I've done silk-screen printing for over a year now and have an interview at a Litho print shot. This is quite similar, especially with the CMYK method. Very simple and informative video, thanks!
Nice video! I have one doubt: how water will cover non-image area and ink will cover image area? What makes water did not fill image area and vice-versa?
Hi. Put very simply, the whole printing plate is dampened and there is a chemical in the water mix that can identify the tiny dots in the plate that make up the image. That chemical dries the instant it touches a dot, allowing the ink to adhere to those areas. Hope that helps. Thanks
The colors are not mixed, they are printed over each other. Those metal plates they were loading into the press are like stencils, each one is different depending on what colors are needed for the label, when the colors are transferred to the paper from the blanket and cylinder it only transfers what was drawn up on the plates, if you were to look under a magnifying glass you would see tiny dots and all the colors that are layered over eachother to get the desired color. You control how much ink is being distributed from the ink fountain to the rollers with the keys you asked about. Older presses would be setup and keyed in by hand, so it’s not as common anymore unless you’re using an older press. Modern presses use programs linked directly to the press to key in the jobs so the guessing is taken out of the equation and you just have to fine tune the ink and water % hope that helps
thanks for the video! the cmyk rosettes in these prints are dotted. what causes the dot pattern of the print in this entire process? are the press sheets etched in a dotted pattern to begin with? also, can you control the placement of each individual/granular dot in the software prior to printing?
@@solopress thanks for taking the time to respond. I'm interested which step of the machine's mechanical workflow introduces the dots. Suppose we stop the machine in the middle of the printing process and use a microscope on the surface of the yellow unit's blanket cylinder. Would we see a dotted or a solid-fill pattern of yellow ink (in a region of the print that has a lot of yellow weight)? Using a microscope on two items of a print I ordered, I noticed that the cmyk rosettes are virtually identical among the two in a certain region of the print. A high reliability like that leads me to believe that they are dotted on the blanket cylinder. But that still leaves the question of what step in the mechanical process seperates the ink out into dots.
Thanks for your comment. The press sheets are not etched in a dotted pattern to begin with, it’s the image itself determines where the dots are placed. Each CMYK colour is printed separately from its own plate. Dots from each CMYK colour come together on the finished print in a tiny rosette pattern that’s only visible under magnification. When observed with the naked eye, the combination of the four inks creates the desired colour. The process that creates the placement of the dots in their rosette pattern is known as Euclidean dot formulation. There is an alternative called Stochastic dot which places dots randomly rather than in a rosette pattern, but we don’t use this method. Hope that helps!
@@solopress I thought about it some more and I think it my misunderstanding is clarified as follows : in a cmyk rosette print, its etching does occur in a dotted fashion but it is NOT forced or done automatically by the etching step - it is defined by the image source given to the etching step. So if we were to zoom into the press plate , we would see dots in a typical example workload.
@@wuschelbeutel I think you’ve grasped it, in that the pattern of dots is not pre-determined. There’s no set template for the different coloured dots to fit into. Instead, the exact placement of the dots is created in response to the image as a means of achieving the correct colour in any given location.
The dots are in the image area of the printing plates. If the dots need to be moved, the pre-press department must alter the job on a computer. Moving the dots farther apart will cause the color to be less bold. Moving the dots closer together will make the color bolder. Altering the dots is called changing the curve. Most of the time, the job is set up correctly, so no curve change is necessary. Sometimes you get a whiny customer that wants a crazy shade of a certain color and the only way to achieve that, is to change the curve.
Solopress As a student Industrial Product Design, I was wondering if this same system could be used to print fatty ink (same texture, only fat-based) on a plastic (non-absorbing) sheet?
@@Semtexxxxx UV-inks and coatings are not drying by oxidation and penetration into substrate but curing by means of chemical reaction cased by UV radiation - perfect solution for polymers (foils, plastics) and for metalized surfaces. A special equipment of the press is required such as: EPDM compound rubber rollers and blankets, intermediate dryers with UV-lamps, end-of-press slide-in dryers with UV-lamps, wash-up hoses suitable for UV wash-up solutions, UV-light protection devices. You can find details on many sources in Internet.
