Decorated beverage can tabs
A decorated tab for a beverage container has a lift end, a nose end, and central webbing. An enclosed portion of the central webbing has a coating. A symbol is located on the enclosed region which is created by selective removal of the coating by a laser ablation. The symbol has a boundary profile defining a perimeter of the symbol generated by a continuous, uninterrupted vectorized laser dot pattern defining regions of ablated coating. The symbol has an interior portion generated by a plurality of pulsed rasterized laser dots defining further regions of ablated coating.
1. A decorated tab for a beverage container comprising:
a lift end;
a nose end for contacting a tear panel on a beverage can lid opposite the lift end;
a central webbing between the lift end and the nose end, the central webbing comprising a plurality of layers;
a first layer on the central webbing of a coating;
a second layer of a reflective metal wherein the first layer is deposited on the second layer; and
a symbol on the central webbing comprising a light diffraction feature produced from a micro slit pattern in the coating directly above with the reflective metal.
2. The decorated tab of claim 1 wherein the micro slit pattern comprises a slit in the coating having a width less than 1000 nm.
3. The decorated tab of claim 1 wherein the micro slit pattern comprises a slit in the coating having a depth less than 1000 nm.
4. The decorated tab of claim 1 wherein the micro slit pattern comprises a plurality of slits formed in the coating having a depth less than 1000 nm.
5. The decorated tab of claim 1 wherein the light diffraction feature is created by selective removal of the coating by a laser ablation.
6. The decorated tab of claim 1 wherein the light diffraction feature is created by embossing the coating to produce the micro slit pattern.
7. The decorated tab of claim 1 wherein the symbol is created in under 50 milliseconds.
8. The decorated tab of claim 1 wherein the central webbing comprises an enclosed region and wherein the light diffraction feature is formed thereon.
9. A decorated tab for a beverage container comprising:
a lift end;
a nose end for contacting a tear panel on a beverage can lid opposite the lift end;
a central webbing between the lift end and the nose end;
a coating deposited on a metallic tab stock of the central webbing; and
a light diffraction feature formed on the central webbing formed from a micro slit pattern in the coating directly above the metallic tab stock of the central webbing.
10. The decorated tab of claim 9 further comprising:
a symbol on an enclosed region of the central webbing wherein the symbol comprises the light diffraction feature.
11. The decorated tab of claim 10 wherein the symbol comprises:
a first boundary profile defining a perimeter of the symbol comprising regions of ablated coating outlining the light diffraction feature; and
an interior portion comprising the light diffraction feature.