My latest marathon trip rounded off three weeks, 6 hotels, 4 countries and 9 flights. Lost track of my room number by the end of the trip, but added two more new South American countries to my list, first Argentina and then Uruguay.

Before you start looking for a map, Uruguay is a small country between the north of Argentina and south of Brazil, on the Atlantic coast, about the same size as Italy, with just 3.3 million people, but 30 million sheep and 15 million cattle.

The flexo market in Argentina is large, about the 3rd largest in Latin America, similar to Colombia, significantly smaller than Brazil and Mexico, but again with a relatively small percentage of traditional digital LAMS flexo plate making. Here few of the printers seem to have their own plate making operations The vast majority of Flexo plates are made by trade shops, but only half a dozen or so of the largest trade shops have traditional LAMS digital flexo plate making, meaning analog is still the most common plate making method used.

There are however clear signs that this will change in the next few years. Concerns about supply of silver-halide film, the push for higher print capabilities, and more printers indicating a desire to make their own plates, show that this is likely to be a significant transition.

Again, like in Chile, there are a great deal of Italian and southern European presses here, with new equipment in many facilities. When visiting Argentina I learned that there are many Italian descendents and speaking Italian is common in the southern cone of South America, explaining the strength of these manufacturers. There is also a good percentage of gravure here, indicating high print quality again.


 
The visit to Uruguay focused on a new Flexcel NX System installation in Cromograf, who were the first to order a system in Latin America, and a significant trade shop for some of the biggest international brand names, currently exporting plates to as far away as Peru and Chile. The new purchase represents a huge step up for Cromograf with all new plate processing as well as the Flexcel NX System. The team from Cromograf, the dealers, Lumila and Kodak personnel are shown here.

Miguel Angel Acosta Stabile, Director of Cromograf, third from the left, with 35 years experience in Flexo, and achieving amazing things with his team, demonstrated to us an incredible amount of flexo knowledge, know how, and experience. Part of the joy for me of doing these types of trips, is the people I meet and what I learn along the way. Between the Kodak team of Tom, Walter and I we have over 60 years of Flexo experience, and even though Miguel out ranks us all, he is happy and amazed to see what he can now do using Flexo, and still learns more every day.

The team was joined in Uruguay by Paul Lancelle, Kodak flexo specialist and former FFTA chairman, who had come to work with Cromograf and Lumila on the setup of the new Flexcel NX System. Paul can be seen here demonstrating the system to Cromograf customers who were so curious after press trials that they just had to see for themselves.


 
Uruguay is an interesting country. It supposedly has great beaches for the summer - not that I got to see them, as it is winter there now (pretty mild compared to US winters though!) and Montevideo has great places to eat. I am sure I will upset my colleagues from Argentina when I tell you that to date the best beef I have eaten was in Uruguay, along with some of the best meals overall. I guess I'll reserve my final verdict on the best beef in Latin America until I've ticked Brazil off the list.

I know that the team all enjoy working with the flexo industry in Latin America, in many ways an industry on the edge of transformation. The customers and team members are excited, looking to learn, with the full knowledge of the strengths and weaknesses of all of their options available. The people are really what make the flexo industry such fun, even in the current economy, and Latin America is no exception.

I'll next blog from Latin America at the start of another 3 week trip that kicks off with the Brazilian FTA event in Sao Paulo, where I am presenting and looking to learn more. I look forward to sharing those learnings with you all.

Just 6 weeks or so after the first visit to South America and Colombia I find myself back in the beautiful country with interesting and beautiful people. It is a visit that opens up my eyes even further to the changes and potential that this will become a power house for packaging, and particularly flexible packaging in the future. To reinforce the warning that the US&C risks falling behind countries like Colombia when we start to come out of recession, the first orders for Flexcel NX Systems in Colombia were taken, all into printers, both narrow and wide web. Combining the newest equipment with the best in plate technology will allow these printers to easily move forward and reinforce their positions as suppliers to the biggest brand owners.

One of the examples of where the newest press combines with the newest press, was a print trial on an OMET XFLEX. The XFLEX won the FFTA Technical Innovation Award last year, as did the Flexcel NX System this year. This is the first time I have seen these two industry leading innovations for Flexo together, and I have to say it was a beauty to behold. The speed to color, ease to change anilox rolls, print cylinders between jobs, ink tray loading unloading, minimal web path during the job, auto registration all worked simply and perfectly. The printer actually setup the first job twice, to prove to the prepress manager, and just to confirm that the press and plates combination really was so fast coming to commercially acceptable print together.



The picture in this Blog comes from a visit to the old Spanish capital in Colombia, and we have titled it "The 3 Tom's Looking For Dr John", where I shot a panoramic, and Tom accidentally managed to move into every shot, looking a different direction each time! It is a little freaky in some ways, but an interesting shot, automatically produced using a Kodak Easyshare M1093IS. The other lesson from that trip is distance as the crow flies is not important, how big a mountain you have to go up and down the side of controls travel time, and the degree of headache at the other end!

