[frolical]

I want to put the black and gray together on the same screen with just black ink. I heard I can make the gray part of the design a halftone so it'll print out gray.

I have accurip but I'm not too sure how to use it. Can someone explain the process of doing this for me?

I've tried printing with accurip before when printing all black designs with halftone screen option checked and some of the blacks ended up not being a solid black. I don't want that happening to this design, I want the black black and the gray gray.

Thanks for any help, I really really appreciated it.

 

[Bigfoot Designs]

Easiest way to do it would be to print the black as a black and then to do the grey as a separate print and just add that one to the black acetate. Not the best but it does work well, epecially since your grey doesn't seem to have to align border/border with another color.

Or print one in Accurip and another in black and place them together before you burn. You will have o adjust your exposure time a little for this though...

 

[red514]

what format is the design in, bitmap or vector? or what software are you using to edit the design?

 

[RichieC]

Well I don't know "Accurip" at all, but knowing printing, it is converting ALL that color ( in your case black) into a halftone rather then leaving it a vector/solid shape. Can you create a second black color, and set just that new black to halftone? It may kick out another plate as it may see the second black as another color.

What is the original software the design is created in? Using vectors and a clipping path of the characters, you could make your own halftone, but you'd need to know the finest dot or line you can CONSISTENTLY print. Make a field of dots or lines that will create a grey to the eye, then use the character outlines as a clipping path / mask.

Not sure if this will help you, but perhaps it will inspire a workaround.

 

[frolical]

how do I "set a color to halftone"?
The image is currently a vector. I can edit it in Illustrator or Photoshop

 

[red514]

vector will make this fairly easy.
your design should be done with spot colors (you can use Pantone Solid Coated colors if you'd like as that's an industry standard), no global colors.
assign a Red spot color to the red object and then a Black to the other objects. now select the symbols you want to be a gray and adjust the Opacity or the Transparency of those objects till you get the gray you want. (note, on press there's often an average of 20% dot gain so you will want to lighten further to compensate for this)

now when you go to print go to the Output section and use the mode: Separations (Host Based)
you should see the spot colors your assigned to the design under the Process colors. the spot colors should have a printer icon next to them and you can assign Frequency, Angle and Dot Shape

 

[frolical]

I can do the red and blue just fine I just want to be able to print the gray and black together on one screen, supposedly having the gray burned onto the screen in a halftone. I don't understand the process red514 just described.

 

[Greatzky]

if you want to print the grey as a halftone and not as a separate screen/color you need to Set your black as a CMYK Value(K=100) then set your grey for a Black value like (K=40).. that way when you go to separations in your image software it will put them on one screen and then accurip will print the grey as a halftone.

If you set the grey and black to spot colors then they will be put on their own screens/separations. That's the easiest way I know to do this. That's how I create halftones in Illustrator and Corel with Accurip or FilmMaker.

 

[sben763]

Greatzky is spot on with the rip it's all about the percentage of the color in vector you may need to drop anywhere from 40-15K though to get the gray effect you want. If you were working with a raster file you would just adjust the opacity.

 

[frolical]

I think I've got it now. Thanks so much you guys!