Prinergy Screening Settings

[vaugh6288]

Hello all.

Attached is a photo of our current screening settings within our 5.2.2 workflow. We are experiencing some issues in grainy screens and gradients and I wanted to reach and see if anyone had some suggestions on what kind of screening angles they use.

Thanks!

 

[gordo]

Hello all.

Attached is a photo of our current screening settings within our 5.2.2 workflow. We are experiencing some issues in grainy screens and gradients and I wanted to reach and see if anyone had some suggestions on what kind of screening angles they use.

Thanks!

You are using standard screen angles. Your Magenta and Cyan are swapped but that wouldn't make a difference. Your Yellow is running at an lpi of 108% of the other screens (since the "Do not increase yellow ruling is not ticked) - that is also standard. Your using Round dot which is good (all dot shapes at all angles are the same). 200 lpi is an even divisor of the 2400 dpi of your device which is also good (no rounding errors to cause random extra pixels on the dots).

So, I suspect your graininess is not coming from the screening because that's all good. So most likely it is the press and ink transfer.

Have you examined your dots using your microscope? This is an image of halftone dots on the paper showing poor ink transfer from plate to blanket to sheet:




Perhaps the graininess you're seeing is actually slur, or doubling, or poor ink/water conditions, or impression cylinder settings.
Look at the dots close up and they'll tell you.

BTW, Below is how the above orange dots should look.

 

[Stephen Marsh]

I have seen this sort of “graininess” when people try to print to a higher LPI than they can actually print. Halftones “bridge” together, not all of them though – just in “clumps” over the sheet.

I note the “hybrid” Maxtone set is being used. Is the “graininess” in the highlights or shadows, is it found in flat tints or gradated tones? Is this litho or flexo? What substrates?


Stephen Marsh

 

[vaugh6288]

Stephen,

It is found especially in gradated tones and crossovers. We see on coated sheets. Litho print

 

[gordo]

I have seen this sort of “graininess” when people try to print to a higher LPI than they can actually print. Halftones “bridge” together, not all of them though – just in “clumps” over the sheet.

I note the “hybrid” Maxtone set is being used. Is the “graininess” in the highlights or shadows, is it found in flat tints or gradated tones? Is this litho or flexo? What substrates?


Stephen Marsh

His Maxtone Minimum Dot Size is set to "00" which used to mean that the hybrid AM aspect of Maxtone isn't being applied.
I haven't seen what you mean by people trying to print to a higher LPI than they can actually print and as a result see "clumping."
He needs to do a closeup examination of the actual halftone dots in the presswork to help understand what's going on. It's not his screen settings.