The skies the limit when it comes to wide-format digital printing. So, as the countdown to Christmas begins, Melony Rocque-Hewitt looks at some of the niche products that have caught the imagination of the public.
Not so long ago, I was having lunch with a sales director of a London-based, wide-format, digital printing company who told me that when he went to see clients, one of his party tricks was to take an empty portfolio with him to demonstrate the ‘no limits’ characteristics of wide-format digital print.
Nice touch, and it certainly worked for him, but what has this potentially ‘no limits’ industry of ours thrown up? As we’re now suddenly in the countdown for Christmas, we thought we’d take a look at some of the offerings from wide-format companies that have caught the imagination of the public and wouldn’t look amiss under the Christmas tree.
Art presentation
Seeingthebigpicture.co.uk was established in 2005 and offers art solutions for the home and office environments. The company is a partnership of ideas and skills between Craig Wood who has an interest and background in design, web design, interiors and marketing in tandem with a fabrication and digital printing company.
Seeingthebigpicture.co.uk was set-up in 2005 with a focus on the consumer market but it also services photographers and the commercial sector. The company offers a number of products including acrylic, canvas and alloy prints housed in acrylic photo frame solutions such as large sized acrylic blocks or contemporary photo cubes.
Customers can either send their own images to be turned into a stylish piece of artwork, or alternatively they can choose from a selection of unique photographic and digital artworks under the categories of still life landscapes, digitally stylized prints, split canvases and silhouette prints.
Seeingthebigpicture.co.uk has been offering a bespoke art-effects service where customers can send in one of their own images which are then turned into an iconic, contemporary artwork in the style of Andy Warhol and Julian Opie for example.
The company prides itself on its personal service but, says founder Craig Wood, is acutely aware that as far as the consumer market is concerned, there is serious competition for digitally printed, large sized, canvas reproductions on the high street based solely on price not quality.
This has altered the flavor of the company somewhat, which is now focusing much more on the commercial sector – where quality is important and where the company can advise and steer clients on projects. To this end the website will be redesigned shortly with a more commercial feel to it. Features such as the Warhol/Opie effects to photos will be dropped, but as Craig Wood points out, “We offer a bespoke, personal service and will work with anyone consumer or commercial that approaches us. We treat all our clients the same.”
All weather garden art
Insideout-gardenart.co.uk is an on-line business based in Derbyshire offering weatherproof images with which to decorate outdoor garden spaces. The idea for the company was sparked-off after founder Sue Badbury commissioned a digital print company way back in 2001 to output a large piece of garden art to cover an unsightly wall in full view of her kitchen window.
Convinced that others too, would buy weatherproof canvasses to adorn their garden spaces, she set up Insideart gardenart.com in 2006. Her hunch was right, as the company has experienced year on year growth and has never looked back.
Insideout-gardenrt.com is a family run company which designed and built its own website and produces its own wide-format printing and lamination in-house. Images are output to durable, weatherproof polyvinyl chloride material using UV inks and for further protection are finished with a satin laminate. The vinyl is hand stretched onto hand-made, renewable, hardwood frames.
The downloading and output of customers’ own images now accounts for 50% of the business. However, for those who want to leave creativity to the experts, the company partners with and photographers who provide fresh, unique and current imagery.
www.insideoutgarden.co.uk
Fantasy and fun to suburbia
A mission to bring colour and humour to the grey, drabness of German suburbia was the inspiration behind www.style-your-garage.com. Here digitally printed, 3D photo-realistic images are output to material that is then attached to up and over garage doors.
The garage billboards are made from an exclusive special material – not dissimilar to truck tarpaulins, but have a finer structure. The material is rip-proof and can be cut without damaging it. The billboards are completely weatherproof able to withstand wind, cold, rain, heat and sunlight and also come with an all important fire safety certificate.
The company first started selling these garage tarpaulins in Germany but now has customers as far afield as New Zealand, USA, Canada, Australia, Malaysia and Russia but with Germany, UK and the USA being the top ranking customer locations.
A year after launching style-your-garage.com, the company decided to start offering door designs – giving boring doors a new look such as a New York elevator or the appearance of a famous door such as 10 Downing Street.
Suitable for both interior and exterior doors, the door billboards are not large stickers; they are special, large, thin and stable covers. They can easily be fixed to any smooth door using the double-sided tape that comes with the product, making it easy for anyone to attach the door covers quickly and without ugly air pockets forming.
This summer the company launched style-your-walls.com, a high-quality, self-adhesive wall 3D effect wall sticker that adheres to all standard surfaces and walls and unlike other wall stickers it is suitable for use over woodchip wallpaper. The stickers can be fast and easily applied to walls without leaving creases or bubbles can be removed and reused at any time without leaving any marks.
According to head of sales and marketing at the company the stickers have been very well received and have gone down a storm in the Caribbean as well as customers buying these for their children. As far as the immediate future, the company will be launching 3D adhesive stickers for fridges and expects to start offering these before Christmas.