Colombia seems to be the country in South America with the highest penetration of traditional digital flexo plates, high percentage of Comexi wide web presses, and a smaller percentage of gravure to flexo.

Chile on the other hand was very different. From the flight from hell overnight Sunday with all the families returning from vacations, to arriving at the hotel to go to bed in the dark, and the getting out of bed at noon for the first appointment, to opening the curtains to see for the first time the snow covered Andes mountains seemingly a few blocks away, that was a real WOW sight to wake to!

The Flexo industry in Chile was different, far fewer CTP for Flexo, about 20% of Colombia, much more analog, very good analog, more Italian presses than anything, and a higher percentage of gravure than in Colombia. But here again a market ready to transition, Chile is a big exporter, so their packaging appears on our shelves all of the time, and they will continue to grow this trend. Here converting Flexo is really also going after gravure conversion, so the densities that can be produced with as few colors as possible is important.

As I visit super markets in other countries, that gets really interesting trying to explain you are "just looking" with a loop when you don't speak Spanish, it is clear that there are some significant market differences too. Quantities are smaller, many weekly instead of monthly purchases as in US, more flexible packaging, stronger brighter colors, more competition for sales. You come to the conclusion that the packaging in Latin America is at least as good and in most cases better than the majority in the US today. This too will help understand how they can become a threat to the US producers.

The next issue of the blog will come from Argentina and Uruguay, and my verdict to date on the beef, and who for Latin America reins supreme!

Minnesota is the home of the Flexo Center of Excellence R&D and Applications for Kodak, so it is a regular place for me to visit. This is also the Kodak flexo center for customer support and demonstrations for the Americas, where customers regularly come to gain hands on experience and learn more about our flexo solutions.

Minnesota is an interesting place, but I am really glad the weather for my two visits over the last month was MUCH better than the -45 F plus wind chill In February, which was the coldest I have experienced anywhere.

One of my recent visits included attending a multi-supplier banded anilox test that demonstrated the ability of Flexcel NX Plates, with the right inks, tape and anilox, to truly match the densities of gravure for process and spot colors on wide web flexible packaging. There is a huge level of interest from flexible packaging buyers and printers to be able to match the capabilities of gravure with Flexo. It is clear that there are 3 components to this:

1. Resolution (around 175 lpi (70 lpcm))
2. Consistency
3. Solid Ink Density

With Kodak's latest technology, it is now possible to offer all three via the Flexcel NX System.

Realistically, to achieve this you do need the right press components, files, and application in combination. Some printers are ready, but many are not. The Flexcel NX System is capable of 300 lpi so 175 is no problem, and the flat top dot with 1:1 image transfer from the digital file provides the consistency, but without the right components for anilox, tape, and ink this is still beyond the capabilities of many in wide web flexo today. With the banded roll test results, which will be published as a white paper, it confirmed the requirements and procedure for successful implementation.

The challenge for flexo has been ink density, ink lay down, and visual impact on the shelf, without needing the high numbers of spot colors of traditional digital flexo. This is now addressed, allowing gravure-like high ink densities with process printing and spot colors. This promises to open up the capabilities of Flexo even further.

Not all flexible packaging flexo printers will want gravure quality. For those that have no need to move to higher screen rulings and don't want to make significant press room changes, the Flexcel NX System enables improvement in tonal range, contrast and density that will open up opportunities to grow the market. But for those willing to optimize their printing process the Flexcel NX System opens up a world of possibilities.

During the last trip I also visited Geoff Aker at SGS in Minneapolis, my first time in the facility, one of the largest and certainly one of the nicest I have visited. A clear signal of the investment and commitment required in the modern fast turn around flexo industry.

Minnesota is also home to Joe Tuccitto, FFTA Education Director and a place where we have worked and fished together in the past.

On a completely different topic, I will be the chair for the Emerging Trends & Technology Session at the FFTA in Las Vegas 2010, along with co-chair David Galton of Asahi Photoproducts in Europe. I encourage anyone interested in presenting a new technology, or anything else for this event to submit your up to 250 word abstract to www.flexography.org. If you don't submit an abstract then you have no chance of presenting, so get your thinking caps on and call David or I if you have any questions, or even if you have an idea and want to talk it through. Over the years I have worked for and been a member in many associations, and I have learnt that with associations the world over, the more you get involved the more you get out of it, so don't be shy in coming forward.

My next trip to Minnesota will be in the Fall, when the extra layers may be needed at night, but at least not the heavy winter coat and thermals!

