What is Screen Printing | The Process of Hand Silk Screen Printing
What is Screen Printing
Manual screen printing is a classic and traditional printing method. Luxury brands
such as Hermès basically use this printing method for silk scarves. It mainly includes
color separation, film printing, screen preparing, printing, and drying.
1, Color separation: After receiving your design, our designers will separate each
color in your design to make layers of different colors.
2, Stencil film: similar to a photo negative, it is a fully transparent PET (polyester film) film.
We print each layer of the color separation on a transparent film, and the printed part is
white or black, unprinted parts remain transparent.
3. Screen: A screen is made of a piece of mesh stretched over a frame which is made of
a synthetic polymer, such as nylon. We will choose a screen that matches the design and
the size of the scarf, and paint photosensitive glue on both sides.
4. Exposure: Cover the patterned film on the screen and expose it to bright light or ultraviolet
light. After a period of time, the area covered by the film pattern will remain liquid, and the other
areas will solidify.
5. Rinse: Wash off the sensitized screen, the liquid part will be washed away. These mesh
holes that form the required printed pattern will allow inks to pass through during printing.
6. Prepare for printing: After the screen is dry, place it on the fabric. Each screen is poured
with ink of the corresponding color, with the move of squeegee, the ink passes through the
mesh on the screen to form a single-color pattern on the fabric. After all screens are used,
all single-color are combined to form the designed pattern.
The advantages of screen printing are large production capacity and relatively high production
efficiency, and the color saturation and luster of screen printing are the best among all printing
methods, and the back color of the fabric is also relatively good.
Disadvantage is that the screen printing technology is relatively complicated, and very
time-consuming, screen printing will generate a lot of waste water, which is a highly polluting
printing method, and its minimum order quantity is relatively high. With the improvement of
digital double-sided printing technology, screen printing is gradually being replaced.
