screen printing > 4 Color and Simulated Process Printing

4 color process on a Navy blue shirt

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tonypep:
Without having images to view its a little tricky to comment on however......I've said it before whether true process or sim you're only as good as your underbase. With the right combination of film separation, screen making, and ink formulation you should not need to p/f/p/f the base.
I would agree that sim would be a better option due to the transparency of process inks vs the translucency of standard colors but again it all goes back to having good seps. Pricing can come into play as a 4 color process vs 8 or 9 sim which would be typical. I think most of us know that "seps in a can" have severe limitations but can work in some instances. Using a professional separator such as Dan who would; I believe; call out mesh counts and sequence, etc is invaluable. The extra upfront money always justifies itself in less downtime, frustration, and superior results.
tp

squeegee:
Even if you quoted 4 color process, on 2500 units, the difference in running it sim process would probably be 3-4 screens, depending on the art, for that many units those extra screens aren't worth much in the scheme of things.

I've tried cmyk on darks and the experience was frustrating to say the least, of course that was a long time ago so I'm not sure what may be different now.  I do know you can run 2500 units with one flash using simulated process and most likely never touch the screens for the whole run.  Sim process when done correctly as Tony said can make fantastic looking prints.

rushhourscreen:
Brad is spot on, why let the customer dictate the process?  You are the professional printer and simulated process is the way to go.  That is, unless you want to spend time on R&D learning how to create and print 4 color process on darks.

Fluid:
Was it a solid underbase or halftone underbase?  Did you use Tripple pigment inks or regular 4-color process inks?

Ultimately like mentioned before, that many shirts I would have printed it as a simulated. If printed on a automatic, adding the extra colors / screens would have ultimately speed up the production.  You could have kept your quote at the 4 color process or how ever it was.  Stopping to clean every so often like you did just adds way to much time to production.  The amount of money you would have "lost" on the extra screens, art and setup would have actually most likely not been a loss due to the increase in speed of production.

Dottonedan:
Thanks all for the support of using my separation service :)  Much appreciated to be loved.

Many customers get overwhelmed with all the colors they see and typically assume that a job must be done with MANY colors.
Often, a sim process jobs can still remain at 4-6 colors on white and not be process. Taking the "4 color process" element out, can be more beneficial at times.

It works the other way around as well. A guy quoted a job at 8 sim process colors. Once I got a look at the art I knew right away, it was more advantageous to do this one in process with 1 spot color. After all, when a job has large areas of 100% bright yellow,  100% bright magenta and  100% bright cyan, it almost screams process. It had a few areas of different colors that were easily made up from the CMYK but had one other that was unique.  This is what a good separator does for you. They can evaluate and determine the most economical and easiest method for production.

Each job is different.

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