See you next time

Since joining Kodak at the end of 2007, a key part of my role is evangelist for flexo, internally and externally of Kodak, and globally to grow the flexo industry. To date I have been to Europe, North, Central, and South America plus Asia. As I travel all over the world visiting Flexo printers and trade shops, as well as other packaging printers, I learn a lot that people like me to share.

It has been suggested that as I do this I could share my findings in a blog series titled "Where in the Flexo World is Dr John?"



The latest trip was to Colombia, my first to South America and now completing a full count for continents visited except Antarctica. In the current economy, Colombia was a real surprise. There are a few reminders of their troubled past, like each motor bike rider is required to have ID vests, but the country has had 8 years of stable government. Everywhere you look there is construction, investment, and signs of growth (they did not take the bad loans as in the US) and their economy is only a little soft, but doing very well.

What we saw at every printer visited were new investments, many presses less than a year old in every site, the newest and most advanced technology, and a client list of who's who for the top packaging brand owners. They also are keen to listen and learn more to improve the print quality they can achieve. They employ many engineers, and apply total quality management and preventive maintenance throughout their operations. They are often self sufficient operations, with film blowing or ink manufacture operations.

There are some of the best analog printers we have ever seen, achieving resolutions and results that mean that going to traditional LAMS digital plates will be a clear step backwards for them.

It is clear that much of the print is for local use, but increasingly it is for export to the US and Europe, and with the investments they are making now, there is the potential that as the world economies recover and demand increases they will take high quality print from other countries in the Americas, and become a major export force, like Turkey does in Europe, especially flexible packaging.

This is a country Tom Kowalski and I look forward to returning to very soon and continue to learn more before extending our introduction to Latin America with Walter Murillo, with a trip to several of the southern cone countries soon.

Two personal lessons from Bogota is that in traffic red lights and stop signs are only optional, but a U-turn will get you a special spot fine from the police, and yes you really need at least 3 hours at the airport for international flights.

After reading Esko's "revolutionary" press release dated March 25 we did a fair bit of head scratching, and while it is not our normal style to comment on our competitors' press releases, we just had to respond with a couple of simple questions. So what is really new, and how can something that is not new be revolutionary?

So how is 4000dpi laser imaging and hybrid screening revolutionary for flexo? Hybrid screening has been in use for many years and there are lasers that are used for imaging flexo at 9600 and 12400 dpi.

Matching offset with flexo. Well that's nothing new either. The Kodak Flexcel NX System has been doing that for the last 18 months with a 2400dpi Squarespot imaging device. It achieves 1:1 image transfer from the digital file to the plate from 10 microns up to 300lpi using AM, hybrid and FM screening, the same as they use in offset.





And about square pixels in the data file and a round laser beam, even John's three year old Lilly knows that the round block does not fit properly in the square hole. This means that a 1:1 digital pixel to dot on plate can never be achieved with a round laser beam.

Irrespective of this "revolution" in resolution and screening technology (which as we said before is really nothing new) the fact that it is applied to traditional digital black mask flexo plates still remains, resulting in oxygen inhibition and rounded bullet shaped dots. These rounded bullet shaped dots are clearly accepted by some of the statements in the press release as causing variation in the press room, delays in press set up, reduced plate life and production inconsistency. This means that the plate is a major cause for variation in existing digital black mask flexo plate systems (here at Kodak we have been saying that for more than a year). The new imaging and screening does not change the profile of the printing dots, so how can it significantly affect their performance on press? High resolution and hybrid screening can certainly help your highlight and fine line performance; we have technology to do this too. Keeping the rounded dots there and keeping them consistent in real world production is the challenge, and only a flat top dot can enable the stability and wide impression latitude that we all desire for true consistency - it is simple physics 101!



Lilly also loves to draw with an ultrafine pencil, which is comparable to small dots, but even Lilly knows that coloring in the shapes in her coloring book takes a long time with such a fine pencil. It is just lucky that as a Flexo industry we don't need to do large solid areas on our plates, otherwise that could slow imaging down greatly.

ESKO claims that more than 90% of all digital flexo plates and sleeves are imaged on CDI imagers. We know this is not true. Kodak is a major supplier of flexo imaging devices and unless none of our customers are actually using their Thermoflex and Trendsetter NX devices to image flexo plates, then the statement must be false. I have actually visited and seen them working in trade shops and printers all around the world. When you see clearly overstated claims like this in a press release it makes you start to question all of the other claims.

Their sustainability statements are a little questionable too. Once again others seem to be hung up primarily in the solvent vs thermal debate instead of looking at the big picture, where industry data indicates that the greatest environmental impact that can be affected by flexo plate choice is in print production. So it's clear that the flexo plate should be chosen to reduce the actual number of plates used, optimize productivity and minimize waste in the pressroom.

Esko's statements throughout the press release indicate that the current digital black mask flexo plate system has a whole series of issues that need addressing - issues that have a serious effect on production performance, resulting in higher levels of waste. It's hard to see how just smoothing the dot edge of a round top dot will have the significant effect that they claim in all but the exceptional cases.

