I have a book on screen printing [Control without Confusion, troublshooting screen-printed process color by Joe Clark], and it suggests a 30 degree angel between each color. It recommends: Cyan 75 Magenta 105 Yellow 90 Black 45
what a lifesaver you are sir, got a test for a new job tomorrow and i was getting really nervous because of my lack of color separation experience thx a bunch!
my mind is blown. stressing over a ridiculous design with a bunch of colors and fade... i really thought i needed to outsource it because i'm not that experienced to photoshop (7... yeah, it was for free and it does the job i guess) outside of really simple task. i spent the last 3 hours trying to Color Range it all and ensemble it in inkscape, like twice. and i scraped it all. desperately looking for a better way to do this and i found this tut. THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING!!! You made this 7 years ago and this noob is just now getting hip to the CMYK process. thank you for this. thank you.
This is one of the most concise explanations I have seen for how to do a CMYK in Ps. I wish I had something as easy when I started doing screenprinting artwork... YOU ROCK.
I've written the steps down and I'm going to try this! You are very clear in what to do and how to repeat the steps for each color. Thanks for recording this! Thanks for sharing!
so in case you just want the numbers that he stated... Frequency: Mesh Count divided by 3.5 Angle: Black (K) - 45 Yellow (Y) - 0 Magenta (M) - 75 Cyan (C) - 15
+itsThuts Can you explain why the mesh count is divided by 3.5? I didn't understand that part. I am using screens with a mesh count of 230. Would I still divide by 3.5 or is the number you divide by based on the mesh count of the screen? thanks
I really appreciate this video. it has helped me a lot.i am a t-shirt designer and usually take my art work to be printed. with this billion dollar video i am good to kick off by myself....THANKS IT REALLY HELPED
Hi Thomas, I did it! I told a friend of my problem with the differences between my version of photoshop and yours. He said "there is always more than one path to a given result" He was right. Using the basic guide lines that you laid out I found a slightly different path to the same end. I have printed my cmyk films and will do a test print when I can get some time. I had to tweak each film a bit for saturation but that worked well as you can assemble them and see a tentative result.
Wow, Thank you so much for posting this video. I have been looking for hours trying to find a tutorial that breaks this down into a simple CMYK separation and it seems that everything out there wants to over complicate this process. This is going to save me a lot of money and headaches.
This was a great video! thank you for posting. I had the artwork burned on the screen already but was so insecure about how good of a job I did separating. You taught me a few thing I did not know about in Photoshop and reassured me that I actually did alright on my own... that tip about the "multiply" setting and the layer order was what I was missing when I was testing it in Photoshop! Now here I go with the ink!!!
nice, I do some thing #Bob_Marley Simulated #Eagle_Valley_Californi #Motorcycles USA #SCOOBY DOO #Simulated Color Separation rb.gy/u2siwu rb.gy/tv2zx1 rb.gy/6pev8s
thanks man. so far this is the best cmyk tutorial i have encountered here in the net. i have still to try it though coz i find it very easy to do just by watching your video.
Thank you.. I followed the instructions and made notes as I went. IT WORKS.. the only thing I do different is to add +20 Brightness and Contrast to all layers. that seems to get it closer to the original image. I need to learn this because I have a 4 x 2 press.
Awesome video, learned alot. Quick tip on dragging and dropping hold shift while dropping and it will snap to center. It works in CS2-CS5 as far as I know.
Thank you so much for this tutorial! I have been trying to figure it out on my own for the printing company I work for and kept getting stuck after the halftoning! This is a huge help!!!
Thank you from someone you made smarter about graphics design this will help me a lot and all I can do is like and share your video! thank you again and merry christmas from asia!
Great tutorial for doing halftone for printing. Would like to note this: If you're screen printing on paper doing the multiply on each layer works when you're printing ink. If you're screen printing on t-shirts... The multiply does NOT reflect how it will appear when it's printed on the t-shirt. The difference is that when you apply multiply to a layer, it blends with the colors underneath it. Paper printing colors blend, on t-shirts it doesn't blend.
One thing not pointed out, is make sure before doing all the halftone seperations, have the file sized as you want to to print, if you do all this and end up scaling it up or down, your dots will be larger or smaller than desired... and generally 300 resolution, unless you have a really great printer 300+ Again, Awesome video! Cheers mate!
This process is so awesome. I have come back to this a few times. I finally decided I was going to make Photoshop actions from it. I have made actions from 110 screens up to 305 screens . 35 -85 dot. I cant thank you enough. Fast Films and other seps software is 400 -800 bucks! There is another guy on you tube who has a nice spot color process. Anyway, since you gave this to us. If you would like the actions, I will mail the to you. Just message me! I have made them for Photoshop 7 to CS6
So far the most informative tutorial on CMYK Separations process. Thanks bro. Just like the rest, I also wondering on how to prepare the 'white layer' base especially when printing on the dark garments. Anyone?
