WO2004101210A1

WO2004101210A1 - Method for producing a laser marking on reflective material

Info

Publication number: WO2004101210A1
Application number: PCT/CN2004/000406
Authority: WO
Inventors: Kam Fuk Derek Ip
Original assignee: Merit Corporation Limited
Priority date: 2003-04-25
Filing date: 2004-04-26
Publication date: 2004-11-25
Also published as: CN1539589A; CN100421966C; EP1618983B1; EP1618983A1; HK1087058A1; DE602004019773D1; ATE424306T1; EP1618983A4; US20060213871A1

Abstract

The invention relates to a method for producing a laser marking on reflective material, wherein on the same marking there are plurality of images that can be observed in different visual angles. The method includes the following steps: directing a beam of laser light in one angle of incidence to selectively vaporize every component and make blurring effect on one side of the reflective material; directing a beam of laser light in another angle of incidence to selectively vaporize every component and make blurring effect on another side of the reflective material. Due to the different reflectivity of the blurring side and non-blurring side, each of the sides forms dark spots and bright spots on the reflective material, wherein the dark spots and bright spots constitute the images. In this way described above, the plurality of sides can be used to record and show different images on the same reflective material. The method can make use of the reflective material that is commercially available, common computers and laser scanning devices that can be adopted by medium and miniature firms to increase the quality and reduce the cost of the laser marking. The laser marking has high optical effects and is difficult to imitate.

Description

Processing method of laser mark on reflective material TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention relates to a method for processing visible marks on a reflective material with a laser, and more particularly to a method for processing a plurality of images located on the same laser mark on a reflective material of a base object, which can only be observed from different angles. Background technique

In addition to having a certain visual beauty, a certain degree of durability, and more importantly, it is necessary to prevent imitation by others. Therefore, at present, some famous brand products use laser marking, which is very difficult to make, that is, laser-made patterns and text on the off-the-shelf reflective materials. In order to be able to undergo multiple washings with the garment, the laser marking used on the garment is generally a reflective material such as a cloth base or a plastic film base.

It can be seen from FIG. 1 that generally commercially available reflective materials 100 are composed of a substrate 11, a reflector 12, and a support layer 13 that fixes the reflectors on the substrate; the substrate 11 may be cloth, paper, or a plastic film; the reflector 12 may be a spherical transparent object. When the reflector is spherical, the reflector can only refract light, and the true reflection (light) effect is performed by the support layer. In the structure shown in Figure 1, incident light from any direction is reflected from the original direction.

The reflection effect of the polygonal reflector 14 in FIG. 2 is different from that of the sphere 12. The reflector 14 shown in the figure is a tetrahedron, which is completely dependent on the total reflection of the light incident perpendicular to a facet in the polyhedron. Still emitted from this incident surface. Therefore, the reflection mechanism in Figures 1 and 2 is completely different. The use of lasers to process visible signs on reflective materials has a long history. For example, in US 6,231,196 B1, filed in 1997, the laser beam was simply used to correlate the reflective material. Part of the reflective material is vaporized, resulting in a dark patterned logo in a bright background. The method proposed in US 6,217,175 B1 filed in 1998 is more advanced than the above method One step is to burn the bottom of the spherical reflector at the relevant part of the reflective material with a laser beam, so that observers perpendicular to the plane of the reflective material can see the dark pattern text, while observers at a certain angle from the vertical direction only You can see the bright background without any pattern text.

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of the light reflecting principle after the bottom of the spherical reflector 12 in the prior art is burned down. It can be seen from FIG. 3 that the bottom of the sphere 12 is made into a plane, and of course, there is no supporting layer for reflecting. Therefore, when the incident light is perpendicular to the incident of the reflective material, there is no reflection. The observer cannot see the reflected light in a certain range, so he sees a dark pattern text. The figure shows that the range is 30 °, and the angle is determined by the diameter of the plane. Depending on the size. However, when looking beyond this range, because the plane has no effect at this angle, the pattern text cannot be seen, only a bright background. Therefore, the essential content of the prior art is only to destroy the reflection characteristics of the bottom of the spherical reflector 12, that is, the first exit surface and the second incidence surface of the incident light, so that the incident light cannot be reflected. Since each circular reflector 12 has only one bottom, the prior art method can only make at most one mark on the same spherical reflector 12.

