Printing ultra thin lines

P

Patrik

New member
Hi!

When printing orienteering maps the biggest issue and problem is getting the smallest contour lines sharp and dense. The colour is brown ( a mixture of CMY) and those lines can be as thin as 0,11mm.

The best results I’ve seen are from maps printed by laser printers with a physical resolution of 2400x2400dpi. (Of course offset is best)

I’m using an OKI pro 9431 with 1200x1200 resolution and I’m happy with the print results except for the thinnest lines.

When I look at the contours through an 10x augmentation glass they appear as on the picture below. Yellow a little bit offset and the edges of the lines are not sharp. Is there a good way to correct this?

Better rastering by a rip software? Which one and what function?

I print pdf:s from Acrobat reader with PosttScript driver…

Thanks for any tips!

Patrik

IMG_8118.png
 
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The registration of the color separations is a function of your printer. Not sure what the tolerances are on that model, but when I have color separation issues that’s an adjustment, part replacement, and or service call.
 
namelessentity said:
Most color printers have an auto registration function if this happens. Thin 4 color lines are generally a little problematic on any printer, but you should be able to get it better dialed in.
I'm not sure if this is for your specific model, but I found this: https://www.oki.com/printing/download/45582202EE8_C911_Adva_EN_308782.pdf?id=45582202EE

Page 71 of that manual might have your solution.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the tip but this function is preselected on so the picture is taken from a map printed with the function active. When I turn this option off, lines get more dense but the width of the contours increases as well which is a problem because I need them to maintain their width( due to map standards).

The printer supplier believed the results could be better with an external rip.
 
Based on your sample image the registration of your printer is off ( badly ) or the tolerance of the device is not sufficient for your expectations.
The OKI device you mentioned is not a high end device. I agree with comments from @kslight .
An extra rip is unlikely to fix this, although it may have some settings to shift separations to compensate for registration issues.
Printing this on a properly calibrated high end device like an HP Indigo or similar will certainly yield better results.
 
We set all minimum stroke width for offset and digital to .25pt (0.088 mm - crop / trim mark width using a PitStop Action). We do this for all jobs and we do a lot of maps / architecture maps.
On our digital machine we occasionally need to run "Color Registration Adjust" when a separation is out of rego, If that doesn't work we call for a service.
 
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While you photo shows a register fit problem, I wonder if printing with Frequency Modulated (FM) screening rather than Amplitude Modulated (AM) screening will create a normal viewing distance appearance of being sharper with more detail?
 
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