After you select CMYK mode, Go to filter and select Pixelate - color haftone. In the dialog box select the screen angles and dot gain and you are done.
Jerry Rivera It will be hard for me to explain this with a few words in this comment box, I would suggest that you get a basic understanding of printing before attempting to change these settings. If the screen angles are wrong you will end up with a moire` pattern, and the image would look like it has measles.
I thought I should add even though I have printed many four color project with the offset process, and have years of experience with screen printing I have never used the four color process for screen printing. I have toyed with the Idea, but attempted it. Screen printing is a great printing medium where you have great freedom to use bright bold colors printed onto many different sub-straights and varied applications that in my opinion is where it belongs. Screen printing can be a fine art as lithography can be too. The trouble with printing onto tee shirts is after there washed a few times there just another tee shirt.
This is an awesome tutorial. The only thing that people need to be informed of is that when you submit a color separation to the printer. You don't want to color the layers yourself. They need only be halftones and saved in a .psd layered file with each corresponding layer labeled c, m, y, and k. Colors are not recognized, only black. Black represents the color to be printed on each screen. Printers usually tell you where to set the ppi. They decide the dpi. White ink is laid 1st..and so on. :)
this video is bad ass, ive watched it over and over again trying to remember each step. I watched the video as I was doing it and for some reason when I select all, color range and delete, it wasn't deleting. I have photoshop 7.0 and could not figure it out. then I looked and when I converted to cmky and split channels , each channel locked and I couldn't delete. so after I figured it out I unlocked them as I went and finally got it to go. thanks for the great video man I appreciate it .
Like a lot of people here I thank you for this, there are obviously many ways you can set frequencies and angle but I found these to work quite well, dividing 300 by 3.5 to get the frequency might be high according to some sources but I tried this process exactly on a shirt using 305 thread count 85 frequency and the angles given here and it worked quite well (hand screen printing no white layer on a grey shirt, it would have been better to use a white shirt) I do not know if 3.5 is best and it might be just as good to divide by 4 or 4.5 thus getting a lower frequency (as I read else where) or to never for higher than 45 or 65 like I read still elsewhere, but in all honesty it came out nice and the ink was very thin on the shirt which is a plus with high thread count screens. Lower thread count spot color stuff the ink is much thicker and you can really feel it. Other than the question about how high the frequency really needs to be and the million different angles that people post as being their ideal, this process works for screen printing on light cloth, on dark cloth you would need at least a thin white base. Also, when printing CMYK you should print it WET, that is, do not dry each layer in between colors, this way they mix. Here is a link to a shirt I did using this process. twitter.com/drumaximus/status/995348797969530882So thanks man.twitter.com/drumaximus/status/995348797969530882
Thanks, As I am doing screen printing, every layer is registered and printed on an Hi DPI inkjet printer with all color slots filled with BLACK ink, no color printing onto transparencies to use in exposing the screens. So while its cool to see the mockup aspect that this tutorial gives (adding all layers to one file and coloring them to see how it will look) the real working files are the BLACK 4 color separations. I save each one out then import them into illustrator on their own layers to register them for printing. So in illustrator I will have a layer per color exactly aligned and label for what color screen it is and a layer for registration, so all one needs to do is turn layers on and off to print each one (register layer stays on all the time.) If you are printing, alignment and registration is EXTREMELY important.Also a word about the white base for doing this on dark color fabric as there have been quite a few people wondering about this and this does need to be done on dark shirts. As I said above, color does not come into play until the last step, actual printing on the material with screens and pigment. To make those screens you simply need every layer black and printed on transparencies in completely opaque black ink. To get white layer, you simply need to turn your full color image completely black on a white or transparent background...simple as that. How ever you do thing depends on how you have your image but as long as the whole original image is turned black it will be fine, it is the output not the process, there just needs to be white everywhere you are printing and it needs to be exactly size and shape of image. Then save it out as your white layer. I do this FIRST and then I go back to the original color file and do seps. Remember everything needs to be AT THE SIZE YOU ARE PRINTING. Do not do this process then resize, it will mess things up, also do not use ACCURIP when printing these separations. Also, the white base can be printed with a lower thread count screen but the color seps MUST be printed on high thread count if it is photo or illustration quality.Thanks again man.
+PhotoZen that's correct, whether vector spot colors or cmyk raster seps, to make a white under base just have one transparency that has the whole image black....print transparency and this will be your white base. all colors go on top of that when screen printing.
