Art for Automatic?

[Logoman]

Is there a Tutorial or Class explaining how to do Art for your Auto? Underbase, chokes ect. when you want to get away from using Revolver on your Press?

[Sbrem]

There sure are a ton of videos on youtube, though you have to weed through a lot of them; some folks are not as sophisticated as others, so some of the advice is not so good, but experience will teach you after a while to separate the good from the bad. You'll have to make a mistake or too, but mistakes put you on the path to the "right way" whatever that may be. The better printers will tell you that they get their award winning work by going around the press once, and done, no Revolver type of program, as good as that is to have; it's a "fix" for the lack of a bigger machine with more heads and flash units. Having learned to separate before flashing came about, the biggest problem was a proper underbase, which very often simply wasn't used since you couldn't flash it. White usually printed as the last color, so it would stay bright. When finally getting an auto with flashes, we could experiment to find out what worked and what didn't. After getting a set of separations from one of the "big separators" in the early '80's, I studied those films to death. One of the best printers around told me once that if you need more than 2 flashes, "you're doing it wrong." So head on over to youtube and check it out, and good luck, you'll get it.

Steve

[tonypep]

And unfortunately most of what you will need to sift through is by ink/ press manufacturers or separators that have little experience in real world boots on the ground production.
First rule.......there isn't one

[bimmridder]

I could tell you exactly, step by step, precisely what we do. Then you could duplicate it all. And likely fail. The best answers come from trial and error in your shop, with your people, on your equipment, with your supplies. Just my humble opinion.   

[Sbrem]

How about you ask questions here? What sort of trouble are you having exactly?

Steve

[1964GN]

< disclaimer >I am FAR from an expert< / disclaimer >

I use PS for all of my multi-color SEPs (spot or otherwise) so if you use AI or corel this wont apply.

ALL art is to size at 300dpi. I choke the UB 2px for most but am starting to do 3px for some, and for larger/taller prints. We are still having film issues that is a subject for a new thread.

Say you have a image with spot white and gold where the 2 colors touch.

1) Create UB channel > select all white and gold > modify > contract 2px/3px > fill 100%
2) Select all white only > fill 100%
3) Create gold channel > select all gold > fill 100%

This gives you a choked underbase under the gold only and the white that shows will be identical in size. Now duplicate the image a few of times and sep each one with different chokes 1,2,3,4px, burn your 3 screens and let the testing begin. We would typically print UB/flash/top white/flash/gold.

This should get you started

[Doug S]

Definitely screen tension, mesh selection, image size and print stroke count are just part of the equation.  As far as the image size, I've found that a left crest print with small text that I use a .25 point choke and larger prints anywhere from .75 to 1 point choke for the underbase.  I use illustrator for 95% of my separations.  I use mostly shurloc frames, but someone using well maintained newtons can probably get by with less of a choke than what I use.

If I use a 150/48 for an underbase and a 225 for the top colors than I'll choke my underbase a tad bit more especially if I'm double stroking the underbase and doing a single hit on the top colors.