Halftones on a base print

[3Deep]

Ok had a print yesterday whip my azz, halftone print on a white base and the dot gain was like nothing I ever saw.  I might answer my own question but you guys can tell me if you agree or tell me a better way of doing this.  So I'm printing a teal shirt 5 color job but the royal blue has the halftone so I give it a 50% tint and print the solid royal direct on the shirt.  If I'm thinking correct I should have sepped the halftone at 25 to 35% and the dot gain would have been at the 50% I had on my computer screen instead of it bulking up to 60 to 70 percent from sepping it at the 50% on my computer screen.  Sometimes I forget that once I sep my film I need to back off the halftone percentage if I'm going to print on a solid base, can yall help a brother out here, thanks in advance.

darryl

[mimosatexas]

For a large area of a single shade of a color (say 50% opacity in photoshop of said color) I usually will drop it 15-20% AND use as high a mesh count as possible to prevent gain.  I always see a little gain from the actual print stroke, and a little gain from the next color squishing (even when flashed).  I error on the low side vs the high.  If everything ends up being super tight and you only see a little gain, you can adjust flood, angle, pressure, speed, stroke twice, etc to increase gain on press.  A lot harder to back off than it is to increase the gain in my opinion.

[JBLUE]

Unlinearized 50% is really like a 70% dot on the film. Add another 15% for on press and now your at an 85% dot on the shirt. You will want to drop it carefully.