They took the scheme and wrapped it around lights, doors, windows, and wings-tucking, pinching, altering, and fitting the graphics onto the aircraft with precision. Still part of the livery team, this group understands each measurable surface of every commercial aircraft exterior. While our livery designers focus on composing and illustrating graphics, Teague’s Catia designers step in for engineering. Once Alaska Airlines picked a final design, we quickly pivoted from conceptual to concrete. Each one from a different Teague designer, each showcasing a unique composition, each a standout. For a month, Alaska considered three final concepts. We created gorgeous concepts of all things orca, ranging from tribal to modern, abstract to representational. Our livery designers went to work, grabbing pencils, mouses, and styluses. The result was beautiful and fast it took just 12 hours to print both sides of the tail, a quick job compared to the many days and large crew it would take to hand paint such a design.īecause the new printing technology was designed for the tail, fuselage graphics would still have to be hand-painted by Boeing’s talented paint crew, requiring a new Teague illustration that had to pair perfectly with the printed photo. The half breaching mammal was revealed line by line. The Boeing printer was then mounted, turned on, and left to work its magic. After mocking up a selection of photos on Alaska planes, a vertically posed orca photo taken by Jane Cogan, a retired Boeing engineer who volunteers with the Center for Whale Research on San Juan Island, was chosen and sized to fit a 24-foot tall vertical stabilizer. Together our teams decided a photograph would best showcase the color blending capabilities of the inkjet printer. For thousands of years, the orca whale has been revered as a symbol of the West Coast and considered a guardian of the sea, a protector of humans, and an icon of power. After many reviews, Alaska decided their 737 should pay tribute to the mighty orca. Our designers came up with ideas ranging from West Coast birds, orcas, the northern lights, and even an octopus illustrating with its own squirted ink. So, when asked to design graphic concepts, we jumped at the chance to pilot the new technology. Teague has collaborated with Boeing for 76 years and Alaska Airlines for 20+. Alaska liked ideas that highlighted the surroundings of their headquarters in the Pacific Northwest. Boeing wanted ideas that could show off the benefits of inkjet technology. Alaska agreed, and talk turned to graphics. It sat waiting in an airplane hangar as Boeing began talks with Alaska Airlines, asking if the airline would be the first to try out their first-of-its-kind printer. The canvas: a white 737 vertical stabilizer, i.e., a plane’s tail. In 2019 they were ready to pilot a new direct-to-shape 3D inkjet printer backed by 120 patents. And instead of taking days to paint, any design could be printed in a matter of hours.Īlways the innovator, Boeing set out to develop a custom printer capable of producing large-scale images. On the other hand, with a printer, anything goes. Extra layout, more spray time, and additional drying cycles equate to more hours and more money. This means no fades, no color blending think paint by numbers, but with fewer colors. On a traditionally painted livery, each color is sprayed from a paint gun separately and by hand. What if you could print graphics directly onto an airplane? Livery graphics are usually hand painted. But what if you could print graphics directly onto an airplane? In rare instances, they’re printed on decals. Post-design process, these graphics are usually hand painted. Teague has a livery team whose sole purpose is to partner with airlines around the world to design and wrap such schemes. Liveries are graphic schemes applied to the exteriors of airplanes. Still, chances are pretty high you’ve seen one-which means it’s likely you’ve seen a livery designed by Teague. You may have never flown on a commercial airplane.
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