Technology | What they Say


PRINT WORLD’S PROMETHEANS


MANUFACTURERS ALWAYS STRIVE TO BE AT THE FOREFRONT OF TECHNOLOGY, ENSURING THEY BRING ABOUT MEANINGFUL CHANGE. AS WE ENTER THE TRADE SHOW SEASON, WE MAY JUST SEE SOME OF THESE PROMETHEAN IDEAS IN PRACTICE. IN RESPECT OF THIS, IR’S MANAGING EDITOR, MELANIE ATTLESEY, HAS ASKED SEVERAL BUSINESS LEADERS WHAT FEATURES THEY WISH TO SEE IN THE WIDE-FORMAT PRINTERS OF TOMORROW.


‘Huge choice at every price point’ David Allen, Managing director, Allen Signs


Since the first wide-format printers became available the pace of change hasn’t slowed. From only being able to print on coated stock or very limited widths we’ve now got a huge choice at every price point. So, what else is there?


At any level a printer represents a significant investment but a lot of the time ongoing maintenance can make the difference between a successful experience and not. I’d like to see printer manufacturers continue the trend of easier maintenance by the operator and I’d love to see work on inks to reduce the amount of time required to outgas prints. If you could swap and change ink sets with ease that would be a bonus. When it comes to flatbed and hybrid,


I’d like to see a hybrid that has the panel positioning that’s as accurate as a conventional flatbed. While it’s getting


‘Interesting things to


come for the industry’ Alex Liggett, Owner, The Vinyl Guys


I think anyone who runs print & cut wide-format machines would love some sort of feature that would print, cut, weed and add the app tape too, but I’ll try to think of some features that are more realistic. I do think that there is scope for integrating some AI-style intelligence into the machines to make the process of cutting after print and lam more seamless. A feature on roll-to-roll wide-format machines where you could


feed any print into your machine


(without crop marks) and a camera reads the job and intelligently places cut lines on it for you and you can edit them as you need.


14 | April/May 2025


better, the limitation of the format means it’s not quite there yet. I still feel there’s too many compromises with a hybrid; you have in theory the best of both worlds. The roll- to-roll system could be easier to load and


the tracking better. Rigid material handling is ok


but I’d like to see the belt systems improved to handle bigger sheets easier. As with anything


you always need to optimise the yield on materials, but most seem to struggle when you need to print full sheets. I think the hybrid of the future will have more accurate sheet positioning available and better belt systems making them truly versatile. Versatility is key at this level; easy head replacement and maintenance should be a priority of the future meaning that they last longer and have a useful second life compared to today’s printers that are of little value in a short space of time.


On the newer machines that have touch screen controls, there is already visual instructions to help users with maintenance and cleaning. These systems could be further developed to work as a diagnostic feature where suggestions are made for resolving issues and lists of parts and part numbers are available to either save engineer time or speed up the process and ensure they come with the correct parts.


Greater remote control of your machine and the ability to change over materials without being in the print room in person. We can already operate and monitor wide-format machines remotely but on the condition that we already have material loaded in and the machine is ready to go. Having the ability to have a selection of materials ready to go, which would self-load would make for a truly remote print process. I do think that where we are currently with wide-format print, in terms of productivity and quality is brilliant. The versatility of modern-day machines allows print businesses to offer a huge range of diverse products from one machine and I think that as long as the rate of material development continues alongside machine development there will be some interesting things to come for the industry.


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