The above-mentioned first prior art logo is too simple to be easily copied by others. In addition, when the laser beam perpendicular to the reflective material vaporizes the reflective material in the relevant part, it is easy to hurt the bare supporting substrate around the reflective material. And this method is just the same as etched marks on the surface of the dishes, there is no special optical effect. Although the second prior art described above has a certain degree of optical effect, it can only be used for spherical reflectors and cannot be used for polygonal reflectors. In addition, it is inconvenient to process the bottom of the spherical reflector of the ready-made opaque substrate reflective material into a flat surface, which will damage the original substrate of the reflective material. Therefore, this method cannot be adopted by small and medium-sized manufacturers purchasing off-the-shelf reflective materials. More importantly, this method does not make full use of the structural characteristics of reflective materials, so the difficulty required for imitation is not high. Summary of the Invention

The object of the present invention is to provide a simple laser mark processing method for ready-made reflective materials, which not only eliminates the difficulty of using existing ready-made reflective materials, but also makes it difficult to use the ready-made reflective materials. Disadvantages also eliminate the disadvantages of the prior art that can only be used for spherical reflectors, and also eliminate the disadvantages of the optical effects and imitation difficulties of the prior art that are not high enough, so that ordinary commodity manufacturers only need to purchase ready-made reflectors. Materials can design and produce laser marks with high optical effects and high imitation difficulty.

The object of the present invention can be achieved by the following measures:

A method for processing a laser mark on a reflective material is to prepare the laser mark that can display a pattern to be processed on the reflective material to which a plurality of reflectors are fixed, characterized in that the method is: The laser beam selectively scans and irradiates the reflector at an angle of incidence according to the pattern, so that the irradiated surface is vaporized to form a hairy surface, and the surfaces of the remaining unirradiated reflectors are non-hairy, so that when When the laser mark is viewed in the direction of the incident angle, the pattern formed by combining the dark spots and the bright spots formed by the hairy surface and the non-hairy surface may be displayed thereon.

In this processing method, a laser beam is first scanned at an angle of incidence to obliquely scan one side of the selected group of reflectors, so that the irradiated surface is vaporized to form a plurality of first hairy surfaces, and then the laser beam is made. The other side of the selected group of reflectors is scanned obliquely at another incident angle, so that the irradiated surface is vaporized to form a plurality of second hairy surfaces; the first hairy surface and the first hairy surface are correspondingly formed. The two hairy surfaces do not completely overlap; the remaining non-irradiated surfaces are non-hairy surfaces, so that when the laser marks are viewed in the directions of the two incident angles, respectively, the corresponding hairy and non-hairy surfaces can be displayed on the two corresponding Two patterns formed by combining dark and bright dots.

The angle of incidence can be selected from the range of 10 ° to 80 °.

The angles of the two incident angles are the same.

The angles of the two incident angles are different.

The method further comprises obliquely scanning the laser beam to irradiate one side of the selected nth group of reflectors at an nth incident angle, so that the irradiated surface is vaporized to form a plurality of n-th hairy surfaces accordingly; The n-th hairy surface, the first hairy surface, and the second hairy surface do not completely overlap each other; the remaining unirradiated surfaces are non-hairy surfaces, so when the laser marks are viewed along the directions of the n incident angles, respectively , Which can respectively display the combination of the dark and bright spots formed by the above hairy surface and non-hairy surface, respectively. N specific patterns; where n is an integer greater than two.

The angles of the above n incident angles are the same.

The angles of the n incident angles are different.

The reflector is spherical.

The reflector is a polyhedron.

Compared with the prior art, the present invention has the following advantages:

1. Using the method for processing a laser mark on a reflective material according to the present invention, multiple patterns can be formed on the same reflective material by using the structural characteristics of the reflective material, so that when the observer observes the laser mark, different angles can be seen at different angles. Image.

2. With the method of the present invention, a commercially available reflective material can be used, and both a spherical reflector and a polyhedron reflector can be used.

