Blog

[The Note] Digital pigment printing: the eternal promise or a close reality?

Approximately half of all printed textile volume in the world is printed with pigment printing. Almost all of this pigment printing is done conventionally, with rotary screen printing. Digital pigment printing is still very rare. Why is that? 

Although digital pigment printing is likely to become major technology in the future, we are not there yet. There are 3 major drawbacks that need to be solved in order to make digital pigment printing profitable. In this blog I will explain what makes digital pigment printing challenging to execute.

[The Note] Digital sampling for rotary screen printing: is it possible and when does it make sense?

Nowadays, many printing companies combine both digital textile printing and rotary screen printing. An understandable choice, because both print forms have their own advantages and disadvantages. By combining them, you get the best of both worlds.

However, using two printing processes side by side also raises questions. One of the frequently asked questions to SPGPrints from our customers has to do with sampling. Can you make a digital sample for a design that will be printed conventionally? And if you can, does it make any sense at all to do this? In this blog I will explain the importance of sampling and what this means for the combination of digital and rotary screen printing within your company.

[The Link] Difficult designs in rotary screen printing: 3 reasons why Ortascreens™ can improve your results

In rotary screen printing, you often need to cover high-quality requests from brand owners and consumers. Geometric, micro- and halftone designs will be the most challenging to create. But what makes these designs so special? 

In a printing process, several elements have to be combined: the fabric, the screen and the design. The matching of these three elements can be hard in rotary screen printing, especially with the aforementioned difficult designs, but there is another way to look at it. All of these elements reflect rasters: a repetition of small elements in a regular grid structure. To make difficult designs easier to print, SPGPrints developed an orthogonal screen: the Ortascreen™. But how do orthogonal screens contribute to your rotary screen printing process? In this blog, I will explain 3 advantages of these screens.

The information below is visualized in an animation. Watch it here.

[The Note] When to use rotary screen printing and when to choose for digital textile printing?

Both rotary screen printing and digital textile printing are still widely used in the textile printing industry. Several printing companies, solution providers and trendwatchers expected (or wished?) that digital would one day replace rotary screen printing entirely. The truth is that both types of printing have their own advantages and disadvantages, which makes it logical for them to coexist (as explained in this previous blog). That gives printing companies a difficult choice to make. Which type suits their printing process and products best? Is it more profitable to print conventionally, or does digital printing provide more advantages in the long run? Many printing companies today have both digital and rotary screen printing in house. But when to use which technology?

In this blog I will list 7 different factors that show the differences between rotary screen printing and its digital counterpart. With the help of this list you can make a targeted choice. Not only does this have a positive effect on efficiency, but also on quality and customer satisfaction. That being said, let's take a look at these decisive factors.

[The Note] Combining digital and rotary: does a hybrid printing machine make sense?

Many printing companies nowadays use both digital and rotary screen printers within their production process. Wouldn’t combining the two printing methods in a hybrid printing machine make more sense?

A logical question, especially when you consider that there are manufacturers that offer single-pass digital machines with one or more rotary stations implemented. It does not look like a difficult mechanical/electrical job and a printer that can print digitally as well as rotary sounds like a useful asset for many companies. However, in the view of SPGPrints hybrid printing machines are rarely a sound investment. In this blog I will explain why. 

Note: we assume in this blog that a customer’s desire for a hybrid printer is based on the wish to combine both technologies in the same print job. You could also assume that the printer prints either only rotary or only digital in a job, in which case all the arguments in this blog would not be valid. But we deem that type of application not the basis for the request for a hybrid printer.

[The Link] The Future of Rotary Screen Fabric Printing: is digital textile printing taking over?

Back in the late eighties, when digital textile printing and reactive inks were being developed, estimating the consequences of these innovations was not yet possible. However, it was soon thought that digital textile printing would push rotary screen printing into the background and eventually even replace it. 

Now, almost thirty years later, we can say that rotary screen printing is still very much alive and kicking, despite digital printing continuing to develop rapidly. Can rotary screen printing keep up with this development? And what are the expectations now? How long will rotary screen printing last? In this blog, I will evaluate the past and forecast the future of rotary screen printing.

[The Note] Ink Pricing: 7 factors that determine the price of digital textile printing inks

When you are selecting a digital textile printing ink for your production process, from a financial perspective it might be tempting to go for the cheapest ink. After all, the differences in pricing can be significant and by selecting a cheaper ink you save a lot of money in the purchasing phase. But how much does this cost your company in the long run? What does it mean for the quality of your end product and the satisfaction of your customer?

To clarify that choosing for the low-priced option ultimately results in more expenses in the long run, I will discuss 7 aspects that determine the real price of ink. In this blog, I explain what information is actually hidden behind the price tag, so you can make a future-oriented decision when it comes to ink.

[The Note] Re-starting after COVID-19: what did the virus do to digital textile printing inks and our machines?

The outbreak of COVID-19 was a drastic event that changed the world harshly. In this previous blog, I already explained what the first consequences were and what I expected to be the long term impact for textile printing. Now that the world is slowly getting back to a more normal situation, we can start analyzing: what consequences has COVID-19 actually had so far on our industry? How do you deal with machines that have not operated for a long time? Can I still use the inks that I have in stock? And what can we expect in the upcoming months? 

In this blog, I will explain more about starting up again after COVID-19 by responding to some frequently asked questions about inks, machines and getting back to printing.