Need help choosing printer

As long as the image is opague you should be fine.

If it's not, print the image twice, and tape them together.

A lot of times, the reason Epson is recommended is RIP's are available for them. It's easier to develop a RIP that does halftoning for Epson than HP. If you don't need halftones, then any printer (as Selanac said) that prints opaque enough will work fine.

how do i know which printers print opaque?

dawebmastr said:

how do i know which printers print opaque?

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Most inkjets on the market today will. The trick is to find the right settings when you print. A waterproof film most likely works the best whichever printer you choose, using dye or pigment inks.

JeridHill said:

Most inkjets on the market today will. The trick is to find the right settings when you print. A waterproof film most likely works the best whichever printer you choose, using dye or pigment inks.

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i have waterproof film i bought from silkscreen printing
and my printers i have i used for just school papers i tried to use them and i didnt get any good results

i have some cheap printers a canon mp499 and canon ip2700
i was screwing with the print settings in photoshop and did something where it would print the white background not white a dark color idk.... weird... and the ink can scartch right off the transparent paper when i thought it shouldnt...

JeridHill said:

Most inkjets on the market today will. The trick is to find the right settings when you print. A waterproof film most likely works the best whichever printer you choose, using dye or pigment inks.

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I agree that most inkjets are fine. It's the film or velum that you use that makes a difference. Ink too. Somebody mentioned that if you can double up positives and tape them together to make the black more opaque. This is what I do as I am using a Epson Workforce 1100 with cheap-o, multipurpose transparencies and the ink cartridges it came with. This was the cheapest large format printer I could find and works well.

Pigment inks will scratch off of the film, that's the downfall of pigments. We have a RIP so it is dense all the time. If you don't use a RIP, you need to try to find the right settings for whichever printer you are using. It's literally trial and error.

I was using some transparencies that came with a press I ordered from silkscreeningsupplies it worked great. It had almost a blue tint to it, I tried to reorder and ended up getting some waterproof R-film that is not working so well for me so now I'm dealing with the same thing trying to find settings to get it opaque enough. So far no luck but if I come across something I will let you know.

Opague means Dark. So if your printer prints the ink thick and Dark where you can't see through it your fine.

Film is usually only Water Proof on one side. So if you buy Fixxons, you can only print your image on the Waterproof side. They mark the package it comes it to say Print on This Side.

You'll need to know which direction your printer prints from. I.E. the printer prints on the top or facing up or on the bottom, paper or film facing down. Epsons usually print on the Top.

Thanks for all the input, however I just found a great deal on an Epson Workforce 1400 so i'll definitely be going with that printing system.

I know quite a few people who use the 1400 without a RIP and they do well with it.