I know it's an old comment and it's okay if you don't answer me. I'm just confuse when you say "you should print it WET" , Does wet ink will not damage the design after putting the next screen?
For anyone not sure of the difference between ppi and dpi. Ppi is pixels per inch and represents the digital image quality..the higher the better. Dpi is the print machine's setting for how many dots of ink per inch will be used for the printed product.
I've been playing with this a lot and I found a few things might be a bit of a help - I set my output to 4 times the size of my input (input 300px output 1200px: my halftones were looking very chewed up at a 300px output, I'm still working with the size ratio at 1, but there might be a better option like 2 or 3 for this) and then I set my magenta angle to 22.5 instead of 15 and my cyan angle to 67.5 rather than 75, this seemed to make the dot pattern spread more evenly - Yellow at 0, Magenta at 22.5, Black at 45 and Cyan at 67.5
AMAZING! Thank you so much, this is exactly what I was looking for. If you come across any other helpful tips during your Photoshop exploration, please share them.
Its a simple screen printing rule. Some shops like 4 to 1, most use 3.5 to 1, 3 to 1. Some shops even will put 40 lpi art (which can be burned onto a 140-160 screen with no issues) on a 260-305 screens just because those screens have better ink control on press. Its really personal/shop preference.
Really nice tut! I am working on getting this done for black textile without overprinting dark areas twice. Will it work to simply invert the black channel before bitmapping and afterwards add the C Y M channels to it? I wonder if RIP machines can do that automatically.
You can go to any of the 4 files and click on the channels flyout menu and choose merge files. In the dialog box choose the 4 different files and click ok.This will composite all of the colors back together so you can see what it will look like printed. I do this on a copy so I still have the separations for printing.
Great Video, very detailed, i'm going to try out your angles on press and see how it comes out, Thanks for the help! I've used the below angles in the past,it worked but yeah over 90 is repeating angle.. so 105 and 15 are pretty much the same? weird.. So i'm excited to try your angles, you explained them well. great job! • cyan = 75° • magenta = 15° • yellow = 105° • black = 45°
The how to of angle used in creating the halftone screen was very insightful, thank you for the insight.1 By the way, if you have some time, your comments and suggestions on our work is welcomed.
Excellent explanation of how to do halftone colour separations in Photoshop in preparation for making 4 colour process - screen printing positives which usually had to be done by a reprographic shop...or at least back when I was screen printing they were. Thanks for making this video, great work. May I ask how you make the positives from the 4 layers? Do you print through an inkjet or laser printer on clear film?
your video is a great start, Now you have to get your images to film, then to screen, and you have to do that with as little change in dot size as possible. then of course you need paint or ink that is as perfect as possible. I worked as a photo-lithographer. many years ago at that time it was all done in the dark room using pan films in a process camera shooting through filters to get our separations then contacting through angled half tone screens to get our negs or positives. If you are going to do your own printing by all means give this a try. You can try to print your positives to film directly from in jet printer but I would not advise that. A good quality laser printer I am sure would give you a better hard dot (I would even consider printing with black laser onto paper and then having that print shot onto lithographic film by print shop, they can shoot directly to positives too), but then I don't know if it is possible to print a film positive with that kind of printer. I wish the best of luck to any who attempt this process.
Hi there, great video, it helped me decide to get into screen printing, I thought it would be much, much harder... I have a question though... How do you add a white background to print on dark or black t-shirts... Thanks
RedStarLacrosse thank u very much I have gravure plant but don't have Desinger so we give out for this work. Plz provide me more details. As I am learning too
Very informative. That said, I recommend something more along the lines of Illustrator or Corel Draw (X6) which offer a "print as separations" option. Set your freq/angle there and print each screen to file as a PDF or JPG. If you confident enough in your settings you can even output them directly to film positives. Make sure you use a good inkjet printer and quality films. And of course, registration marks are key.
Really Helpful vid ! Lifesaver. I have a question, how can i get a white base for black t-shirts ? Im aware of color overlaying and giving it a choke, but the more colors you add, the bulkier the design gets. Is there a way to halftone the white which i will be lining it up using micro registration thanks
Thanx dude! I can't wait to try this out! After the multiply-part, the image really came to life. Crazy when you zoom in, to see all the CMY-parts. I'm very curious about the results on paper!
If the CMYK process seps are done right, you wouldn't have to worry about flesh tone. But if you gotta have flesh, you can learn to spot colors. You'll find descent color range vids on youtube. Simplest way to do it is to select the skin of the yellow channel, cut and paste it on a flesh channel and use the yellow channel just for the hair, eyes, teeth, etc. You would have to tweek the levels of magenta and cyan channels to get it just right, but you'd have flesh. Has to be done b4 splitting.
