We also received a demonstration from Frank Adegeest of a packaging design and collaboration software called Esko Visualizer. Frank Adegeest explained, “There is a convergence between structural and packaging design. This is an area where we see a lot of growth.”
Esko acquired StoneCube in May 2007 and Visualizer takes advantage of StoneCube’s 3D software. The software modified by Esko links product design to the packaging structural design and also understands materials. Any product such as a toy designed in Solidworks can be imported into Visualizer and the box can be designed around it in Score or ArtiosCad. 2-dimensional work is transformed into 3D.
The structural and graphic design products are integrated in a dynamic way. Simulations of the printing processes are possible with dynamic manipulation of embossing, colour, and hyper-realistic images and graphics. Every kind of line extension and brand variant can be dynamically visualised and shared across the packaging supply chain in a 360 degree 3 dimensional digital view.
In the immortal words of Frank Adegeest, “Retailers are very powerful – they define what the brand owners can put on the shelf. In some markets, the big retailers ARE the brand owners.”He said that 3Dis the challenge and with EskoVisualizer not only the product but all the processes are in 3D. “You can virtually hold the product in your hand.” ArtiosCad takes into account both shape and the material used in the packaging. Material strength and thickness are important environment parameters. There is a swatch library for materials that can be used to visually demonstrate the effects of various processes on the materials and there is a colour library. Effects include “Eckart” metallic ink embossing with real-time feedback of various processes on different substrates.
The super-realistic packaging design can be exported to a 3D pdf for a virtual 3D proof. It can even be superimposed in a digitised retail space to see the effect of the package on the shelf environment. EskoArtwork is working on visualization software for flexible packaging that will show pillow, gusseted and stand-up pouches and how their shapes are altered from let’s say the filling machine.
Adegeest could have continued demonstrating all night but he relented, and almost at the end he said, “We want to bring a new dimension to packaging design and preproduction.” He says that the fourth dimension is materials and the effects of the interactions between different materials. “We can demonstrate the added value of various materials and process chains without having to go through the physical proof.” |
