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THE DPH consists of a fiber taper – fiber optics which have been evenly stretched in such a way
that they taper to become narrower and narrower in parallel, without crossing or changing position
Printing at the
speed of light
PHOTONIC IMAGING has been around for a while, but a young company is promising to unlock
new applications for the inkless printing process. David Pittman reports
LumeJet was founded in January 2010
to explore and develop commercial
opportunities for new photonic
technology developed at Warwick
University.
Photonics is the branch of technology
concerned with the properties and
transmission of photons. It was
recently identified as one of the key
enabling technologies (KET) critical
to business-led innovation by the EU
Commission’s 2020 New Horizon
program.
In terms of printing, it is a digital
process that uses LEDs to interact with
photo-activated media, as opposed to
the inkjet process, whereby ink is jetted
on to the substrate.
LumeJet’s technology originates from
a research project at Warwick University,
sponsored and initiated by Trevor
Elworthy, LumeJet CIO and founder,
which was developed into the company’s
Digital Print Head (DPH).
The DPH consists of a fiber taper – fiber
optics which have been evenly stretched
in such a way that they taper to become
narrower and narrower in parallel,
without crossing or changing position.
Light enters at one end and exits at the
other through an LED array, passing
through a lens stack and beaming a tiny
dot onto photo-sensitive media to print
inklessly.
LumeJet’s technology is tailored to
suit specific applications; the LumeJet
S200 ultra-high resolution photo printer
has a twin DPH configuration, with two
heads mounted side by side, and prints
a dot size less than 0.005mm onto color
negative roll paper. Both identical heads
have 288 LEDs, 96 calibrated for each
of the three colors – red, green and
blue (RGB). In the LumeJet S200, the
printheads are moving and traverse the
media in a single pass, edge to edge.
LumeJet has now started work on a
new system for high-speed industrial
applications for photonic printing,
such as inline labeling and packaging.
LumeBar has clusters of LEDs mounted
side by side across a static page-wide
"LumeJet describes
photonic digital printing
as fast, clean, repeatable
and micron-accurate, with
the benefit that it can be
applied to solid objects
and flexible media."
digital print bar, which will print directly
onto designated areas of photo-sensitive
media on the product as it goes past on
the production line.
LumeJet describes photonic digital
printing as fast, clean, repeatable and
micron-accurate, with the benefit that
it can be applied to solid objects and
flexible media.
Miles Bentley, LumetJet’s commercial
director, notes that photonic printing
technology has been around for a
NOVEMBER 2013 | L&L