TAGA Technical Paper contributor shares the success he has achieved through TAGA. I work in the research group for QuadTech. Our company develops and sells control systems for printing presses. My own work has largely been the measurement and control of color online (that is, on the printing press). I have also been involved in other products that we develop, including register control and web inspection. The majority of my work has to do with advanced research for new product development.   I have been attending TAGA since 1993, and have presented eleven papers and given two tutorials for this conference. TAGA is the one conference that I try to attend every year. Why is this conference important to me to attend? It is worth my time because of the high quality of technical papers and the diversity of topics and of disciplines. The TAGA technical papers committee is very diligent about screening out presentations that are largely commercials for products. Because of this, TAGA is the place to go where you can hear good, solid technical presentations without marketing hype. The technical papers committee actively solicits experts in the industry to present, so the papers are assured of having content that is both reliable and relevant. TAGA has diversity in academics versus industry involvement. Currently, about 60% of the papers are from academic institutions and organizations. Roughly 20% of the papers are from industry. The remaining 20% of the papers represent collaborations between these two groups. TAGA fosters this collaboration, to the benefit of both groups. The other diversity that TAGA provides is the diversity of topics. I look forward to presentations about topics that I know very little about. Often, they turn out to be topics that I should know something about! Why is the TAGA conference an important venue for me to present? There is a certain amount of good karma involved here. If I am receiving, I should be prepared to give. But this is hard to sell to my boss! It is much easier for me to get permission based on the fact that TAGA attracts the technical movers and shakers in this industry. Speaking at TAGA is an opportunity for my company to influence the people who are most influential in the industry. Sometimes that message is simply that my company is doing new and innovative things. Sometimes the message is a bit more of a sales pitch –...