The guy that lives inner city where i live just sold his car and so many of his own properties just to help his printing shop carry on. If we could afford the equipment here within the city, it'd be so much more convenient for us to print all of our package designs, lots of time and money for delivery would be saved(coz we're having other companies in another city handling the printing processes).
My family runs an offset printing company and we do almost everything in house. To have the capabilities to do everything from start to finish, you are looking at millions of dollars. You can expect a 5 color 40" press (which prints a max sheet size of 28x40) to run you about $2,000,000 brand new + a couple hundred thousand to ship and install it. You also need prepress equipment: powerful computers, ripping and prepress software and servers, and a plate maker. For post press equipment you would need guillotine cutters, folding/scoring/perf machines, stitching machines, laminating/uv/finishing machines, die cut/foil/emboss machines, and more depending on what each job entails. Not to mention a large warehouse to fit all the equipment and be able to run the business in.
@@ChickenManiac they're generally not very expensive, obviously depending on what type. The overall setup time to print one or two sheets would make it far too expensive. It's not simply a case of put the plates on and print a couple of perfect sheets immediately haha
And those rollers are a mix of rubber and nylon or copper, the rubber rollers must be a specific hardness range known as Durometer, the rollers must also have a specific finish which is measured in microns and must be set to one another using manufactuers specifications in order to transfer the ink properly. The rubber compounds must also be either ink receptive or ink rollers and water receptive for dampening rollers. See, its pretty easy, nothing to it.
Hexachrome isn't really used anymore when it comes to litho printing, although the concept of enhancing CMYK colours with additional colours is something that is done in digital printing.
@@solopress Although it is a different ink formula, I remember around 2000, buying a Epson Stylus color printer and finding that printing from CorelDraw, I could get absurdly intense colors out of it, on the level of day-glow paint colors. Really vivid pinks and oranges and magentas that jumped out as if illuminated by black light sources. Later printers I've owned could not produce such vivid colors. But I can see that extremely wide gamuts are now possible with CMYK alone.
I've done silk-screen printing for over a year now and have an interview at a Litho print shot. This is quite similar, especially with the CMYK method. Very simple and informative video, thanks!
Mass printing is a little different than the artistic small scale approach.
Thanks! The shot at the end showing the machines working together was particularly cool.
Glad you enjoyed it!
This is the best explanation video till now.
Glad you think so!
This cleared up loads of my questions - thanks!
Very informative and easy to understand video. Thanks!
Nice video! I have one doubt: how water will cover non-image area and ink will cover image area? What makes water did not fill image area and vice-versa?
Hi. Put very simply, the whole printing plate is dampened and there is a chemical in the water mix that can identify the tiny dots in the plate that make up the image. That chemical dries the instant it touches a dot, allowing the ink to adhere to those areas. Hope that helps. Thanks
@@solopress : Thank you so much for your kind reply. It was very useful!
This was my question as well; thank you for asking! (And for the answer!!)
The imaged area of the plate is hydrophobic - it repels water. So ink sticks there, but not on the wet unimaged area.
Simply put oil and water do not mix.
The good VDO . May I put sound and subtitle for my country watch ?. I'm from Thailand .
How do we get different colors out of CMYK colors? & What is the use of inking keys?
The colors are not mixed, they are printed over each other.
Those metal plates they were loading into the press are like stencils, each one is different depending on what colors are needed for the label, when the colors are transferred to the paper from the blanket and cylinder it only transfers what was drawn up on the plates, if you were to look under a magnifying glass you would see tiny dots and all the colors that are layered over eachother to get the desired color.
You control how much ink is being distributed from the ink fountain to the rollers with the keys you asked about.
Older presses would be setup and keyed in by hand, so it’s not as common anymore unless you’re using an older press.