3. The laser mark prepared by the method of the invention has good optical effect and high imitation difficulty. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

1 is a cross-sectional view of a known reflective material using a spherical reflector;

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of light reflection in a known reflective material using a polygon reflector;

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of the light reflection after the bottom of the prior art spherical reflector is burned down;

FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of a laser beam firing a mark on a reflective material according to the method of the present invention; FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of a laser beam incident angle selected for processing by the method of the present invention; and

Fig. 6 is the best observation method of the laser mark made by the method of the present invention. detailed description

FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram of the method of the present invention when a laser beam is used to burn a mark on a reflective material. Although the spherical reflector 12 is shown in FIG. 4, the effect on the reflector 14 in the shape of a polyhedron is exactly the same. The laser beam used can illuminate at least a range of a spherical surface of a reflector. The processing laser beam of the present invention shown in FIG. 4 does not strike the reflector 12 in a direction perpendicular to the bottom of the reflector, Instead, the first incident surface at the upper part of the reflector 12 is irradiated at a certain angle, that is, any angle of incidence between 10 ° and 80 °, so that the surface generates minute vaporization hairs, so the incident light is scattered or Refracted in multiple directions so as not to reflect in the direction of incidence; when viewed in the direction of this angle of incidence, the surface of the gasified hair is a dark spot, and other unilluminated reflectors are bright spots. The advantage of the laser beam obliquely illuminating the reflector is that there are at least two irradiated surfaces BD and AC on the same spherical reflector 12 that are not completely covered with each other, where the arc surface CD is a part of each other and the arc surfaces BC and AD are not Part, so two different signs can be made. Firstly, a laser at a certain angle of incidence is used to selectively vaporize one side of each group of hair-forming reflectors, and then a laser at another angle of incidence is used to selectively vaporize the other side of the hair-generating groups of reflectors. The reflectivity is different from the non-matte surface and forms dark and bright spots. Many dark and bright spots with different densities form the picture. Therefore, more than one surface can be used to record and reflect different images on the same reflector. .

In addition, a group of reflectors can be selected according to the pattern of the laser mark, and then the surface of the group of reflectors is irradiated with laser light from one direction at an incident angle, and a combination of a hairy surface and a non-hairy surface can be formed. Another image pattern is formed.

Thereby, a plurality of images located on the same laser mark but only observable from different angles can be processed by using a laser on the reflective material.

By analogy, as long as the reflector does not have a matte surface, theoretically, many different patterns can be made, but the resolution is low.

If the reflector is polyhedron-shaped, the number of marks that can be made on the same sheet of reflective material will be more, because of the different poses of each polyhedron, but of course the brightness and contrast will be worse.

FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of an incident angle of a processing laser beam selected by the method of the present invention. Five spherical reflectors 12-1, 12-2, 12-3, 12-4, and 12-5 are drawn from right to left in FIG. The upper half of the sphere 12-2 is irradiated with laser beams incident from the right and left at an angle of 30 ° each. As can be seen from the figure, in the upper right half of the sphere, only the lowest light from the right An arc between the intersection A of the ball 12-2 and the highest ray from the left and the tangent point D of the ball 12-2 is not affected by the two groups of light Lines are irradiated together. That is, this curved surface is processed only by the light from the right. In the same way, the ball 12-3 is the result that the incident angles of the left and right rays of light are each 45 °, and the ball 12-4 is the incident angle of the left and right rays of 60 °. It can be seen that the larger the incident angle is, the larger the non-overlapping area of the left and right rays, that is, the larger the AD arc surface, but the larger the area that cannot be irradiated. The sphere 12-5 is a result of the incident angle of the light from the right being 30 ° and the incident angle of the light from the left being 60 °. Although the upper right half of the ball 12-5 (ie, a quarter arc) has the largest non-overlapping area AD, there is no non-overlapping surface in the upper left half. Therefore, if the incident angle of the laser is 45 ° on the left and right, the best resolution can be obtained for the left and right marks. Of course, for reasons such as confidentiality, the use of laser beams with different incidence angles on the left and right can increase the difficulty of imitation by others.

Although the overlapping surfaces of the left and right rays of each ball on the top of the ball in Figure 5 are large, because when the light enters the glass-like medium at a large incident angle, a large amount of light will be reflected out, and only a small amount will be incident, so in fact The phenomenon of left and right light overlapping is not as serious as the icon.

