Unique 3D RELIEF Effects for Premium New Thread

Oberthur Fiduciaire has launched a technology for threads in the form of RELIEF™ – which offers striking bas-relief 3D effects in what the company terms a major advance in security features for threads and unlike anything else on the market.

The visual effects of RELIEF are equivalent to those of the latest SPARK Flow® Dimension – creating the impression of visual tactility, ie. an image or effect that appears to project beyond the surrounding surface, that does not actually exist.

Unlike SPARK, however, the effect is not created through the alignment of pigments using magnetics, but through the printing process itself, and specifically through liquid crystal inks, the molecules of which have very specific optical properties. It is by manipulating and layering these optical properties that the 3D effects, which are essentially a contrast between light and shadow, are created, along with vibrant colour shift.

According to Oberthur Fiduciaire, rather like for penicillin or radioactivity, the technology that led to the development of RELIEF threads came about by accident. It was discovered while conducting advanced and sophisticated research as part of their ongoing R&D efforts, when a 3D image of their engineer's fingerprint unexpectedly materialised in a 3D relief effect. It then took them more than three years to transform this early stage discovery into the highly secure durable 3D effect of the thread samples available today.

Because the process is based on inks alone, smaller features can be created – enabling threads as narrow as 3mm wide to utilise the technology, albeit that the company recommends widths of 4mm and wider for the best effects.

Moreover, no metals are involved. And whilst the appearance has all the hallmarks of embossing, that process isn’t involved either. As such, the technology supports Oberthur Fiduciaire’s Earth 365 philosophy of environmentally-sustainable products and production – metallisation, demetallisation and embossing all having a high impact on the environment. RELIEF products are also thinner than alternatives and can easily be recycled. Finally, they are produced at the company’s facility in Rennes which uses 100% renewable energy.

Five colour variations are currently available (blue-to-purple, green-to-blue, gold-to-green, orange-green and red-to-green), although more colour options are in the pipeline.

RELIEF threads can incorporate machine read features such as magnetics and Cleartext, and can be overprinted and/or varnished without any degradation of the image or colour quality.

In addition to threads, the company has also developed (albeit not yet launched), RELIEF stripes and patches that can be applied with or without a transparent window to optimise the display area.

Commenting on the launch, Etienne Couëlle, Managing Director of Oberthur Fiduciaire, said: ‘RELIEF is a brand new premium effect that offers the broadest range of design options and is fit for all denominations. It will be as revolutionary as the holographic and later moving effects were, in the 1990s and early 2000s’ respectively’.