Artwork is the key to any successful screen printing operation. If you start with quality artwork, films and screens, the actual printing process is a walk in the park. We get asked all the time about artwork and outputting film positives. Some suppliers and manufacturers will tell you that a RIP program is required to produce dark black prints on film positives using an inkjet printer. This usually isn't necessary and many times you can actually produce very opaque images using standard inkjet printers and the right film.

Inkjet Printers

Not all inkjet printers are created equal. The industry standard are Epson brand printers. Epson builds reliable workhorse printers and most RIP software for screen printers are designed for use with Epson printers. Even without an Epson printer, you might be able to get similar results from following this general guide.

Epson 2200 Settings

From photoshop and with your document open, select FILE > PAGE SETUP. Next, choose the Printer... option and then Properties.... From the resulting dialog box, first ensure that you are seeing the "Advanced Settings" and select your PAPER TYPE. It is always best to choose a Photo Paper setting like Semigloss or Glossy. This will allow you to get 1400 dpi (or something close to this dpi) and it will setup the printer for handling a paper type that will take more ink.

Every printer has slightly different settings in the printer's dialog box but many Epson printers are similar to what is pictured here. Look in your printer settings for Contrast and Saturation settings and maximize these options. Also ensure that you are printing with more than just the black ink cartridge (more about this in Software Settings). By upping your saturation and contrast you will be telling the printer to load up on the ink amount for your film positive.

Some Epson printers have additional settings under Ink Config (or a similar option) that allow you to up the color density. On the Epson 2200 you can up the color density as much as 20% as you can see below. This will also help to output darker, more opaque films without the need for a RIP driver. On the 2200 there is also a setting called Drying Time per Print Page. This setting will tell the printer how long to wait between each print giving the previous print time to dry. This can help prevent your film positives from sticking together if you have to leave the room while the printer is processing a multi-color job.

Water Proof Inkjet Film

Our water proof inkjet film is a much higher quality film than standard inkjet film transparencies. Your prints will dry almost instantly on this newer type of film and last much longer. This film also resists fingerprints and dirt much better than the old style film. Water proof inkjet film accepts all types of ink including dye and pigment based inks from all the top manufacturers.

Software Settings

Your software settings can often be the most important piece of the puzzle when trying to output opaque films for screen printing. There are many programs available for creating screen printing artwork but the 3 most popular are Photoshop, Illustrator and Corel Draw. Each of these programs works a little differently but all are acceptable programs for outputting film positives. Corel and Illustrator are great because they can easily perform spot color separations in a few steps. Photoshop is a powerful tool because it is capable of outputting complex, photo-realistic designs.

The key setting for each of these programs is the color you are choosing as your "black" for the image details. What we see on our computer monitors is not always what the printer "sees" when it produces the final print. If you have Adobe Illustrator, you can see what I mean by going to Edit > Preferences > Appearance of Black. Under this setting, you can see the difference between "Rich Black" and "100k Black". Rich Black is much darker because it uses Cyan, Magenta, Yellow AND Black to create a much darker and "richer" black (hence the name!).

When you are outputting spot color designs it is best to have your color settings in CMYK mode and up your color values as follows....

You could up all the color values to 100% but this is overkill. You would end up wasting the extra ink. Even though the amount of ink you would waste is relatively small per print, the numbers would add up over time. The numbers above will product the darkest black images without the need for a RIP when printing directly to the printer.