Both the laser and the computer used to implement the method of the present invention are current technologies. For example, the laser generator can use devices such as neodymium-yttrium aluminum garnet (NdYAG), carbon dioxide (C02) or semiconductor-pumped lasers. To control the laser generating device and the laser reflection scanning device. Commercially available tapes of reflective material are generally rolled, and the tape can be scanned by laser scanning while the tape passes through the processing site using an intermittent tape winding device. When a laser beam of appropriate intensity scans each group of reflectors 12 or 14 in sequence at a certain angle, the side on which the group of reflectors is irradiated will generate corresponding vaporization hairs, so that the group of reflectors are scanned at this angle. It appears as a dark spot when observed. The groups of reflectors that were not scanned are still a bright spot. Many dark and bright dots of different densities make up a picture. In order to increase the production speed, it is better to use one laser device for each of the left and right light sources. When the area of the logo is 1.5 cm high and 5.0 cm wide, and the laser energy is 10 watts, it only takes 30 seconds to scan and process. This is only an experimental data of the present invention. In fact, the processing time will vary due to the nature of the reflective material used, the complexity of the pattern, the type of laser, the angle of the incident light, and so on.

When inspecting or observing the laser mark 100 made by the method of the present invention, regardless of the illumination light Still the observer must shoot / look at the mark 100 in the direction of processing to get the clearest image, as shown in FIG. 6. For example, the image on the right side of the laser sign of the present invention in FIG. 6 is made by scanning at an angle of incidence of 60 °, so when viewing, the illumination light (shown by a flashlight in the figure) and the observer (shown by the human eye in the figure) The best results can only be seen in the direction of 60 ° incident angle. The image on the left in Figure 6 was made with a 30 ° incident angle scan, so be sure to illuminate and observe at 30 ° incident angle like the icon to see the best results. In FIG. 6, the images presented in the bright background viewed from two different directions are completely different, for example, text is seen in one direction, and patterns are seen in the other direction.

The angles of incidence described herein all refer to the acute angle between the direction of the incident light and the direction perpendicular to the plane of the reflective material. Industrial applicability

By adopting the method for processing a laser mark on a reflective material according to the present invention, multiple patterns can be formed on the same reflective material by using the structural characteristics of the reflective material, so that an observer can see different images at different angles when observing the laser mark; This method can use off-the-shelf commercially available reflective materials, and can use both spherical and polyhedral reflectors. The laser mark prepared by the method of the invention has good optical effect and high imitation difficulty.

Claims

Rights request

1. A method for processing a laser mark on a reflective material, wherein the laser mark capable of displaying a pattern to be processed is prepared on the reflective material to which a plurality of reflectors are fixed, characterized in that the method is: The laser beam is selectively scanned and irradiated at an angle of incidence according to the pattern to irradiate the reflector, so that the irradiated surface is vaporized to form a hairy surface, and the surfaces of the remaining unirradiated reflectors are non-hairy, so that When the laser mark is viewed in the direction of the incident angle, the pattern formed by combining the dark and bright spots formed on the hair-producing surface and the non-hair-producing surface may be displayed thereon.

2. The processing method according to claim 1, characterized in that the laser beam is scanned at an angle of incidence to one side of the selected group of reflectors at an angle of incidence, so that the irradiated surface is uniformly vaporized. A plurality of first hairy surfaces are formed, and then the laser beam is scanned obliquely at another incident angle to irradiate the other side of the selected group of reflectors, so that the irradiated surface is vaporized to form a plurality of second Hairy surface; the first hairy surface and the second hairy surface do not completely overlap; the remaining non-irradiated surface is a non-hairy surface, so when the laser marks are viewed along the two incident angle directions, respectively, The two patterns formed by the combination of the dark spots and the bright spots formed by the above hair-producing and non-hair-producing surfaces can be displayed separately.

3. The processing method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the angle of the incident angle is selected from a range of 10 ° to 80 °.

4. The processing method according to claim 2, wherein the angles of the two incident angles are the same.

5. The processing method according to claim 2, wherein the angles of the two incident angles are different.

6. The processing method according to claim 2, further comprising: making the laser beam obliquely scan and irradiate one side of the selected nth group of reflectors at an nth incident angle, so that The irradiated surface is vaporized and a plurality of n-th hairy surfaces are formed correspondingly; The uniform rough surface and the second roughened surface do not completely overlap each other; the remaining non-irradiated surfaces are non-frosted surfaces, so that when the laser marks are viewed in the directions of the n incident angles, respectively, the above-mentioned causes can be displayed thereon. N patterns composed of matt and non-matt surfaces corresponding to dark and light dots; where n is an integer greater than 2.

7. The processing method according to claim 6, wherein the angles of the n incident angles are the same.

8. The processing method according to claim 6, wherein the angles of the n incident angles are different.

9. The processing method according to claim 1, wherein the reflector is spherical.

10. The processing method according to claim 1, wherein the reflector is a polyhedron.