Great tut man! Just wondering how it will look on a black tee since they are selling the most.. as well as other dark colors. Need to test this out now I have the process. Thanks for doing it
I was always told from my Screen vendor to use a True elliptical dot at 22.5 degree angles from each other for best results. meaning the most ink penetration through the screen material.
yoo!! thank you for adding this video it help me out a lot . I just started pressing t-shirts and im working with 1 screen and one color but will be investing in a 4color screen kit so I wanted to get ahead and learn so I can get right to it. THANX!! King A-wax
Thanks for the input. I understand that a professional screenprinter/printshop would not use this method, and that they have RIP software to do all the figuring, but this does actually produce functional separations for process. All the information on the layers comes from channels. Like you said, the steps are absolutely unnecessary if you want to pay somebody else to do the work, but to say I am "completely" off seems a bit disingenuous.
Hi Thomas, Have you done any experimenting with a white underbase and hight lights for printing on dark shirts? Thank you for posting, very nice work. Rose Brown
This a really great Tutorial. I have created my own actions from this Now I am wondering how I can create them to print on black? What could I do to this to make it work as a 'Simulated Process' for darks? Any thoughts?
Very helpful video. Once i forgot how to do this and came up with a solution to make the process a bit faster. Maybe someone finds this useful. Instead of painting every plate as a separate layer with color overlay you can paste each of 4 patterns to a corresponding CMYK channel. That way your'e pasting in just a black patterns and if done right photoshop composites everything automatically.
Awesome video, just to be random and without getting into too much detail, those little portable Digital photo printers like the ones sony make (there are other brands) to print on the spot photos use this kind of 4 colour process to print out those full colour photos :-D
Once you have the file separated as instructed, when you go to print (with all your layers visible), it should come out of a printer very similar to what would print at your local screenprinter, so long as you run it at 100%. If it's done correctly, the moire pattern shouldn't be overpowering. You can also print each layer on copy paper, on its own, and use a lightbox to check how the ink would lay down.
Did you do the color overlay to each of the CMY layers you added? Did you also change from grayscale to CMYK color mode? That is what will give you the color.
it's been almost 8 years and you're still helping us out. Thank you for a great tutorial man. God bless!
so true, the best way to do this, and the only one I use since I saw this tutorial, Thanks Tom
I have a book on screen printing [Control without Confusion, troublshooting screen-printed process color by Joe Clark], and it suggests a 30 degree angel between each color. It recommends:
Cyan 75
Magenta 105
Yellow 90
Black 45
what a lifesaver you are sir, got a test for a new job tomorrow and i was getting really nervous because of my lack of color separation experience thx a bunch!
my mind is blown. stressing over a ridiculous design with a bunch of colors and fade... i really thought i needed to outsource it because i'm not that experienced to photoshop (7... yeah, it was for free and it does the job i guess) outside of really simple task. i spent the last 3 hours trying to Color Range it all and ensemble it in inkscape, like twice. and i scraped it all. desperately looking for a better way to do this and i found this tut. THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING!!! You made this 7 years ago and this noob is just now getting hip to the CMYK process. thank you for this. thank you.
Nice! Glad you found this video, and that it helped you 👍🏼
Thanks! I set out to learn this process tonight and I think I just did. TH-cam is a marvelous thing.
This is one of the most concise explanations I have seen for how to do a CMYK in Ps. I wish I had something as easy when I started doing screenprinting artwork...
YOU ROCK.
I've written the steps down and I'm going to try this! You are very clear in what to do and how to repeat the steps for each color. Thanks for recording this! Thanks for sharing!
Video might be old but it still worked with CC. They have changed a few things up but you can still get the same results. Outstanding work.
so in case you just want the numbers that he stated...
Frequency:
Mesh Count divided by 3.5
Angle:
Black (K) - 45
Yellow (Y) - 0
Magenta (M) - 75
Cyan (C) - 15
+itsThuts Can you explain why the mesh count is divided by 3.5? I didn't understand that part. I am using screens with a mesh count of 230. Would I still divide by 3.5 or is the number you divide by based on the mesh count of the screen? thanks
@@charliemichaels2832 I usually just run a 45 angle with a 230
I really appreciate this video. it has helped me a lot.i am a t-shirt designer and usually take my art work to be printed. with this billion dollar video i am good to kick off by myself....THANKS IT REALLY HELPED
this is the best tutorial i have found on the subject.
