Fleeting Image kicks a goal with 6-metre soccer ball
Performing better than the national team, Melbourne signage company, Fleeting Image, has scored well with a six-metre soccer ball on display in the city.
The ball has been erected outside of Crown Towers on Melbourne’s Southbank. Inside the ball is a fully contained apartment where the winner of the competition to watch all the matches will live for the duration of the Cup.
Produced on the HP Designjet L25500 with HP latex inks the 50 metres of vinyl required for the job was printed in sections according to John Evans, managing director of Fleeting Image.
“We had to be very exact with this job on number of levels. Firstly we had to match the corporate colours of FIFA and Adidas. That was critical. But we had no issues achieving the right colours with the HP Designjet and the latex inks, which are fantastic. Then we had to print the graphics in sections,” he said.
Laid out on the factory floor the pattern looked relatively simply, but Evans found that the challenge really began when he and his team began to cover the ball.
“Wrapping a round object and ensuring there are no bubbles or glitches in the seams is difficult enough, but when the object is six metres in diameter and you are up on scaffolding and the weather turns against you, it becomes very tricky,” Evans said.
On the day the ball was to be covered, Evans and his team battled gusty winds up to 55mph and attempted to cover the ball in between rain showers. “We had to keep wiping down the ball before we could put the vinyl on. In retrospect we must have been quite a sight, hanging onto the scaffolding so as not to be blown off, and manoeuvring these larges sheets of vinyl, but we got there,” he said.
