When visitors enter the recently opened Arizona SeaLife Aquarium in Phoenix’s Arizona Mills Mall, it’s not just the 5,000 creatures on display in the attraction’s many tanks that convey the deep sea experience. Surrounding them—on walls, the ceiling, and on the tanks themselves—are more than 20,000 square feet of digital graphics of fish and the ocean floor, all produced by Paramount Promotions/Monster Color. 

 

“It was pretty much a routine job for us, but also a fun project to work on,” says owner Brad Bergamo. The local company is a full service specialist in digital design, print and production. On this project, Mutoh’s ValueJet and Blizzard inkjet printers did the lion’s share of the work. Paramount is also prepared to deliver whatever a client needs in digital graphics. The company’s equipment line-up includes a grand-format UV-curing roll-to-roll printer, an EFI-VUTEk QS 200 UV flatbed, a Mutoh Falcon II outdoor inkjet and an assortment of Mutoh and Mimaki plotter/cutters.

 

A MONSTER PROMOTION

To promote its digital capabilities, Paramount Promotions/Monster Color wrapped the outside of its building with a digitally printed mural of monsters. It’s that wrap that first caught the eye of representatives of SeaLife. At that point, in June of last year, Merlin Entertainment had just leased the space in the Arizona Mills mall for what would be its second SeaLife aquarium in the U.S. The company specializes in family entertainment attractions and operates a global network of aquariums and other entertainment destinations.

 

“One of their representatives passed by our building and was impressed with the size and the quality,” of the building wrap, recalls project manager Chris Hobbs. “They came in and talked with us about their plans and to see what we could do for the outside of their aquarium. They had painted the exteriors in the past, but it just took too long, so they already had the idea they might want to go digital.”

 

The initial order was for a barricade wall, 200' x 15', to hide the site while it was being prepared, but to also promote the venue and create some anticipation. It was printed and installed in just three days. “Once they saw those graphics, they were impressed and started talking with us about what we could do for the interior, as well,” says Hobbs.

 

Merlin’s project designer, Theo Papadopoulos, had relied on mural painters to create the themed environments for SeaLife aquariums from his designs on previous project. “With the traditional mural painted method, it’s only as good as the person painting the mural. I wouldn’t know exactly what I was going to get when I turned up onsite,” he notes.

 

The SeaLife ticket kiosk features a cylindrical display with sliding glass doors and very colorful oceanic graphics both inside and out.

He sees digital printing as a superior alternative for several reasons: its contemporary feel; more creative control; ability to produce graphics with minute details; more flexibility in scheduling; and the ability to re-use artwork, once a design is complete, in other venues.

 

WRAPPED INSIDE AND OUTSIDE

By the time the job was finally completed, Paramount/Monster Color produced an estimated 30,000 square feet of graphics, wrapping the attraction inside and out, as well and creating digitally printed displays, backgrounds and die-cut sea creatures adorning the tanks.

 

For the building exterior, one potential concern was print durability when exposed to Arizona’s harsh heat and sun. “We’d actually thought ahead about that and used our own facility to test the durability of digital prints,” says Hobbs. “The first large scale wrap we did was that monster wrap of our building with 3M’s IJ8224 textured vinyl, and it’s held up well for three years.” 

 

That graphic was produced with the Mimaki Blizzard. which figured prominently in the SeaLife project. That structure faces south and west, for maximum exposure, while the aquarium exterior faces north and east, getting much less sun and ensuring an even longer life for the image.

 

But it’s not entirely maintenance free. “The aquarium has proven to be very popular, with long lines waiting to get inside,” adds Bergamo. “The biggest problem we’ve had with that wall is that people pick at it while they wait in line. It’s more than likely we’ll have to replace some parts of it, but not because of exposure.”

 

This promotional standup display stands inside the Arizona Mills Mall, directing traffic to the nearby kiosk where patrons can purchase tickets.

Working in Merlin’s offices in England, Papadopoulos created all designs in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop, then uploaded the files to Paramount’s production department in Arizona. 

“All the themed environments are created using Illustrator,” he reports. “This has the distinct advantage of producing vector lines, giving us the flexibility to draw and scale artwork to the size we need.

 

For marketing and entrance graphics, he worked from photographs shot for this project. “We needed photo realistic images, so we used Photoshop to compile images into a high res file.”

On the American end, there were a few minor problems. “The measurements sometimes varied because they were working in metric and we’re measuring inches,” says Bergamo. “Other than that, their files were all pretty good.”

 

A SHOWCASE FOR DIGITAL

At the very outside of the building, double-sided banners measuring either eight or 20-feet long help highlight the location and attract visitors. All are mounted on spinning poles and were printed on Ultraflex banner material with the NUR Expedio 5000. The 12' x 120' exterior mural wraps the entrance and approach, with silhouettes of all types of sea creatures, set against varied blue backgrounds depicting above and below the water.

 

Once visitors step inside the aquarium, murals and images—every bit as colorful as the range of sea creatures on display—surround them on all sides. Nearly every interior surface throughout the 26,000-square-foot attraction is adorned with some type of custom-printed digital graphic. All interior wraps were printed with the Mutoh Blizzard at 720 dpi, on 3M IJ-35 media, then protected with a luster over-laminate. “There weren’t a lot of straight walls on the interior, and there were several different tanks that featured some graphics,” notes Hobbs.

 

The initial order was to wrap a 200’ x 15’ barricade wall in order to hide the construction site while the aquarium was being built—but also to promote the venue and create some anticipation.

One of the focal points of the aquarium is its 160,000-gallon shark tank, or shoaling ring, measuring 30 feet in diameter. The tank background was printed on 3M IJ-5100 for its reflective quality. “The shoaling ring tank is the only one that has a background,” says Hobbs. “It’s IJ5100 with 3M 8518 gloss lam, mounted on acrylic with 1/8" acrylic sealed over each six foot by eight foot section to keep the salt water from degrading the graphic.”

 

For the front, textured silhouettes of sea creatures were printed on 3M IJ8626 and then machine cut before being applied to the tank. The effect gives visitors the sense they are underwater, at eye level with the shark. For other tanks, images of fish and other sea creatures were printed on clear or translucent window film, then contour cut before being applied to the tanks.

 

The entire project took approximately 10 weeks. “We had a lot of man hours involved, but we were able to meet all their deadlines, so the aquarium was finished and open two weeks early,” says Hobbs. “It was a lot of work, and great way to show off all we can do with digital graphics.”

Papadopoulos describes himself as “very happy” with Paramount Promotions/Monster Color and the quality of their work, and expects to work with them again.

 

“We knew what we wanted, and they made it happen.”