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Screen Mesh for Printing
Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2014 4:11 am
by KaCe
I did a search of the archives and found a lot of material on grit screen sizes and sanding material, but did not see anything regarding favored screen mesh for screen printing. I had a screen made 156 mesh. I was hoping to read more about the art work (size of halftone dots; shape of dots and lines). I am working on doing more screen printing and so want to get my "poop in a group", as my sister and I say. (This isn't dog poo, it's poop as in info.
) Thanks for any clarity. Excited to work on it.
Re: Screen Mesh for Printing
Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2014 5:59 pm
by williamslaybaugh
Your halftones are going to depend on the equipment you are using to expose your screens more than anything. The faster your exposure the finer your halftones can be, less time for light to bleed through your image. The type of printer used to print your positives is also going to be a factor for good halftones. Ink jet printers have a much denser black than laser printers allowing for finer halftone details not being washed out. The rule I've seen from most of the screen printers on halftone is multiply the Dot Per Inch by 4.5 to get the screen mesh needed. Since you have a screen mesh of 156 your maximum DPI will be 35. I have an entry level florescent vacuum unit and use ink jet positives with an exposure time of 45 seconds and can get good results between 30-40 DPI. When I had access to a Metal-Halide exposure unit I could get good results at about 50 DPI using a 200 mesh screen. Any higher and the details were lost by the screen clogging. I also use the ellipse dot at 22.5 degree angle.
Re: Screen Mesh for Printing
Posted: Tue Feb 04, 2014 7:41 am
by KaCe
William,
Thank you for the good info. It is helpful to me to hear how others do this. (I almost bought a used halide, but didn't know where I could put it. It was so large, but it would have been great.) I am considering having my negatives produced by a graphic service that can produce the nice black negative I want. They charge by the sq. in. with a minimum charge. So I'll get several images ready and have them print them out.
I am surprised that inkjet is better than laser. I thought that laser was more dense. I must be remembering how it was when inkjets first came out. I know that they didn't have good coverage back then. But I hadn't thought about how the industry may have changed.
I will do my image with the suggested resolution. Thank you so much.
KaCe