Screen printing induction

This morning we had our screen printing induction which involved receiving a lot of instructions on the process and logistics of the print rooms. We must clean off the screens (paper or fabric) before using them with a chemical called b-solve and water, a process that I think I'd have to try a few times before fully understanding. The screen is then dried and spread with a fine layer of a special primer chemical. Images can then be put onto the screens, by placing them on a massive UV or LED light, with the positive between the screen and the light, under a vacuum. There are diagrams all around helping with the process thankfully! Once the positives were on the screen we printed using a mixture of, I think 2/3 ink to 1/3 binder all mixed up. The screen needs to be clamped into place and flooded with ink while not touching any paper and then set down onto the test sheet where you can test its positioning before flooding again and printing.

I was fairly happy with the results although I need to develop a greater understanding of how to mix the colours as my orange came out quite yellow. This will all become more clear when we do our own prints at some point next week. I look forward to having this as a potential option in projects however I need to make sure I'm very organised to be able to do it all in time.