Hi Thomas, I did it! I told a friend of my problem with the differences between my version of photoshop and yours. He said "there is always more than one path to a given result" He was right. Using the basic guide lines that you laid out I found a slightly different path to the same end. I have printed my cmyk films and will do a test print when I can get some time. I had to tweak each film a bit for saturation but that worked well as you can assemble them and see a tentative result.
Wow, Thank you so much for posting this video. I have been looking for hours trying to find a tutorial that breaks this down into a simple CMYK separation and it seems that everything out there wants to over complicate this process. This is going to save me a lot of money and headaches.
Dude! This totally saved my brain. I have a 4-color press and this will open up so many possibilities. Thanks tons!
You're welcome! Thanks for the comment!
This was a great video! thank you for posting. I had the artwork burned on the screen already but was so insecure about how good of a job I did separating. You taught me a few thing I did not know about in Photoshop and reassured me that I actually did alright on my own... that tip about the "multiply" setting and the layer order was what I was missing when I was testing it in Photoshop! Now here I go with the ink!!!
nice, I do some thing
#Bob_Marley Simulated
#Eagle_Valley_Californi #Motorcycles USA
#SCOOBY DOO
#Simulated Color Separation
rb.gy/u2siwu
rb.gy/tv2zx1
rb.gy/6pev8s
thanks man. so far this is the best cmyk tutorial i have encountered here in the net. i have still to try it though coz i find it very easy to do just by watching your video.
Thank you.. I followed the instructions and made notes as I went. IT WORKS.. the only thing I do different is to add +20 Brightness and Contrast to all layers. that seems to get it closer to the original image. I need to learn this because I have a 4 x 2 press.
you are my hero for this video. i just started up a screen printing business with a couple buddys of mine and got some very helpful tips! THANKS!
Awesome video, learned alot. Quick tip on dragging and dropping hold shift while dropping and it will snap to center. It works in CS2-CS5 as far as I know.
Thanks so much for this tutorial, this is probably the best Photoshop tutorial I've found on here!! 👏
Oh my God so so direct and straight forward. Was very helpful. thanks alot
Yes, magic! Thanks for taking the time to post this video!
This tutorial is absolutely brilliant, will use this shortly to attempt some photo to screen prints.
Thank you so much for this tutorial! I have been trying to figure it out on my own for the printing company I work for and kept getting stuck after the halftoning!
This is a huge help!!!
Thank you from someone you made smarter about graphics design
this will help me a lot and all I can do is like and share your video!
thank you again and merry christmas from asia!
Dear Lacrosse; Very nice presentation and educative also quite fundamental; Thank for sharing.
Great tutorial for doing halftone for printing.
Would like to note this: If you're screen printing on paper doing the multiply on each layer works when you're printing ink. If you're screen printing on t-shirts... The multiply does NOT reflect how it will appear when it's printed on the t-shirt.
The difference is that when you apply multiply to a layer, it blends with the colors underneath it. Paper printing colors blend, on t-shirts it doesn't blend.
One thing not pointed out, is make sure before doing all the halftone seperations, have the file sized as you want to to print, if you do all this and end up scaling it up or down, your dots will be larger or smaller than desired... and generally 300 resolution, unless you have a really great printer 300+
Again, Awesome video! Cheers mate!
Very comprehensive, this helped so much thanks for posting
Thank you so much for this video, I learned and was able to solve my color separation within the first 3 minutes.
Great information. This is a process I’ve been trying to figure out for a little while now, this made it much easier!
This process is so awesome. I have come back to this a few times. I finally decided I was going to make Photoshop actions from it. I have made actions from 110 screens up to 305 screens . 35 -85 dot. I cant thank you enough. Fast Films and other seps software is 400 -800 bucks! There is another guy on you tube who has a nice spot color process. Anyway, since you gave this to us. If you would like the actions, I will mail the to you. Just message me! I have made them for Photoshop 7 to CS6
So far the most informative tutorial on CMYK Separations process. Thanks bro. Just like the rest, I also wondering on how to prepare the 'white layer' base especially when printing on the dark garments. Anyone?
So incredibly helpful and enlightening, and very nicely presented. Thank you very very much
awesome job man! this was super helpful and i now know how to print my designs. in the long run tons of money saved
After you select CMYK mode, Go to filter and select Pixelate - color haftone. In the dialog box select the screen angles and dot gain and you are done.
Can you explain how to use that tool?
Jerry Rivera It will be hard for me to explain this with a few words in this comment box, I would suggest that you get a basic understanding of printing before attempting to change these settings.
