When I was a corporate print buyer, managing production details for shareholder reports and prospectuses kept me hopping. My projects were traditional ink-on-paper pieces - millions of them in an average month.

Honest to Pete, I thought that work was exciting and challenging - until I learned about firms that specialize in large-format visual communications. You know who I mean - those really cool places that produce custom, large-format graphics for way-out applications, like:

Building wraps Vehicle wraps Floor graphics Digital wallpaper

Fabric banners Wall murals Tradeshow graphics Exterior signage

One such company is DGI-Invisuals, located not far from me in Burlington, MA. DGI-I was an exhibitor at our annual print buyers conference last September, and recently I took a tour of their offices.

If you've never been to such a facility, let me tell you, it knocks your socks off. This is not your typical print shop. Heck, you wouldn't call it a print shop: it's a whole different kind of visual production facility.

To try and get my head around the types of issues a large-format production facility deals with, I interviewed Sylvia E. Mauro, Manager of Customer Service.

Wall Murals and Jumbotrons

It's difficult to get a simple answer, I learned, because every project presents its own challenges. So Sylvia gave me a "for instance." They handled a major project for the women's final four basketball championship one year. Their work included wall murals, putting graphics on interior and exterior concrete poles, welcome banners and escalator signs at local hotels, table top signs and fabric table drapes at Boston's Logan Airport, branding the entire Garden with graphics for the NCAA (including banners hanging from the rafters), wrapping the jumbotron scoreboard, and swapping out all existing advertisements with NCAA signs. DGI-I also produced outdoor transportation shuttle signs, retractable bannerstands, bus wraps, and more.

They had to measure every location where every graphic would be located. In fact, many of the details they typically need from clients have nothing to do with printing. They ask lots of questions when planning outdoor installations, including the need for special permits and (possibly) police details.

DGI-I handled production for South Station Domination in South Boston. "Station Domination" means a single advertiser buys the rights to display their message(s) on every media space in a single train or subway station. This was a huge undertaking. They had to arrange to get lifts into South Station, for example. They also had to make plans to get into the station at 4 am. This isn't the stuff of your average print shop.

The company does a lot of wall murals as well. I learned that when they create wall murals for hospitals, they must send samples to the fire chemists at the particular hospital for testing ahead of time.

Last summer, DGI-I wrapped 140 vehicles for a special project. Although the motif was the same, they had to measure every unique make and model before creating and applying the wraps.

Guys Who Work with Knives

As I took the tour, what struck me was how atypical the workforce was. There were specialty technicians and engineers on staff. There were people who sew and "guys who work with knives."

Why, they even have their very own "Mr. Wizard." This is Jim Faye, who, according to Sylvia, can "take anything apart and put it back together flawlessly." Another colleague has the unique talent of taking the Beaufort scale (which calculates wind speed) into consideration when he creates custom fixtures for outdoor banners and installation. Product specialist and Production Manager Glen Fairbanks takes lots into consideration when determining product choice, such as how long the piece needs to be up and what conditions it will be exposed to, what is the viewing distance, how will it be installed, what material will lend itself to the design of the piece, how will it be shipped, etc.

One project you don't come across everyday involved wrapping a CT scan machine in such a way as to make it kid-friendly.

DGI-Invisuals would love to give you a tour. They have 30,000 square feet filled with exciting samples of their work. It's as entertaining a tour as it is educational. I dare you not to have a blast there.

Visit their web site at www.dgi-invisuals.com. Check out some great resources on the site - like design templates (for table skirts, bannerstands, and popup trade show booths), file setup guides (check out the guidelines for vehicle wraps), a proportion calculator, and a dpi calculator, too. These are all under the Support tab.

As nice as their web site is, it can't do their facility justice. It's rather spectacular seeing final pieces that are massive and eye catching. I felt like I was in a design museum. Go visit if you get a chance. Tell them Margie sent you.