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Spot Color:
Spot colors are specially mixed inks that come in a rainbow of colors. Unlike
CMYK or process color which creates colors by laying down a layer of cyan, magenta,
yellow, and black in varying amounts on the printed garment, spot colors are pre-mixed
and applied individually to the printed garment. Spot colors will be cleaner and
brighter than if they were created in the four-color process described below. Spot colors
are commonly used in corporate logos and identity programs, and in one, two or three-color jobs.
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4/color Process:
4-color process printing, uses cyan, magenta, yellow, and black to simulate
thousands color possibilities. Each of the process colors is laid down on the garment
one at a time in varying amounts. To reproduce a color image, a file is separated into
four different colors: Cyan (C), Magenta (M), Yellow (Y) and Black (K). During separation,
screen tints comprised of small dots are applied at different angles to each of the four
colors. The screened separations are then transferred to four different printing screens,
one for each color, and run on a printing press with one color overprinting the next. The
composite image fools the naked eye with the illusion of continuous tone. This method of
printing only works well on white color garments. |
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Simulated Process:
Simulated process printing is a method of printing that was first developed to
print vivid photographic type images on dark colored garments. Since CMYK colors
are translucent by nature, they are very difficult to print on a dark garment. Because
the inks for simulated process color are generally all-purpose, semi-transparent
plastisol they give you a bright print even when printed on an underbase of white
ink. When done correctly, simulated process prints can be very photorealistic with
smooth gradations and bright colors. Simulated process printing is a labor intensive
art that requires special attention, especially during the color separation. By
breaking the image down into specific colors, we are able to print a much sharper
and cleaner image that really 'pops' off the garment. |
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| Specialty Inks: |
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Glitter
Glitter ink has a fairly dense concentration of tiny glitter flakes. It’s available in a
range of basic "crayon colors". We don’t recommend it for tiny details.
When it’s printed over another ink, or directly onto a tee, the underlying color can
slightly show through the Glitter.
Shimmer
Shimmer is basically sparkly, metallic ink. It’s available in silver, bronze, black and
gold. We’ve previously experimented with special formulas for a pinkish-red shimmer and a
bluish-aqua shimmer, but the results ended up looking like grayed-out, non-sparkly versions of
the color. It does not hold super-fine detail well and starts to look flat grey in areas of
finer detail.
Foil
Foil is shiny and soft and has a slightly mirror-ish appearance. It’s available in silver,
gold, bronze, red, blue, green, black, purple, iridescent clear, iridescent silver, luminescent
silver, metallic rainbow (bands are fixed width), patterned silver and patterned gold. The
metallic foil "pattern" appears like a super zoomed-in shot of a reflector.
Puff
Puff is a rounded, raised ink that’s best when used with organic shapes and lines. Hard
edges and angles are often softened or lost when printed with puff. It can hold some detail,
however the finer the detail or smaller the line, the less it "puffs". Puff isn’t
effective for large fill areas due to its heaviness, and the area won’t appear as puffed.
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High-Density
High density ink raised, square stack ink. It's much better than puff for elements that
have hard edges or angles. Similar to puff, areas of fine detail or with elements that come
to a point don't translate well. It's also not recommended for fill areas, as the center
of the fill tends to "sink". Essentially, high density ink would be used if you
don't want the "rounded, raised" look of puff, but wanted a "square, raised"
look. High density ink also can be printed in "clear", which produces a darkened,
tonal effect on a tee. Pretty neat stuff!
Glow-in-the-Dark
Super glow is what it sounds like... Glow-in-the-dark ink, on steroids. It is very transparent
and looks "water-color-ish". Super glow is really cool on light color shirts because
it has a tonal clear effect that glows. It's great if you wan to play around with the idea of
hidden messages or design elements. Keep in mind that it's not 100% transparent, so elements
in super glow will show up slightly even when not Glowing.
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