Lenticular Card Views

Home, Garden & Pets

There are many commercial end uses for lenticular images, which can be made from PVC, APET, acrylic, and PETG, as well as other materials. While PETG and APET are the most common, other materials are becoming popular to accommodate outdoor use and special forming due to the increasing use of lenticular images on cups and gift cards. Lithographic lenticular printing allows for the flat side of the lenticular sheet to have ink placed directly onto the lens, while high-resolution photographic lenticulars typically have the image laminated to the lens.

Recently, large format (over 2m) lenticular images have been used in bus shelters and movie theaters. These are printed using an oversized lithographic press. Many advances have been made to the extrusion of lenticular lens and the way it is printed which has led to a decrease in cost and an increase in quality. Lenticular images have recently seen a surge in activity, from gracing the cover of the May 2006 issue of Rolling Stone to trading cards, sports posters and signs in stores that help to attract buyers.

Lenticular images were popularized from the late 1940s to the mid 1980s by the Vari-Vue company.[3] Early products included animated political campaign badges with the slogan I Like Ike! and animated cards that were stuck on boxes of Cheerios.[3] By the late sixties the company marketed about two thousand stock products including twelve inch square moving pattern and color sheets, large images (many religious), and a huge range of novelties including badges. The badge products included the Rolling Stones' tongue logo and an early Beatles badge with pictures of the 'fab four' on a red background.

While not a true lenticular, the Dufex Process (Manufactured by F.J. Warren Ltd.)[5] does use a form of lens structure to animate the image. The process consists of a metallic foil imprinted by litho printing with the image. The foil is than laminated to a thin sheet of card stock that has had a thick layer of wax coated upon it. The heated lamination press has the Dufex embossing plate on its upper platen. The plate has been engraved with angled 'lenses' at different angles so designed as to match the artwork and reflect light at different intensities depending on angle of view.