Modern presses use programs linked directly to the press to key in the jobs so the guessing is taken out of the equation and you just have to fine tune the ink and water % hope that helps
@@Balouthegreat thanks alot....
thanks for the video! the cmyk rosettes in these prints are dotted. what causes the dot pattern of the print in this entire process? are the press sheets etched in a dotted pattern to begin with? also, can you control the placement of each individual/granular dot in the software prior to printing?
@@solopress thanks for taking the time to respond.
I'm interested which step of the machine's mechanical workflow introduces the dots. Suppose we stop the machine in the middle of the printing process and use a microscope on the surface of the yellow unit's blanket cylinder. Would we see a dotted or a solid-fill pattern of yellow ink (in a region of the print that has a lot of yellow weight)?
Using a microscope on two items of a print I ordered, I noticed that the cmyk rosettes are virtually identical among the two in a certain region of the print. A high reliability like that leads me to believe that they are dotted on the blanket cylinder. But that still leaves the question of what step in the mechanical process seperates the ink out into dots.
Thanks for your comment.
The press sheets are not etched in a dotted pattern to begin with, it’s the image itself determines where the dots are placed.
Each CMYK colour is printed separately from its own plate. Dots from each CMYK colour come together on the finished print in a tiny rosette pattern that’s only visible under magnification. When observed with the naked eye, the combination of the four inks creates the desired colour. The process that creates the placement of the dots in their rosette pattern is known as Euclidean dot formulation.
There is an alternative called Stochastic dot which places dots randomly rather than in a rosette pattern, but we don’t use this method.
Hope that helps!
@@solopress I thought about it some more and I think it my misunderstanding is clarified as follows : in a cmyk rosette print, its etching does occur in a dotted fashion but it is NOT forced or done automatically by the etching step - it is defined by the image source given to the etching step. So if we were to zoom into the press plate , we would see dots in a typical example workload.
@@wuschelbeutel I think you’ve grasped it, in that the pattern of dots is not pre-determined. There’s no set template for the different coloured dots to fit into. Instead, the exact placement of the dots is created in response to the image as a means of achieving the correct colour in any given location.
The dots are in the image area of the printing plates. If the dots need to be moved, the pre-press department must alter the job on a computer. Moving the dots farther apart will cause the color to be less bold. Moving the dots closer together will make the color bolder. Altering the dots is called changing the curve. Most of the time, the job is set up correctly, so no curve change is necessary. Sometimes you get a whiny customer that wants a crazy shade of a certain color and the only way to achieve that, is to change the curve.
I miss working on the Press
Are the ink cylinder and printing plate cylinder perfectly synchronized and registered?
yes
@@solopress great channel!
Ink roller when engaged covers the whole plate. It's the chemistry that creates the image. No synchronisation required
Excellent
Really well made!
Solopress As a student Industrial Product Design, I was wondering if this same system could be used to print fatty ink (same texture, only fat-based) on a plastic (non-absorbing) sheet?
Yes, it is possible. The substrates need to be treated to have sufficient surface tension for printing or coating
In this case the UV technology could be used.
@@bobrik63 can you explain a bit more what you mean by UV technology?
@@Semtexxxxx UV-inks and coatings are not drying by oxidation and penetration into substrate but curing by means of chemical reaction cased by UV radiation - perfect solution for polymers (foils, plastics) and for metalized surfaces. A special equipment of the press is required such as: EPDM compound rubber rollers and blankets, intermediate dryers with UV-lamps, end-of-press slide-in dryers with UV-lamps, wash-up hoses suitable for UV wash-up solutions, UV-light protection devices. You can find details on many sources in Internet.
What does lazer etched mean............I wish these videos would explain better.
How does the aluminium paper knows what colour to stick and what to repel :/
Hi. There is a separate aluminium plate for each coloiur.
Well made!!!!
