I am looking at purchasing a VersaCamm for producing small decals for use on packaging etc and some of designs I have been asked to print are in full colour and often have gradients on them.
Would the VersaCamm make a good job of printing these? Or would the colours look pixelated? Am I asking to much of the VersaCamm to produce high quality prints like an Epson 1400 can?
As I need to often print large quantities and inkjet is out of the question.
Your help is again much appreciated.
Many thanks,
Simon
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Simon Blue Jay Designswww.bluejaydesigns.co.uk Providing quality colour stickers
Last edited by Rodney; July 29th, 2009 at 02:23 PM.
Reason: removed member URL - it's already in your signature :)
we have a versacamm 300 and have used for stickers/labels before and in my experience i dont think it gives an ideal solution....although the printer is a fantastic asset the labels were 'scratchable' whereas if they were rubbed or slightly grazed then all colour would come of , and the print was a little 'liney'.....i dont want to knock the versacamm to much as what it produces otherwise is outstanding , maybe it was down to me and incorrect settings/material, who knows....prob have to look into it myself
Also interested to learn is there is a good combination of material/ink that would provide a decent sticker. As stated above using standard ink/material they seem to scratch very easily. We did use the Mattes material but those are time consuming and ery expenisve to make for our purposes.
Johnson Plastics, Conde both have them. I believe their original purpose was for making such things as name plates on trpohys etc thus they are a lot thicker then a normal sticker. The also have brush gold and silver but if I recall in sunlight the gold brush actually starts turning back to silver. They do make a good heavy sticker but again the "paper" is expensive and they are a bit of a pain to make.
We have done stickers and put them on plastic mugs & glasses and put them through the dishwasher and never had them scratch up. We have made labels for a lot of things with our versacamm and not had any real problems with them. The latest labels we made were for some people that sell honey from their local bee hives.
I have an SP300 in my shop. When the ink first comes out, it is very volatile, after it sits for an hour, it may be dry to the touch, however I usually wait a good twelve hours before actually doing anything with it. If you're serious about scratch resistance, you will print with crop marks, wait for the vinyl to outgas, then laminate, then cut. Lamination will apply a lot more scratch durability to the print and also enhance its uv lifetime a little.
How much ink you deposit, will change a few things, if you go with the standard setting, you will probably have some banding, which will look ugly if you're up close, but won't be noticeable a foot away. If you go with high quality, you eliminate the banding, but you may end up laying down too much ink which could cause your vinyl to shrink if you cut immediately afterwards, it will also take longer to cure. I haven't had any issues printing out large poster portraits of people with the sp300. As for gradients, I seem to recall having a little bit of issue with them before, think converting to a bitmap solved it though (was a vector object originally).
I have an SP300 in my shop. When the ink first comes out, it is very volatile, after it sits for an hour, it may be dry to the touch, however I usually wait a good twelve hours before actually doing anything with it. If you're serious about scratch resistance, you will print with crop marks, wait for the vinyl to outgas, then laminate, then cut. Lamination will apply a lot more scratch durability to the print and also enhance its uv lifetime a little.
How much ink you deposit, will change a few things, if you go with the standard setting, you will probably have some banding, which will look ugly if you're up close, but won't be noticeable a foot away. If you go with high quality, you eliminate the banding, but you may end up laying down too much ink which could cause your vinyl to shrink if you cut immediately afterwards, it will also take longer to cure. I haven't had any issues printing out large poster portraits of people with the sp300. As for gradients, I seem to recall having a little bit of issue with them before, think converting to a bitmap solved it though (was a vector object originally).
Any recommendation on lamination sheets that work well with vinyl stickers?
Printing Decals on a VersaCamm 
