Security Element With Gapped Absorber Layer
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing security elements with color-shift effects and optically variable features often experience reciprocal visual interference, limiting their authenticity and counterfeit security.
Innovation Solution
A security element featuring a thin-film element with an absorber layer having gaps where no color-shift effect is perceived, combined with a relief pattern arranged only below the gapped absorber layer, allowing independent perception of the color-shift and optically variable effects without interference.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If both color-shift effect and optically variable relief pattern are present in the security element, then the visual appeal and security features are enhanced, but reciprocal visual interference occurs between the two effects
Solution Approach 1:
The absorber layer is segmented into regions with different optical properties: a first region that produces color-shift effect and a second region with gaps that allows light transmission. This segmentation enables the relief pattern to be visible through the gaps without interference from the color-shift effect, while the color-shift effect remains intact in the first region.
Solution Approach 2:
Different regions of the absorber layer are assigned different local qualities: the first region has continuous absorber material for color-shift effect, while the second region has gaps for relief pattern visibility. This local differentiation allows both effects to coexist without reciprocal interference.
2Manufacturing precision
If the thin-film element is arranged in register with the relief pattern, then perfect registration is achieved, but the alignment complexity and manufacturing difficulty increase
Solution Approach 1:
The requirement for perfect registration between the thin-film element and the relief pattern is extracted and relocated to the relationship between the gaps in the absorber layer and the relief pattern. This allows the thin-film element itself to be applied without precise alignment requirements, significantly simplifying the manufacturing process.
3Illumination intensity
If the absorber layer is made continuous to enhance the color-shift effect, then the color-shift effect is strengthened, but the relief pattern becomes invisible or interfered with
Solution Approach 1:
The absorber layer is divided into a first continuous region for strong color-shift effect and a second gapped region for relief pattern visibility. This segmentation allows both functions to be optimized simultaneously without compromising either effect.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The solution enhances the visual appeal and counterfeit security by ensuring the color-shift effect and optically variable effects can be perceived independently, providing a more secure and attractive visual experience.
Implementation Method 1
it is known to use security elements having multilayer thin-film elements whose color impression for the viewer changes with the viewing angle, and when the security feature is tilted, shifts for example from green to blue, from blue to magenta or from magenta to green. The occurrence of such color changes upon tilting a security element is referred to in the following as a color-shift effect.
Implementation Method 2
the relief pattern can constitute a diffractive pattern, such as a hologram, a holographic grating image or a hologram-like diffraction pattern
Data Source
AI summary
The present invention relates to a security element (12) for protecting valuable articles, havinga thin-film element (30) that has a color-shift effect and that includes an absorber layer (36) having gaps (38) in the region of which no color-shift effect is perceptible, anda relief pattern (26) that is arranged only in gapped absorber layer regions (38) below the thin-film element (30).