Wide impression latitude, significantly extended plate life and consistency are key parameters in minimizing this environmental impact. Sort these issues out and you really start to see the environmental benefits. The improved predictability, reliability and consistency that Kodak's plates deliver, with their 1:1 image reproduction and flat top dots, enable printers to achieve significantly improved waste reduction in production.

The Flexcel NX plate system was built for superior press performance, addressing many of the significant weaknesses of traditional digital flexo. The inherent weaknesses of digital flexo just can not be overcome with 4000 dpi imaging and hybrid screening alone, although they can do a nice job of masking some of the issues!

At best Esko's step forward is evolutionary for them..... it's certainly not revolutionary for flexo!

This post was co-written by Emma Schlotthauer, Global Current Marketing for Flexo at Eastman Kodak.

Throughout my first year since leaving the Flexographic Technical Association as Technical Director to join the rapidly growing Flexo and Packaging team for Kodak, I repeatedly heard people question if Flexo really needs to be able to print at higher resolutions with higher consistency and repeatability. I've even heard comments like "as Flexo printers you don't need to be able to print the Mona Lisa." All these remarks amaze me.

As Flexo printers you need to be able to print what your customer wants, and if that is the Mona Lisa, 0.8 pt micro text for security print, 300 lpi, 10.6 micron SQUAREspot, or on lenticular lens material, then not being able to do that just holds back your company. If you can't do it then your customers will be going to someone who can, and that will mean more market share and work for rotogravure, offset, digital, or screen printing, and less for you!

Lenticular printing is a classic example, traditionally printed offset because Flexo can't do it at all well, using analog, digital or direct engraved plates. Pacur, the leading manufacturer of lenticular lens material, have been attempting to print lenticular jobs using Flexo for almost a decade with no acceptable successes. This has meant the need to use sheetfed offset, with thicker and more expensive lens materials, and offline processing, all driving up complexity and costs. 

In the fall of 2008, Pacur and their prepress partner, Pixalen Studio, learned of a new Flexo plate from Kodak that was said to be doing things that Flexo has never done before. The Flexcel NX Digital Flexographic System used SQUAREspot technology, the same imaging technology used for offset lenticular, so they decided to see what it could do. They set up a test at a local printer using a Mark Andy 2200 to compare direct laser engraving plates to the Kodak Flexcel NX Plates. After 15 minutes on press the direct laser engraving was given up on--still no hope for lenticular. Then the Flexcel NX plates were put on, starting a new age for lenticular printing using Flexo.

Lenticular printing requires lines of precise size and location that combine to produce sharp crisp images and perceived depth. Because the Flexcel NX System transfers data precisely from the square pixels via the Thermal Imaging Layer to the Flexcel NX Plate as a 1:1 transfer, it fit the requirements for lenticular perfectly. The plates are used to print on the back of the Lenstar Lenticular Lens material, and when viewed from the front the image appears 3D. According to the people at Pacur, who really know lenticular printing, the Flexcel NX Plates printed as sharp or sharper than offset. 

I have repeatedly seen the enthusiasm and wonder from printers, trade shops, and consumer goods companies around Flexcel NX—from seeing samples at major exhibitions to witnessing demos such as at the Dallas open house where Narnia movie posters were printed at 300 lpi. But never have I seen such incredible excitement from the printers who had repeatedly tried to print lenticular using Flexo when they realized that there was now a viable option. At Pack Expo in Chicago recently we showed samples of lenticular printing from three print runs at three different printers, using Mark Andy, Nilpeter, and Gallus presses, with one set also printed and converted inline to be self adhesive labels. All 3 trials used a 10 mil Lenstar material and were printed using Flexcel NX.

From the first trial to the exhibition it was only 3 weeks, and so as great as the results were, even better is knowing that this is just the start. Now that it has been proven that high quality lenticular samples can be produced in-line using Flexo, more sophisticated effects such as motion will be tested. This could be the beginning of a new growth market for Flexo, with the sharp printing capabilities and significant potential cost benefits of printing and converting inline on a Flexo press. It will be a significant differentiator for companies using the Flexcel NX System, the only one capable of this. 

I joined Kodak to advance and grow the capabilities and market of the Flexo process, and this is a clear and significant step on that route. Even if lenticular is not for you, the capabilities of the Flexcel NX System will continue to open new doors for Flexo. This is not about little dots, or software magic, it is about the 1:1 transfer of the pixel from your digital file to the plate, and the huge improvements that can bring in print consistency and repeatability on press, where the Flexo industry must succeed. If your plate supplier can't achieve the stability of 1:1 image transfer from digital file to plate, talk to Kodak to see how we can help to add depth to your Flexo printing capabilities.