In the world of t-shirt printing, there are few ways to print colored artwork on to garment surface. The most interesting of them all is the screen printing process that uses the CMYK technique.

CMYK stands for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black. You would mix these colors to make a certain color. These the same colors most home printer uses to print your colored documents. You have either tonners or cartridges of CMYK inks in your home printer.

In order for the printer or screen-printer to, for instance, print a certain color, the printer or screen printer needs to “mix a percentage” of just one or a combination of two, or three or all the CMYK colors. Tiny dots on the image control the mixing. The frequency of tiny dots represents the percentage of that color. For instance, in a given square inch of the photo, 50% tiny dots of yellow combined with 50% tiny dots of cyan create a shade of green.

With the home printer, the electronic parts, especially the microchip will do all the calculations and preparing of the CMYK percentages. But in the t-shirt printing, screen printing process, it needs four screens at a high-mesh counts (usually 305 mesh) if you are printing a white or light garments. But if printing on dark or black garments, it may require an additional 1 or more screen for the underbase white.

The CMYK screen printing inks come in cans or gallons ready for printing. Cyan has its own screen. The same with magenta, yellow and black.

At Poco Shirt Printing, we use the CMYK screen printing process for full-color t-shirt printing orders as well as the digital processes. The CMYK screen printing is best with white or light-colored garments and it’s most economical for big quantities.