[hiveind]

Hey everybody!
Recently I was doing a photoshoot and my competition approached me to inquire about what kind of equipment i used. The subject turned to screen printing because he heard I had finished a job for a client and wanted to know if i did screen printing like he did too, which i dont.
I said, "nah, i outsource to someone else and get transfers" to which he replied
"but you can't do 4 colour process can you? You can only do spot with transfers right?"
i didnt know so i lied and said
"no, i can do 4 colour process transfers too" so he'd leave me alone and go away and have something to worry about...
now, is it true? Can one do 4 colour process on a transfer, or is it limited to only spot colour? I'm still learning all the screen printing lingo!
thanks all.

 

[Rodney]

yes, from what I've read here, I'm pretty sure you can do 4 color process plastisol transfers

 

[hiveind]

can anyone confirm this? I don't believe first-editioncan. As far as i can tell they only do spot.

 

[Twinge]

I can't confirm it for sure, but I will clarify that you will need to do a LOT of quantity to make a 4-color process print affordable; probably 5,000 odd prints or so.

I have seen companies that said they could do this, but I don't recall which (I don't think First Edition did).

 

[T-BOT]

yes, 4-color process hot peel transfers are possible. Not cheap, try The Wildside.

 

[MotoskinGraphix]

Impulse does them as well.

 

[Jasiek]

Transfers are the most suitable to do 4 colour process.
If you look at a company like themagictouch. Making your own transfers is very affordable but only on smaller numbers. (since you don't have setup costs for screens and films and separations)

But you have different sort of transfer.

- the cutting foil, which needs to be cut by a plotter and only uses hard edge vector images ideal for simple logo's, numbers or text

- The transferpaper for white shirts, which you can just print with any laser printer and will have a bit of a film feel around it

- transfer paper that can be plotted for white, You have a full colour image but a hard edge around it, and you can cut the exact lines with the plotter (needs to have a vector outline, but your plotter software should be able to do that)

- Transfer paper for black shirts. Again full colour CMYK but this time printed on a solid white foil. This one should be cut by a plotter since you do not want the white to come out round the edges.

Plus the magictouch just introduced this other paper that allows you to do very elaborate cuts for a white shirt, I think they actually call it Wow or something.

But then again, If you outsource your transfers to a litho printer that precuts it for you, I imagine he has the set up costs again of making the plates and the stencils, so then It probably will be only possible on larger numbers.