What program do you suggest for Seperations?

[Frog]

i just watched the ultra seps video. Looks like he has actually made a "no rip" halftone function in the software and he claims that if you dont have a rip his halftone generator will allow you to output may different line screens right out of photoshop to your inkjet. Anybody try this yet? Seems too good to be true? What would I need a rip for then if this actually works well?? I am really impressed with all the functions he's built into the software. I do wish that you could output vector though….

Well, looks like you get to test drive it for 15 days, so nothing to lose.

btw, for years, some folks without postscript printers or RIPs used a bitmap workaround to work with halftone dots.

[blue moon]

i just watched the ultra seps video. Looks like he has actually made a "no rip" halftone function in the software and he claims that if you dont have a rip his halftone generator will allow you to output may different line screens right out of photoshop to your inkjet. Anybody try this yet? Seems too good to be true? What would I need a rip for then if this actually works well?? I am really impressed with all the functions he's built into the software. I do wish that you could output vector though….

RIP does a lot more than just create dots. . . You can get by with GhostScript in the beginning, but if you are going to print halftones, RIP is a must.

pierre

[Appstro]

HAHA!!!! I got the Ghostscript to work. I have the Ultraseps testing and I output a grayscale  gradation screened to my epson 1430! THANKS GUYS!!! I just need to know what kind of waterproof film and what settings to select on my epson printer to make the most dense film now.

[Appstro]

i just watched the ultra seps video. Looks like he has actually made a "no rip" halftone function in the software and he claims that if you dont have a rip his halftone generator will allow you to output may different line screens right out of photoshop to your inkjet. Anybody try this yet? Seems too good to be true? What would I need a rip for then if this actually works well?? I am really impressed with all the functions he's built into the software. I do wish that you could output vector though….

RIP does a lot more than just create dots. . . You can get by with GhostScript in the beginning, but if you are going to print halftones, RIP is a must.

pierre

I will probably get Accurip with the money from my first few spot color jobs.

[blue moon]

i just watched the ultra seps video. Looks like he has actually made a "no rip" halftone function in the software and he claims that if you dont have a rip his halftone generator will allow you to output may different line screens right out of photoshop to your inkjet. Anybody try this yet? Seems too good to be true? What would I need a rip for then if this actually works well?? I am really impressed with all the functions he's built into the software. I do wish that you could output vector though….

RIP does a lot more than just create dots. . . You can get by with GhostScript in the beginning, but if you are going to print halftones, RIP is a must.

pierre

I will probably get Accurip with the money from my first few spot color jobs.

FilmMaker is the way to go and it is cheaper. . .
AR is good if you want something simple. It is easier to get going, but FM has many more features and produces a slightly cleaner dot.

pierre

[abchung]

I will probably get Accurip with the money from my first few spot color jobs.

I bought a T1100 instead of 1390 last week because I want to run Film Maker.

The reason is due to the following review on Filmmaker.

http://www.theshirtboard.com/index.php/topic,8010.msg80877.html#msg80877

[Appstro]

I have seen problems with Epsons and Filmaker on this board and others too

[screenxpress]

You can get by with GhostScript in the beginning, but if you are going to print halftones, RIP is a must.
pierre

Hmmm, news to me.   I have no problem printing halftones, but what do I know, lol.

[Screened Gear]

You can get by with GhostScript in the beginning, but if you are going to print halftones, RIP is a must.
pierre

Hmmm, news to me.   I have no problem printing halftones, but what do I know, lol.

I used Ghost script for halftones for my first 3 years. I then went with filmmaker to simplify the process and also try to get better detail. Film Maker is not that much and does simplify the printing process. It saves about 2 steps and also the dots are controllable. Honestly you can get away with Ghost script the detail is good and I even did a ton of 4CP jobs with it. It just takes longer to use and you have little to no control with it.

[mimosatexas]

you can create halftones manually in photoshop in about 5 clicks that will print essentially identical to what a rip will do (though there are some variable dot features in some rips that aren't quick/easy to create manually).

If you have your colors separated. either as channels or layers, you simply duplicate the layer/channel into a new psd file (duplicate layer>new), then change the mode to bitmap, choose halftone screen, choose frequency (lpi), angle, and shape, and hit ok.  now you have your halftones.  I do not use separation software, though I have started looking into it to speed up a lot of the repetitive steps of manual separations.  Outputting the actual films though is super easy manually, and all these programs that "replace" rips are doing is automating that 5 click process.

[screenxpress]

You might be right, but I had printed a couple films tests using bitmaps as you describe some years ago and then compared it to Ghost Rip output and I found the dots to be a bit more irregular and mis-shapened.  They definitely were not identical.

This is a nice writeup from Ulano -

http://www.ulano.com/ijf/whatdoesaripdo.htm

[mimosatexas]

I haven't used ghostscript as a rip, and I don't know what setting you were using to output the films with and without it for comparison, but irregular dots straight from photoshop seem to happen when you use lower resolutions when converting to the bitmap as the image is a raster in both steps, meaning if you create a small dot at 300 dpi, it will be much more jagged than the same dot at 1200 dpi, and the printer may print both at 720 or 1440 dpi depending on what you've told it to do, meaning a 300dpi dot printed at 1440dpi will still be much more irregular than a 1200dpi dot printed at 720dpi.  If that makes sense

[screenxpress]

I don't think that was the issue.  Pretty sure I used exactly the same sepped channels, but printed using ghost and bitmaps so the image would have been the same dpi and I would have selected the same lpi for both.