If the screen angles are wrong you will end up with a moire` pattern, and the image would look like it has measles.
homey... this was 3 years ago... today, you changed my life. much respect.
what is the screen angle need to use? C-15 M-75 Y-0 K-45 frequency is 85 in 300mesh?
man!!!! nicest tutorial I`ve found so far. Thank you very much for it. Greeting from Venezuela
I thought I should add even though I have printed many four color project with the offset process, and have years of experience with screen printing I have never used the four color process for screen printing.
I have toyed with the Idea, but attempted it.
Screen printing is a great printing medium where you have great freedom to use bright bold colors printed onto many different sub-straights and varied applications that in my opinion is where it belongs. Screen printing can be a fine art as lithography can be too. The trouble with printing onto tee shirts is after there washed a few times there just another tee shirt.
This is an awesome tutorial. The only thing that people need to be informed of is that when you submit a color separation to the printer. You don't want to color the layers yourself. They need only be halftones and saved in a .psd layered file with each corresponding layer labeled c, m, y, and k. Colors are not recognized, only black. Black represents the color to be printed on each screen. Printers usually tell you where to set the ppi. They decide the dpi. White ink is laid 1st..and so on. :)
this video is bad ass, ive watched it over and over again trying to remember each step. I watched the video as I was doing it and for some reason when I select all, color range and delete, it wasn't deleting. I have photoshop 7.0 and could not figure it out. then I looked and when I converted to cmky and split channels , each channel locked and I couldn't delete. so after I figured it out I unlocked them as I went and finally got it to go. thanks for the great video man I appreciate it .
wooww....thanks man...i've been looking for this tutorial for a century... :)
Awesome Video! Thanks for the education about cmyk separations for screen print
Like a lot of people here I thank you for this, there are obviously many ways you can set frequencies and angle but I found these to work quite well, dividing 300 by 3.5 to get the frequency might be high according to some sources but I tried this process exactly on a shirt using 305 thread count 85 frequency and the angles given here and it worked quite well (hand screen printing no white layer on a grey shirt, it would have been better to use a white shirt) I do not know if 3.5 is best and it might be just as good to divide by 4 or 4.5 thus getting a lower frequency (as I read else where) or to never for higher than 45 or 65 like I read still elsewhere, but in all honesty it came out nice and the ink was very thin on the shirt which is a plus with high thread count screens. Lower thread count spot color stuff the ink is much thicker and you can really feel it. Other than the question about how high the frequency really needs to be and the million different angles that people post as being their ideal, this process works for screen printing on light cloth, on dark cloth you would need at least a thin white base. Also, when printing CMYK you should print it WET, that is, do not dry each layer in between colors, this way they mix. Here is a link to a shirt I did using this process. twitter.com/drumaximus/status/995348797969530882So thanks man.twitter.com/drumaximus/status/995348797969530882
Great to hear, thanks! Print looks great.
Thanks, As I am doing screen printing, every layer is registered and printed on an Hi DPI inkjet printer with all color slots filled with BLACK ink, no color printing onto transparencies to use in exposing the screens. So while its cool to see the mockup aspect that this tutorial gives (adding all layers to one file and coloring them to see how it will look) the real working files are the BLACK 4 color separations. I save each one out then import them into illustrator on their own layers to register them for printing. So in illustrator I will have a layer per color exactly aligned and label for what color screen it is and a layer for registration, so all one needs to do is turn layers on and off to print each one (register layer stays on all the time.) If you are printing, alignment and registration is EXTREMELY important.Also a word about the white base for doing this on dark color fabric as there have been quite a few people wondering about this and this does need to be done on dark shirts. As I said above, color does not come into play until the last step, actual printing on the material with screens and pigment. To make those screens you simply need every layer black and printed on transparencies in completely opaque black ink. To get white layer, you simply need to turn your full color image completely black on a white or transparent background...simple as that. How ever you do thing depends on how you have your image but as long as the whole original image is turned black it will be fine, it is the output not the process, there just needs to be white everywhere you are printing and it needs to be exactly size and shape of image. Then save it out as your white layer. I do this FIRST and then I go back to the original color file and do seps. Remember everything needs to be AT THE SIZE YOU ARE PRINTING. Do not do this process then resize, it will mess things up, also do not use ACCURIP when printing these separations. Also, the white base can be printed with a lower thread count screen but the color seps MUST be printed on high thread count if it is photo or illustration quality.Thanks again man.
Chris, for white underbase did you mean to turn the image black and white then INVERSE color for the transparency?
+PhotoZen that's correct, whether vector spot colors or cmyk raster seps, to make a white under base just have one transparency that has the whole image black....print transparency and this will be your white base. all colors go on top of that when screen printing.
I know it's an old comment and it's okay if you don't answer me. I'm just confuse when you say "you should print it WET" , Does wet ink will not damage the design after putting the next screen?
