Silk Screen Printing

Silk Screen printing, is a printing technique that uses stencils and ink to create designs on fabric. Although it requires significantly more set-up time than digital printing or heat transfer, Silk Screen Printing remains popular because it is the most economical method for producing large quantities.

Some of the Advantages of Silk Screen Printing are:

1. Most Economical Method for producing large quantity
2. Very Durable as it uses stencils and ink to create design on fabric
3. SPOT Color (Pantone) achievable via silkscreen printing
4. Softer hand feel
5. Works on almost ALL types of fabrics

However, while Silk Screen Printing method has many advantages as compared to other printing methods, it also has the following disadvantages:

1. High initial Set up cost as Silk Screen Printing involve producing of Stencil, also known as a screen, per color. One color, one screen. The more color, the more screen is required.
2. Multiple Color graphic printing is not encouraged as silk screen printing charged by per color.
3. In most cases, Silk Screen Printing takes longer production time than Full Color HD Print as it involve more steps.

The process of Silk Screen Printing: 

Silk Screen Screen printing has a steep learning curve that requires knowledge of everything from making screens and press set-up to actual printing.

1. Image Design – Create a customized graphic using professional graphics software. The graphic must be separated by color, with each color printed on its own clear film positive. Fewer colors mean a simpler set-up, resulting in lower costs.
2. Screen Making – Following a process that requires the use of a darkroom and photographic chemicals, a stencil, known as a screen, is made for each colour in the graphic image.
3. Printing – Each screen must be inserted and carefully aligned in the printing press to ensure that adjacent colors in the image are correctly aligned. The printing press applies ink to each screen, then uses pressure to squeeze the ink through the screen’s open mesh areas and onto the shirt. There are three common types of screen printing presses: flat-bed; cylinder; and rotary, which is the most widely used.
4. Drying – After all colors are printed, the shirt need to be dried completely to cure the screen print ink. Once cooled, the shirt is ready to wear.

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