Screen Printing Glossary

Screen Printing in Omaha, NE

DPI (Dots-per-inch) - Screen printer resolution and often used to describe scanner resolution. DPI is also used as the designation for a scan. Like printers, the higher the number the higher the resolution.

Flash-Curing - Screen printing is usually done wet screen printing ink going onto wet screen printing ink.

Halftone - A screen printing halftone is a series of large and small dots that represent image areas of a continuous tone image. Screen printers use halftones in their artwork.

LPI (Lines-per-inch) - This actually refers to the number of dots-per-inch in a halftone but the term is LPI and NOT DPI.

Process Color - Commonly used in offset printing, Process Printing uses the four pigment colors of Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black - called CMYK. You can use this type of printing in screen printing to create full color designs.

Screens - A screen printing screen is like a printing plate. One screen is needed for each color to be printed.

Separations - Screen printing art needs to be separated when making screens for a screen printing job.

Special Inks - or special effect inks are screen printing inks that puff, feel like suede, glitter, sparkle, reflect and glow.

Underbasing - When screen printing on dark shirts, the screen print normally needs a white layer of ink under the colors to allow the colors to be bright on the garment. This layer of ink is called an Underbase.

Plastisol Inks - Plastisol based screen printing ink is the most common ink to use in t-shirt and garmet screen printing.

Water-Based inks - Water-based screen printing ink is not recommended for use by professional screen printers.

PVC/Phalate Free Ink - This screen printing ink is a relatively new kind of ink. PVC/Phalate Free Ink offers the same printing benefits of plastisol but without the toxic components of two toxic chemicals. Also, the screen print has a softer feel on the t-shirt.

Metallic Ink - Metallic screen printing ink uses small particles suspended in the ink. Screen printers use metallic ink for t-shirts that need an extra zip. Football designs, basketball designs and tournament screen printing jobs.

Expanding (Puff) Ink - Screenprinters use puff ink additives  with plastisol screen printing inks to raise the design or ’screen print’ off the t-shirt’s fabric. Screen printing puff ink is used in the screen printing process to create a 3D look to your screen print design.

Gloss - is used by advanced screen printers as a clear base laid over plastisol inks to create a shiny finish.