Thanks very much!
so to start a printing shop like this can cost you how much?
lots
The guy that lives inner city where i live just sold his car and so many of his own properties just to help his printing shop carry on. If we could afford the equipment here within the city, it'd be so much more convenient for us to print all of our package designs, lots of time and money for delivery would be saved(coz we're having other companies in another city handling the printing processes).
My family runs an offset printing company and we do almost everything in house.
To have the capabilities to do everything from start to finish, you are looking at millions of dollars. You can expect a 5 color 40" press (which prints a max sheet size of 28x40) to run you about $2,000,000 brand new + a couple hundred thousand to ship and install it. You also need prepress equipment: powerful computers, ripping and prepress software and servers, and a plate maker. For post press equipment you would need guillotine cutters, folding/scoring/perf machines, stitching machines, laminating/uv/finishing machines, die cut/foil/emboss machines, and more depending on what each job entails. Not to mention a large warehouse to fit all the equipment and be able to run the business in.
i still dont get it
how is the image details made!!!!
why is this method not suitable for printing 1 or 2 sheets? why
thanks a lot tiffany howles
It's too expensive to setup for just 1 or 2 sheets.
It costs alot to get the rollers etched i assume.
@@ChickenManiac the rollers aren't etched
i meant the aluminum plates@@lukeomahony46
@@ChickenManiac they're generally not very expensive, obviously depending on what type. The overall setup time to print one or two sheets would make it far too expensive. It's not simply a case of put the plates on and print a couple of perfect sheets immediately haha
So why are there so many rollers in the roller train? Why not just 1?
choo choo
Thanks, Brad.
The ink must be well mixed
One roller will not do it
And those rollers are a mix of rubber and nylon or copper, the rubber rollers must be a specific hardness range known as Durometer, the rollers must also have a specific finish which is measured in microns and must be set to one another using manufactuers specifications in order to transfer the ink properly. The rubber compounds must also be either ink receptive or ink rollers and water receptive for dampening rollers. See, its pretty easy, nothing to it.
In short to make a perfect uniform film of ink.
Who were the geniuses who created this machine and the process?
I'll let Google answer that one for you Terry. You're right though. They were geniuses.
Maybe ETs create this machines its too complex for humans
Printing has been around for centuries and perfected over time
Very helpful, Thank you
This is a great video!
Her voice made me resident sleeper
nice print show, i like it very much. printing online
Is Hexachrome printing still a thing?
Hexachrome isn't really used anymore when it comes to litho printing, although the concept of enhancing CMYK colours with additional colours is something that is done in digital printing.
@@solopress So CMYK inks have evolved to the point where the gamut is sufficient to make Hexachrome irrelevant today?
@@basspig Yes, that is the case. Hexachrome printing would still extend the gamut, but nowhere near as much as it would have done in years gone by.
@@solopress Although it is a different ink formula, I remember around 2000, buying a Epson Stylus color printer and finding that printing from CorelDraw, I could get absurdly intense colors out of it, on the level of day-glow paint colors. Really vivid pinks and oranges and magentas that jumped out as if illuminated by black light sources. Later printers I've owned could not produce such vivid colors. But I can see that extremely wide gamuts are now possible with CMYK alone.
@@basspigcan also use thousands of different pantone colours it doesn't need to just be CMYK
tanks you very much
you should include sheet-fed in the title. Reel-fed use the same principle but different method of printing.
You mean "blanket - to - blanket" method?
Lithographic printing can be done on a sheet-fed press or reel-fed press it's the same method
You didn't show the stones!
Printing: the easiest job in the world... until things start going wrong. ;-)
Very helpful
You sound like my art teacher
good video
Machine price
Can go into the millions 😮
Thank you very much.
Thank the vedio owner for sharing. I'm Cher, provide CTP and CTCP plate, factory sale directly.
Can we not skip past the beautiful voice of the young lady, I need to know who she is, I’d pay for her to read me to sleep
Thank you
no money shot?
00:25
offset plates positive working formula tale me now.
வ்ர்க் good mgn
நன்றி
Excellent
tanks you very much
Excellent