New Shrink Sleeve Software Provides 3-D Visuals, Predict Distortion
Photos courtesy of DWS
There are a number of research papers that all lead to the prediction the global value of shrink sleeves produced will be in excess of $10 billion by 2020. Brand owners are drawn to shrink sleeves because they allow their products to stand out on grocery store shelves crowded with an increasing number of options.
Shrink sleeves offer a larger area of real estate for branding, with more room for colors and images. The expanded use on the bottle or can—360 degree graphics within the printable label area, as well as the bold graphics that can be applied—offer the eye catching appeal brands are looking for to grab customers’ attention.
From a more responsible perspective, an increasing number of brands want to create shrink sleeves to avoid plastic containers. The industry is thinking green, with glass bottles—and even cans—using shrink sleeves. And now, shrink sleeves are used on unusually shaped containers.
Rolling Up Your Sleeves
Shrink sleeves do have their disadvantages, particularly in the manufacturing process, which can be complex and labor intensive. But that, too, is being erased, as advances in materials, printing and converting technologies are delivering greater efficiencies during manufacturing. There is increased availability of labeling machinery—used to mechanically apply the labels to the bottles—and in application/ labeling line speeds, especially as converters migrate from manual to automated labeling systems. Even container technology has improved, allowing for better shrink sleeve construction.
So, where’s the real problem? It has been during the design of shrink sleeves where the process has been tedious—bringing with it long lead times, requiring as much as six months of planning. Designing and printing shrink sleeves is difficult. It’s labor intensive, involving a number of trial and error steps to get the design right. Designers particularly struggle to express artwork for a curved surface on a flat canvas. Traditionally, they create grids on the shrink sleeve material, wrap it around the container, run it through a shrink sleeve tunnel, measure the distortion of the grids, and try to resize graphic elements based upon these anamorphic measurements. The design usually requires several iterations before the distortion is accurate, and several repetitions involving plates and press time are not unusual. In addition to long lead times, if the distortion isn’t correct, it costs the packager significantly, in time and money.
Distortions result in other issues beyond sizing. Packaging color and transparency can be altered because the hue and density of screened areas can shift in instances of extreme shrinking. If bar codes are distorted, they cannot be scanned consistently. And, different materials shrink differently—even between vertical and horizontal directions. With customers requiring head spinning turnaround times and profit margins incredibly tight, packagers are looking for a way to resolve the shrink sleeve conundrum. There’s the real potential of damaging brand integrity if the process is not handled correctly.
For these reasons, many people don’t like to work with shrink sleeves, but they are not aware there is an alternative. Over the past few years, there has been a design experience that is much easier to use, and faster. Industry education will allow companies to discover that with these software solutions, the process does not need to be tedious—or scary—to design. More important, the process can save weeks from time to market.
Shrink Sleeve Software: Shrinking Time & Effort
Shrink sleeve software can now create artwork, allowing designers and prepress professionals to quickly create, test, analyze, communicate and produce designs with 3-D visuals, without the need to conduct physical test runs. The algorithmic pre distortion can handle much more complex cases of distortions, resulting in more creative designs on more sophisticated containers. So, the repro department can avoid several sets of test prints and measurements, saving operator time.
[perfectpullquote align=”full” cite=”” link=”” color=”#ff00ff” class=”” size=””] Shrink sleeves do have their disadvantages, particularly in the manufacturing process, which can be complex and labor intensive. But that, too, is being erased, as advances in materials, printing and converting technologies are delivering greater efficiencies during manufacturing. [/perfectpullquote]
Some technologies can only handle cylindrical shapes, while some can also accommodate asymmetrical shapes and multipacks, and work in 3-D from start to finish. The process is much easier:
- Virtual Shrink Tunnel: The process starts in the shrink sleeve software, which basically is a virtual shrink tunnel. The converter creates, scans or imports into the software the container shape from a CAD file, enters the material characteristics of the shrink film, and the software digitally shrinks the sleeve around the container
- Direct Design: The digital shrink sleeve model is then used to design new artwork (or apply existing artwork) directly onto the shape. In the 3-D visuals, the artwork will shrink and distort in the same way as it would in the shrink tunnel. These visuals can be shared as 3-D PDF files as images for package shots or movies. For premedia providers, it is an efficient way to offer 3-D services. They also use it as an internal QA tool: checking for panel misalignments or structural mistakes
- With a separate pre distortion tool, the operator can see in Adobe Illustrator how much each artwork element has been distorted and automatically calculate compensations. This is non destructive: The artwork can be returned to the design agency and edited at any time. Thus, when the pre distorted design is printed and applied to the container, the result will be much more representative of what the designer and brand owner had in mind
3-D images accurately predicting the end result can be used to approve designs faster and cheaper than making and shipping mockups to every stakeholder, eliminating plates and tying up a press on physical test runs. This shortens lead times. Brand owners can better understand design limitations. The shrink sleeve software avoids errors and job rework caused by unexpected material behavior in production. Less experienced shops or converters can enter the sleeve label market more easily because designers aren’t working blind in 2-D.
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