Prepress question

S
Posted By
SDA
Sep 12, 2006
Views
363
Replies
10
Status
Closed
Hello:<br>
<br>
I recently have been given a job to create separations from bitmap for Screen Printing.<br>
<br>
Now I’m not at all familiar with the specs and what I specifically need to do with these separations, for output.<br>
<br>
I’m going to be using Photoshop to do this, and was wondering if any of the old hands around here, (or new for that matter) have any URLs, advice etc., they could share, in how I would accomplish this.<br> <br>
The printers themselves don’t seem to know how to create the separations themselves, so they’re not much use to me in terms of "helping" me understand what I need to know to accomplish this.<br> <br>
Thanks!<br>

MacBook Pro 16” Mockups 🔥

– in 4 materials (clay versions included)

– 12 scenes

– 48 MacBook Pro 16″ mockups

– 6000 x 4500 px

CN
Cybernetic Nomad
Sep 12, 2006
The printers themselves don’t seem to know how to create the separations themselves

That’s often a good hint to find another printer…

Can you post an image? it would help us answer you
HB
Heather Bell
Sep 12, 2006
Screen printers usually require, or at least prefer, vector art. Photoshop is not the best program for doing this in, but a link to the image would definately help.
S
SDA
Sep 12, 2006
Cybernetic Nomad:

In this case, I"m working Freelance for the printer doing their seps. 🙂 They have no idea and are no help unfortunately. 🙁

The image can be found here;

<http://sda.awardspace.com/>

Thanks for looking!
S
SDA
Sep 12, 2006
Heather, agreed that Illustrator is the correct application.

The client doesn’t wish to pay for conversion to vector, and wants this done quick and dirty. I’ve done a little research and found that quite a bit seps done for screen printing are done in raster, and quite frankly I think using Photoshop will be the fastest way to get this out the door (I hope).

I’ve posted the image, URL is in my other post. Any
advice/hints/strategies will be appreciated.

Cheers,

Steve
L
LenHewitt
Sep 12, 2006
SDA,

If you are going to use a newsreader, set your newsreader options to NOT send HTML – otherwise every other Newsreader user will just see a lot of HTML markup.

As you are using Thunderbird, the option is at Accounts > View settings for this account> Composition and Addressing and uncheck the "Compose message in HTML" format box.
S
SDA
Sep 12, 2006
OK Len done. I assumed that most here don’t use news readers, but a browser, hence the first was in HTML Subsequent posts weren’t.

Now can you help me out at all with my question or are you the resident policeman ? <grin, jk>
JS
John_Slate
Sep 12, 2006
Is the design to be printed as we see it on a black garment?

If so it will be 3 inks, White, Yellow an Red.

Is this picture all you have to work with?

If you need to reproduce the shadings of those inks in this design you will need to produce a screened output probably at 85 lines per inch, and on shifted angles so as not to produce a moire with the silk (hopefully your printer knows that much… unless they only deal with solid shapes)

Then there is the question of how to print these. Laserprinting black ink on transparency might work, but a film imagesetter would be best.

If they can’t handle halftone screens then you will have to create a highly stylized version of this with all hard edges, no shadings at all. Though I suppose you could do a posterized version with a WHOLE big bunch of inks and screens, but that is probably of of you range price-wise.

As far as actually doing the work to create the separations the best advice I can give you is (and please don’t take this the wrong way) to let someone that knows what they are doing handle it. It is not a simple thing. Maybe if you find a printer (person) that still has a film imagesetter they can make your positives for you… and the screening can be done at their rip instead of within Photoshop

PS: Oh yeah… and actually Len IS the policeman here.
HB
Heather Bell
Sep 12, 2006
Coming from someone who could do it either way, vector, or in photoshop as a multilayer file or a DCS possibly, I’d charge the client a LOT more for the latter options. Tracing and cleaning up in Illustrator would take a lot less time than masking and separating in Photoshop, for me, using my methods. Maybe someone has a quicker way to do in Photoshop, but you basically need to mask each spot and place on a separate layer. This may take a while if you’re not already adept at this procedure. Then you need to find someone at the print shop and ask if they can send each layer from the photoshop file as a separate plate. This isn’t hard, turn on, turn off, print, but they don’t sound exactly with it, so you may have a problem there. That would be the first order of business.
S
SDA
Sep 12, 2006
On Tue, 12 Sep 2006 09:58:11 -0700, in
adobe.photoshop.windows wrote:

Is the design to be printed as we see it on a black garment?

Not necessarily.

If so it will be 3 inks, White, Yellow an Red.

Correct.

Is this picture all you have to work with?

Unfortunately yes.

If you need to reproduce the shadings of those inks in this design you will need to produce a screened output probably at 85 lines per inch, and on shifted angles so as not to produce a moire with the silk (hopefully your printer knows that much… unless they only deal with solid shapes)

It sounds like they’re used to dealing with solid shapes only.

Then there is the question of how to print these. Laserprinting black ink on transparency might work, but a film imagesetter would be best.

They have no postscript hardware, and expect "yours truly" to give them separations with half toning applied. They then will print my file to their ink jet, to apply the separations on the substrate that is their screen "plate".

If they can’t handle halftone screens then you will have to create a highly stylized version of this with all hard edges, no shadings at all. Though I suppose you could do a posterized version with a WHOLE big bunch of inks and screens, but that is probably of of you range price-wise.

Yeah, they’re not going to pay for that, but it’ll be a learning experience for me — Something to add to my skill set. 🙂

As far as actually doing the work to create the separations the best advice I can give you is (and please don’t take this the wrong way) to let someone that knows what they are doing handle it. It is not a simple thing. Maybe if you find a printer (person) that still has a film imagesetter they can make your positives for you… and the screening can be done at their rip instead of within Photoshop

Well unfortunately, I have no choice — I’ve accepted the job. It wasn’t entirely as advertised to me originally, and I’m attempting to do some good will here, with a potential client.

What I really need is a good resource on the mechanics of creating Seps for screen printing. I’m experienced in offset/litho repro, so once I understand the procedure/specs, I’m confident I’ll be able to handle this.

FWIU white is a mask in screen printing.

PS: Oh yeah… and actually Len IS the policeman here.

LOL of course.
S
SDA
Sep 12, 2006
On Tue, 12 Sep 2006 10:27:53 -0700, Heather Bell in
adobe.photoshop.windows wrote:

Thanks Heather.

I was hoping to avoid manually tracing this in Illustrator. I was fiddling with LiveTrace, but didn’t like the results very well. It wwas either too many paths or not enough.

So, you’re probably right — I probably will end up doing this in Illustrator.

MacBook Pro 16” Mockups 🔥

– in 4 materials (clay versions included)

– 12 scenes

– 48 MacBook Pro 16″ mockups

– 6000 x 4500 px

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