For anyone not sure of the difference between ppi and dpi. Ppi is pixels per inch and represents the digital image quality..the higher the better. Dpi is the print machine's setting for how many dots of ink per inch will be used for the printed product.
I've been playing with this a lot and I found a few things might be a bit of a help - I set my output to 4 times the size of my input (input 300px output 1200px: my halftones were looking very chewed up at a 300px output, I'm still working with the size ratio at 1, but there might be a better option like 2 or 3 for this) and then I set my magenta angle to 22.5 instead of 15 and my cyan angle to 67.5 rather than 75, this seemed to make the dot pattern spread more evenly - Yellow at 0, Magenta at 22.5, Black at 45 and Cyan at 67.5
AMAZING! Thank you so much, this is exactly what I was looking for. If you come across any other helpful tips during your Photoshop exploration, please share them.
Its a simple screen printing rule. Some shops like 4 to 1, most use 3.5 to 1, 3 to 1. Some shops even will put 40 lpi art (which can be burned onto a 140-160 screen with no issues) on a 260-305 screens just because those screens have better ink control on press. Its really personal/shop preference.
Really nice tut! I am working on getting this done for black textile without overprinting dark areas twice. Will it work to simply invert the black channel before bitmapping and afterwards add the C Y M channels to it? I wonder if RIP machines can do that automatically.
You can go to any of the 4 files and click on the channels flyout menu and choose merge files. In the dialog box choose the 4 different files and click ok.This will composite all of the colors back together so you can see what it will look like printed. I do this on a copy so I still have the separations for printing.
Great Video, very detailed, i'm going to try out your angles on press and see how it comes out, Thanks for the help!
I've used the below angles in the past,it worked but yeah over 90 is repeating angle.. so 105 and 15 are pretty much the same? weird.. So i'm excited to try your angles, you explained them well. great job!
• cyan = 75°
• magenta = 15°
• yellow = 105°
• black = 45°
Great tutorial. Please is it the same process for flexography ??
Thanks a lot! This was super easy to follow and helpful.
Awesome tips Bro, cheers!
The how to of angle used in creating the halftone screen was very insightful, thank you for the insight.1
By the way, if you have some time, your comments and suggestions on our work is welcomed.
I think you just saved my life.
Awesome!
Thx a lot bro, this is awesome ! I barely started on printing and using photoshop and have no idea how to use it, I'll give it a try. Thx again !
Thank you so much Sir RedStarLacrosse for sharing your very useful knowledge. I really appreciate it and it helps me a lot. More power to you!
Excellent explanation of how to do halftone colour separations in Photoshop in preparation for making 4 colour process - screen printing positives which usually had to be done by a reprographic shop...or at least back when I was screen printing they were. Thanks for making this video, great work. May I ask how you make the positives from the 4 layers? Do you print through an inkjet or laser printer on clear film?
Try using the same angle on all four colors. Use a 15, 22.5 or 25 degree angle. It was help if you don't like moire patterns.
4 year old video but it still helped my ass today in 2022, thank you
This video is really cool! I have never seen this before so it really helps pluss im getting into screen printing! Thanks
This was a huge help. Thank you.
Learned some new things today. Thanks!
your video is a great start, Now you have to get your images to film, then to screen, and you have to do that with as little change in dot size as possible. then of course you need paint or ink that is as perfect as possible.
I worked as a photo-lithographer. many years ago at that time it was all done in the dark room using pan films in a process camera shooting through filters to get our separations then contacting through angled half tone screens to get our negs or positives.
If you are going to do your own printing by all means give this a try.
You can try to print your positives to film directly from in jet printer but I would not advise that. A good quality laser printer I am sure would give you a better hard dot (I would even consider printing with black laser onto paper and then having that print shot onto lithographic film by print shop, they can shoot directly to positives too), but then I don't know if it is possible to print a film positive with that kind of printer.
I wish the best of luck to any who attempt this process.
Hi there, great video, it helped me decide to get into screen printing, I thought it would be much, much harder... I have a question though... How do you add a white background to print on dark or black t-shirts... Thanks
Your a real genius man.. It works on my first t-shirt print! :-)
Thank You Brother Thomas! Just what I needed!
I'm applying for a job that requires doing prints and this kinda stuff is helpful like you have no idea
+TheLonelyGrovyle Nice. Good luck!!!
RedStarLacrosse thank u very much
I have gravure plant but don't have Desinger so we give out for this work. Plz provide me more details. As I am learning too
Dilip Patel 6 ឥស
Dilip Pateតឥឹl ៗៗឲឥោឲងងឹ
Thanks so much for posting this video it's exactly what I was looking for. Is there a way to break down the image into 9 colour?
