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ing. What's more, print providers have a unique opportunity to be involved in and profit from this swiftly evolving sector. Functional characteristics According to Shu Chang, Melbert B. Cary Jr. Distinguished Professor in the School of Media Sciences, College of Imaging Arts and Sciences at Rochester Institute of Technology, most people are familiar with the term 3D printing, in which print technology is used to build an object that is three-dimensional in nature. This technology also is known under other names, such as additive manufacturing and solid free-form fab- rication. "Functional printing can be three- dimensional or two-dimensional," she said. "Functional printing's goal is to bring a functionality to what you pro- duce. That's why printed electronics and RFID are applications of functional print- ing. [Functional printing] is an umbrella term. In a way, 3D printing is functional printing, but not all 3D printing is func- tional." Functional printing can be used to produce lenticular lenses, sensors or solar cells, as well as QR codes and bar codes, Chang said. "It could be visible or invisible, but it must have a functional characteristic to be functional printing," she added. Many companies are engaged in func- tional printing. "The field is very, very diverse," Chang said. "It is so new that there are no real industry leaders. [The company called] 3D Systems is among the larger companies in the field." The Innovator's Perspective The field of functional printing is the focus of two groups of stakeholders, who are approaching the discipline from two different perspectives, Chang said. One group of stakeholders is comprised of engineers and innovators, while the other group is made up of digital printers. The group consisting of engineers and innovators is probing a number of ways in which printing technology can be used as a means of producing objects. They have broken printing technology down and replaced certain aspects of the technology with different substances and approaches. For instance, using inkjet technology, they can replace the dies in inks with particles. Instead of the ink serving as the carrier for dies, it carries particles that are the building materials for objects. "The particles can be silver or copper, for instance, to make conduc- tive tracks in printed electronics," Chang reported. In another approach, inkjet technology is used to jet out not inks but glues or adhesives. "They have a bed, where they put a layer of particles, then add glue to [the particles], then put down another layer of particles and add glue to that to produce an object that is three-dimen- sional," she said. "In this approach, they can use plastics, ceramics, or metals." A third way the innovation community is using printing technology is by extrud- ing very fine material, in much the way toothpaste might be pushed from a tube or substances from a syringe. By extrud- ing "a fine, molten material like plastics, you can also build three-dimensional objects," Chang explained. "In all three examples I've given, digi- tal technology is used to determine the forms these objects will take. Through functional printing, you have forms and functions. Some people call it additive manufacturing because you add materi- als to form the object. In traditional man- ufacturing, you take some of the material away through lathes or mills or cutting. You change the form of the object from one to another [by] removing materials in subtractive manufacturing. "In additive manufacturing, you cre- ate an object from nothing to a form. In A p r i l 2 0 1 4 / Q U I C K P R I N T I N G 19 w w w. M y P R I N T R e s o u r c e . c o m As its entry into functional printing, Kodak is focused on several touch-sensor metal mesh film solutions, including touchscreens (shown), through key partnerships. (continued on page 35) QP_18-19_0414 Functional.indd 19 3/18/14 3:49 PM