I only used bitmaps since I was sending seps to someone who did not have photoshop and had to output as tif bitmaps....if I remember.  Like I said, been a few years ago.

[sben763]

As far as separations go I have used and own almost all the major ones for photoshop and Corel. Ultraseps, t-sep, Simple Seps, and a few others. They all have their strengths and weaknesses.

As far as halftone output. All the photoshop plugins will do exactly what you can do manually in photoshop and is about the exact output as Ghostrip.  The dots are irregular and some what malformed. This can be good and bad depending on the graphic your printing. Accurip is a decent rip gives good dots and is far more consistent then the photoshop method. Simple seps 3 gives the exact output as Accurip when using round dots but that is all simple seps can output and both can print from all channels when wanting to use all black.

Then there is filmmaker. It by far gives the best output of everything mentioned. When setup properly it uses the variable dot technology that epson uses in its printers.  Depending on the printer it uses 1-3 dots sizes per resolution.   Some of the lessor printers like the 1100,7010,7510 only use 2 dot sizes while the 1400, 4800 series and higher end printer will produce 3 dot sizes.  This allows better detail, better gradients and overall better prints. 

There is no right or wrong answer but more of what type of printing, quality and design types your doing.  I've seen where the photoshop methods give better results on a simulated process print due do the way the dots interlock.  If you were doing a photo in grayscale Filmmaker would be the best option for that print although good results can be had with many different methods. 

[Dottonedan]

This has turned out to be a good thread. I have just started a little R&D on the side at my new job and I'm looking into getting the best options for our customers. The customers that look for the more accurate, more higher end halftones.

I don't know much about the newest RIPs and options. I just know the results of these digitally printed halftones these more favored low cost digital and thermal printers put out.

While you can look at them close up and personal with a loupe, you can't really see the most critical dot shapes and how it affects your ability to hold small dots... until you really get close up. I use a loupe that looks more like a microscope that is 50 power. With this, I can tell that the films from any of these dots still lack the clean crisp shape provided by a true (now old school) wet film imagesetter. The term "imagesetter" these days is used more loosely not to be confused with what they call todays imagesetters. Oyo, Calcomp and the like, now call their products "imagesetters" and they are not in the same quality category. They are digital and thermal printers.

See these definitions for true imagesetters.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imagesetter
http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/imagesetter


The Photoshop halftones are a good answer to anyone that doe not have (any RIP at all yet) and need to get a job out, but note, that these dots are not truly accurate to the line screens that you indicate for output. They are only "close" due to the fact that the photoshop halftone dots are resolution dependent. This mean that if you have a 300ppi file and output at 55 lpi, it will have a different number line count when compared to a 150 ppi file output at the same 55 lpi.
 A RIP should provide an accurate line count no matter the file resolution although, the quality of the image should be better at higher resolutions.

The below FIGURE1 illustrates the results on film (of the digital dots) as compared to a true imagesetter dot (bottom left). One might think that because the digital dots (sprays) are put down so small that they must be extremely accurate in forming a dot. To the naked eye viewing at normal distance, this is true. As you inspect the dots closer with a loupe, you can start to see some of the irregularities. With a stronger loupe, you can see that these dots are poorly constructed (as compared to the best option, being a true imagesetter). For digital output on tee shirts, they are par for the course and accepted by the best shops producing typical work world wide.

The average small spray is as low as 2-4 picoliter sprays or specks of black ink. These sprays are "in the area of" 4-6 microns and are non uniform in shape due to splatter, based on the direction and accuracy of the most recent calibration of the multiple heads.  These 4-6 picoliter sprays when overlaid, form the dot shape based on math from the output. Even when perfectly calibrated, the irregular shapes form (as illustrated), due to the distance a pico-liter spray travels from head to film or (screen) when output on a DTS) device. Since the heads can be as close as 3 pieces of paper, it would seem that these shapes are the best that they can be.

Another example of the limitations would be in a 1% dot of an 85 line screen. It's unlikely we would be concerned with this in tee shirt printing, but to illustrate the inability for true accuracy, I viewed a 1% dot in an 85 line screen and it showed two (2) individual sprays that were places within what would be considered side by side, (maybe 2-4 microns apart and only noticeable under a loupe. This was the intent to represent the size of the single 1 % dot in the 85 line screen. See Figure2

The above paragraph illustrates (why) we are not easily able to maintain a good low dot range such as 1-2% dot in an 85 line screen (in the screen) even if we wanted to. When burning screens for that, those dots would more than likely both be lost either due to over exposure, screen mesh selection, ink type, printing methods or just not printing out at all to the film depending on the film output device you may have. Some lesser quality lower cost devises may not put that dot on the film at all and even on the higher quality devices, results can very depending on the frequency of maintenance and calibration of your device.


Out of all of the separation programs out there, I believe any one of them to produce the same results. They all typically should be acceptable to your customer. Each will provide a slight difference in the level of printed results. All usable, all needing some tweaking. The more you learn about color separation yourself, the more you will tweak these seps to get them to be more like what you need. It would be compared to using 4-5 different professional freelance separators. They all will provide usable results and may all produce what is considered exceptional results by your customers, but the more you become experienced with the printed results yourself, the more you will want to get better results. How soon that comes, all depends on your own skills and probably the needs of your customers or the demand for more accurate separations.


Thanks for reading
Dot-tone-dan