Very informative. That said, I recommend something more along the lines of Illustrator or Corel Draw (X6) which offer a "print as separations" option. Set your freq/angle there and print each screen to file as a PDF or JPG. If you confident enough in your settings you can even output them directly to film positives.
Make sure you use a good inkjet printer and quality films. And of course, registration marks are key.
very nice job..... i would like you to make the procces about how to prepare the BASE WHITE to printing on black shirts
Great Vid, thankyou. Add frank's comments and this is very instructive.
Really Helpful vid ! Lifesaver.
I have a question, how can i get a white base for black t-shirts ?
Im aware of color overlaying and giving it a choke, but the more colors you add, the bulkier the design gets. Is there a way to halftone the white which i will be lining it up using micro registration
thanks
Dude, this was awesome. Thank you! Now I don't have to pay my screen printing douche an extra $150 to break apart a photo. No joke, thanks a lot man.
Thank fucking god for a damn tutorial with some who speaks.
LOL!
What an awesome video! Thank you!!
Thanx dude! I can't wait to try this out! After the multiply-part, the image really came to life. Crazy when you zoom in, to see all the CMY-parts. I'm very curious about the results on paper!
If the CMYK process seps are done right, you wouldn't have to worry about flesh tone. But if you gotta have flesh, you can learn to spot colors. You'll find descent color range vids on youtube. Simplest way to do it is to select the skin of the yellow channel, cut and paste it on a flesh channel and use the yellow channel just for the hair, eyes, teeth, etc. You would have to tweek the levels of magenta and cyan channels to get it just right, but you'd have flesh. Has to be done b4 splitting.
Great tut man! Just wondering how it will look on a black tee since they are selling the most.. as well as other dark colors. Need to test this out now I have the process. Thanks for doing it
I was always told from my Screen vendor to use a True elliptical dot at 22.5 degree angles from each other for best results. meaning the most ink penetration through the screen material.
nice tut..i learned a lot..continue your works co'z it's awesome!!!
This is an awesome video, Do you always divide you the mesh count by 3 1/2??
thank you so much,,, more power,,, GOD BLEESED U
yoo!! thank you for adding this video it help me out a lot . I just started pressing t-shirts and im working with 1 screen and one color but will be investing in a 4color screen kit so I wanted to get ahead and learn so I can get right to it. THANX!! King A-wax
awesome vid! :) thnx a lot! :D i used to do this a long time ago but obviously forgot, now i know how to do this again thnx to u. :)
I put all my screen angles set to the same angle and it works great.
Thanks for the input.
I understand that a professional screenprinter/printshop would not use this method, and that they have RIP software to do all the figuring, but this does actually produce functional separations for process. All the information on the layers comes from channels. Like you said, the steps are absolutely unnecessary if you want to pay somebody else to do the work, but to say I am "completely" off seems a bit disingenuous.
Hi Thomas,
Have you done any experimenting with a white underbase and hight lights for printing on dark shirts? Thank you for posting, very nice work.
Rose Brown
wow this is the sickest tutorial ever. do you know how to do half-tones for just one color prints?
This a really great Tutorial. I have created my own actions from this Now I am wondering how I can create them to print on black? What could I do to this to make it work as a 'Simulated Process' for darks? Any thoughts?
you sir have saved my life!
Thank you so much RedStarLacrosse. This is very helpful. Thanks for taking time to teach us this. I will sleep well now lol
Very helpful video. Once i forgot how to do this and came up with a solution to make the process a bit faster. Maybe someone finds this useful. Instead of painting every plate as a separate layer with color overlay you can paste each of 4 patterns to a corresponding CMYK channel. That way your'e pasting in just a black patterns and if done right photoshop composites everything automatically.
Awesome video, just to be random and without getting into too much detail, those little portable Digital photo printers like the ones sony make (there are other brands) to print on the spot photos use this kind of 4 colour process to print out those full colour photos :-D
Brilliant!!!!! This is a great tutorial! Thanks!
Once you have the file separated as instructed, when you go to print (with all your layers visible), it should come out of a printer very similar to what would print at your local screenprinter, so long as you run it at 100%. If it's done correctly, the moire pattern shouldn't be overpowering. You can also print each layer on copy paper, on its own, and use a lightbox to check how the ink would lay down.
Did you do the color overlay to each of the CMY layers you added? Did you also change from grayscale to CMYK color mode? That is what will give you the color.
You make a great point. I really should have flattened that...JPEG. Maybe you should make a tutorial on how to do that, because I am at a loss.
It was a great tutorial, the first color sep that I think makes sense...kudos to you my frined. And Thank you for sharing it! :)
That is actually amazing.