Lasers are needed to take the images used in constructing he hologram – in fact two laser beams are used in conjunction with a photographic plate – these combined images are then viewable as a hologram using normal light.  One laser beam hits the object from the side while the other hits the object from the front – the photographic plate collects both reflected images so the image collected is actually a dual-image on one photographic plate – this creates the holographic effect.

If this seems complicated, it’s because it is – and this is why hologram stickers are such an excellent security device – they are so very difficult to reproduce by counterfeiters.  If you wish to instill confidence in your customers that the products you are supplying to market are in fact made by you and covered by your warranties and guarantees, then a hologram sticker with your logo and brand stamped on them are an excellent way to do this.

So secure are hologram stickers that they are incorporated into credit and debit cards as well as formal identification cards used by companies and government agencies.  While hologram stickers are more expensive to produce and source than ordinary labels and stickers, the costs is still not prohibitive because modern print technology is capable of rendering the pieces at a very cost-effective price.  You can order hologram stickers in relatively small print runs but you will benefit from much greater cost efficiencies if you order larger print runs for the stickers.

Other hologram sticker applications include:

• Quality control marks on items which contain intellectual or performance property such as software, film and audio;
• Asset tracking labels to demonstrate ownership and equipment information (especially when combined with barcode tags);
• Tamper proof evidence by preventing sensitive items such as medication or baby foods from being opened or if they are opened, the end-user will have visual evidence of tampering;
• Vehicle registration and parking rights;
• Concert and event ticket anti-counterfeiting measures;
• Confidential document protection;
• Clothing hang tags;
• Original equipment manufacturer marks (OEM) for use in a wide range of applications including car and aircraft parts as well as widely used in software packaging; and
• Lottery ticket scratch cards.

Hologram labels lend themselves to a wide range of creative uses so it is simple to incorporate your brand name and logo or other customized design into the finished product.  Using hologram labels in connection with your branding lends a degree of unique differentiation to help your company products be more readily identifiable in the minds of the buying public and to get the most out of hologram labels you should consult with a print and design partner who is experienced in designing and producing them.

A hologram is created by capturing the light reflected from an object and reconstructing it so the subject appears to move relative to the position of the viewer of the hologram.  This is what makes a hologram appear 3-dimensional but in fact it is not, it is a 2-dimensional representation just as an ordinary photograph.

In 1947, Hungarian physicist, Gabor Denes (known as Dennis Gabor in English) was playing in his lab with the results of pioneering technological advances dealing with the development of the electron microscope.  Dennis Gabor was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics for his discovery but he had to wait until 1971 to receive the recognition he deserved.

The discovery was made in England at the commercial lab of British Thomas-Houston who filed a patent back in 1947, however the holographic light/optical technique did not attain any commercial significance until the development of the laser in 1960.  With the invention of the laser, 3-dimensional objects were then able to be made and the technique was first discovered in 1962 by two sets of teams – one in Soviet Russia led by Yuri Denisyuk and in the US, led by Juris Upatnieks.

The initial holograms required illumination using the polarized light provided by a laser which severely restricted the use of the hologram.  With the development of “Rainbow Transmission” holograms, ordinary white-light sources could be used to create the 3-dimensional replication and this opened the door to using holograms in everyday life.  The holograms you see on credit cards and as security tags on product packaging are of this type.  The rainbow transmission technique uses a surface print on a plastic film which is then backed by an aluminum mirror-coating to provide the backlight source of illumination – this is what creates the 3-dimensional image appear.

A refinement of the rainbow transmission hologram is the “reflection” or “Denisyuk” hologram.  Here a multi-color image is reproduced and a white-light source from the same side of the viewer is only needed – this removes the need for the backlight coating which increases the cost of producing the hologram.

While static 3-dimensional images can be reproduced on a 2-dimensional medium, the science fiction concept of a 3-dimensional image being projected into a space is not yet with us.  The ability to replicate a 3-dimensional image into a space holds a lot of attraction for television and film but while plenty of effort has been going into creating a 3-dimensional viewing experience, the reality is that this holographic development is still science fiction and not science fact.  The 2008 holographic projection of CNN reporter Jessica Yellin during the Presidential elections last year may have given the impression of a hologram projection into space but in fact there was a merging of a video feed from the reporter which was then combined with the video feed created in the studio.  In other words, it was a cheat, but still gave a good indication of the possibility of 3-d holographic movies and television may be able to bring to the movie theater or your living room within the next few years.

Labeling provides a key weapon in the war against the imitators as packaging is one of the hardest things for a counterfeiter to replicate.

Holograms provide a great way of ensuring the product is genuine as they are exceptionally difficult to replicate; so useful and effective are holograms than many currency notes in circulation overseas use holographic images as part of the overall design – something actively being considered by the U.S. Treasury in the war on counterfeit money operations.  A drawback of holograms is that they can still be stolen as a separate item of value in themselves and many counterfeit DVD operations in the Far East have found ways to actively source holographic stickers or in fact replicate them to an acceptable standard.

Luckily, there have been significant advances in the development of digital printing and colored inks which have been combined with barcode technology to provide an extra layer of differentiation as well as carrying important information about the history of the product package.

Color barcode labels have been actively developed by HP with several pharmaceutical companies who have been looking at ways to ensure the end-user readily sees the medicines they are using are genuine and also are able to access vital information concerning that batch of medicine product.  In some instances, the ability to trust the “medication” is a matter of life and death with an enormous black market for illicit, counterfeit medications.

Before you think this is an issue which affects only the undeveloped world consider that one Viagra pill was selling for over $100 on the black market when the drug was initially launched and only available after an exhaustive medical screening session.

Beating the counterfeiters is a seriously thorny issue!

Hoodia Gordonii was the diet supplement extracted from a cactus which only grew in a specific and restricted location in East Africa and was subject to very strict certification standards but at one point it was thought that over 75% of the supplement was actually counterfeit goods.  These two examples alone have resulted in billions of dollars of sales to unwitting consumers – a direct loss to the manufacturers and the consumer.