The YUDU is a fun machine for home crafters, however, when it comes multiple color registration it does have its limitations. If you are just laying color over color it is fine and you can get some really cool looking images that way. If you need accurate registration when laying color next to color, then you may have some problems.
I have tried all the tricks I could find to minimize the problems by researching and using every trick others have used. I started with spot color separation images that had registration marks applied by Photoshop. I checked them on the light table then I carefully burned my screens, made sure everything was lined up every time.
I noticed earlier on that when I placed the screen on the pegs before burning that there was a little play, the screen would /can shift a bit. So before burning, I pushed the screen up and taped it down. As this was a three color image I burned all three images the same way.
The next two things I found were ideas posted here here.
- The first idea was to make sure that the hinge posts were shimmed very tightly in the the body of the machine so as to keep that movement to a minimum.
- The next thing was, after I placed the burned screen into the screen holder I pushed it up to the top (which again was only bit) and taped the sides to prevent any movement of the screen.
I did this for all three screens as I moved from color to color.
While printing all three colors I tried in vain to keep the screen frame from moving while pulling the ink, however, there is still a tiny bit of movement in the screen frame due to the fact it is made of plastic. If it moves a bit to the right with one color then moves a bit to the left with the next color and moves a bit up or down with the third color….. Well you get the idea. All these bits of movement can and do add up.
I printed 7 images on watercolor paper and got basically seven different results. I expected this to happen as I read in different places about this limitation with the YUDU. I had to test it and see for myself. Still the YUDU is a great and fun machine for the home crafter/hobbyist who is interested in printing one perhaps two color registrations or color over color. But it’s not capable of doing fine registration with multiple colors.
Cya, Al
Cool blog! I have never tried Screen Printing. It looks really cool. Happy SITS Saturday Sharefest!
Merry120´s last blog ..Meal Planning Week 3 & 4
Thank you Merry. I bet you would enjoy screen printing. Thanks for visiting.
Michelle
i wish i knew this before i started printing.
i’m trying to do an edition of 40 prints with 8 different color to color layers…
i started to realize with the 2nd layer that things were VERY OFF.
considering i’m only on the 3rd layer, i still have time to save things… but i dont really know how to go about doing this.
i guess i put a little too much faith into my yudu machine.