Upon entering the FESPA Digital 2016 show, our first impression was the colossal size that our large format print industry has become. The volume of exhibitors, the range of products and services on offer has grown exponentially since our first visit ten years ago. Based within seven huge halls, finding time to see and explore everything on display seemed impossible but armed with a pair of comfortable shoes we did our best! The show itself consisted of a vast range of industry suppliers from machine manufacturers and ink suppliers, to hardware suppliers and material specialists. We were astonished at the variety of fabulous products on show that provided lots of thoughts and ideas for us to consider in our future plans.
We were pleased to see that the key area of focus for machine suppliers was on better quality at faster speeds and the ink technology being used to achieve this was highly impressive. UV print technology is seeing huge investment in this area, suggesting that UV printing machines will be a leading force in the development of this process. Thanks to our recent addition of a state-art-the-art VUTEk GS3250LX to the MX printing arsenal, means we are already at the forefront of what is believed to be the future of digital printing.
FESPA also highlighted dye sublimation as an important area of growth, with specific consideration being given to niche products and services when bringing new machines to market. It has been argued for some time now that the vibrancy of dye sublimation prints surpass other print, and that soft signage is a key opportunity for growth in this market. This was demonstrated, not only with the range of suppliers selling in this area, but the fact that the show itself and a huge proportion of the stands all had some sort of fabric graphic on display. This is fabulous news for us at MX Display because we consider ourselves to champion quality and versatility of fabric printing in the graphic and signage industry.
A new product which was of particular interest to us at MX was the acoustic fabric suitable for dye sublimation print. Whilst we already provide bespoke acoustic graphic solutions, we were excited about being able to do this by the use of specialist fabric alone, eliminating the need for separate acoustic wadding to be needed in certain scenarios. A sample roll of this material is currently being tested so watch this space for more information on this innovative new product.
After three days of print innovation and an overwhelming variety of new products coming to market, digital print technology is definitely an exciting industry to be working in and we see no reason at all why this will not continue.
