# Halftones Without RIP - An Example



## Pwear (Mar 7, 2008)

We don't do many halftone jobs - most of our work is corporate logos and whatnot, so we haven't invested in any RIP software. However, we do get the occasional job that needs fading/shading. The pic below is one of our first practice prints using the "photoshop method" - it's a simple 1-color halftone print. This method works well for us and lets us hold off on the RIP purchase for a while, until we're getting enough halftone jobs to warrant it. I know there's alot of threads on doing halftones without a RIP, just figured I'd show an example of what the result can look like. It was done on a scrap shirt so there's some ink smudges here and there, but the screen itself was crisp.


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## ole Jobe (Jun 16, 2009)

That's not bad, but not as sharp as it could be with a rip. Even ghostscript (free) gives a better dot. God Bless.


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## PositiveDave (Dec 1, 2008)

ole Jobe said:


> That's not bad, but not as sharp as it could be with a rip. Even ghostscript (free) gives a better dot. God Bless.


Your eyesight must be better than mine, I can't see the dots.


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## red514 (Jul 21, 2009)

print looks good!

olejobe, not sure what makes you say he'd get a better dot if he used a RIP. you can't really see the halftone dots in his low res pic. If we saw a close up showing the dots maybe we could state that the dot pattern isn't very good for this or that reason.

I have a rip and use it often, but there's also many job i do using the bitmap halftoning method and i'm hard pressed to see the difference. in close inspection you can see the bitmap halftone dots (when done using an output resolution of 300dpi) looks slightly chunky/pixelated. That slight chunkiness is lost when exposed to a screen of 280mesh or lower and even more so once printed. To achieve a more crisp dot you simple increase the output resolution when converting to bitmap. 600ppi will generate a clean dot, 1200ppi and you'll have a hard time seeing the difference even with a light loop.

The big advantage to using a RIP is the time it takes preparing these halftone images/channels/ect., it saves allot of time. also many RIPs have allot of extra features that can be very handy especially the ones for maximizing film use.
all that said, there maybe an advantage to using a specific RIP with an inkjet printer that i'm not aware of. My experience is only with laserjet printers and image setters for creating my positives.


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## DNeeld (Sep 8, 2010)

red514 said:


> olejobe, not sure what makes you say he'd get a better dot if he used a RIP. you can't really see the halftone dots in his low res pic.


Sure you can. No you can't see each individual dot, but you can see their cumulative result, especially in areas such as the building in the background, the asphalt, the light haze around the car, the license play numbers, etc.

Don't get me wrong, its a good print all things considered, but Ole Jobe is right as well.


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## PositiveDave (Dec 1, 2008)

Rips do give better dots.


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## red514 (Jul 21, 2009)

DNeeld said:


> Sure you can. No you can't see each individual dot, but you can see their cumulative result, especially in areas such as the building in the background, the asphalt, the light haze around the car, the license play numbers, etc.
> 
> Don't get me wrong, its a good print all things considered, but Ole Jobe is right as well.


i don't see how you can honestly say that without seeing the actual dot pattern or a comparison. It could easily be the quality of the original image, poor stencil, ink bleeding.

As i've said before i use both a RIP and manual techniques and i'm hard pressed to tell the difference between my photoshop bitmaped halftones and the patterns created by the RIP. Is it possible that your rip is using settings that automatically enhance the grayscale image for printing before halftoning (adjusting tone curve)? Then i can see a difference (i manually adjust my tone curves/levels to compensate for dot gain on the press, that includes using an adjusted color profile).

I'm just trying to understand the difference between what the RIP is doing and what i'm doing manually in photoshop. With a RIP, you can send a low res image (120dpi for example) and it will out put a dot pattern based of your low resolution image using the printers own dpi settings (i think most bubble jets do 1200dpi?).
If i take the low res image and convert it to a 1200dpi bitmap, the halftone dots are very clean. The only difference i've seen is how well the pattern is generated (the spacing of the dots).
From my understanding, the real benefit of a RIP for halftones is in the amount of time it saves (it does save allot of time).

i'm not posting to bash anyone or how they work, i'm trying to gain better knowledge is all. i know some of my posts come of rather blunt and maybe harsh to some, but it is not my intention to offend anyone.


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## red514 (Jul 21, 2009)

PositiveDave said:


> Rips do give better dots.


can you explain please, how so do they give 'better' dots?


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## DNeeld (Sep 8, 2010)

red514 said:


> can you explain please, how so do they give 'better' dots?


Take a look at Accurip's youtube video:

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUTNFU0xR08&feature=player_embedded[/media]

Of course it is touting the greatness of Accurip, but the section where they compare a bitmapped halftone to a RIP halftone (about the 1:55 mark) is very accurate.


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## PositiveDave (Dec 1, 2008)

red514 said:


> can you explain please, how so do they give 'better' dots?


Printers rasterise at 300/600/1200dpi and then print on a 720/1440dpi printer. Don't. Rasterise at the resolution of your printer, otherwise you have to fit a 600dpi pattern into a 720dpi output and you will get moire.
RIPs have a monochrome mode. You are printing from a single head. Windows drivers tend to use a 'rich black' containing CMY&K inks. Ignoring the relative densities of the different inks, the accuracy of placement is compromised by using 4 heads rather than 1.
A decent RIP (Wasatch rather than Ghostscript) can give extra greyscales. If you have a gradient at 55lpi on a printer with 720dpi resolution, you have 720/55 squared shades of grey which is 172, you can see banding in the positive. Wasatch will manipulate the screens so that it uses a type of 'supercell' so that at 720dpi resolution it appears to be 1440 which is 686 levels of grey and a smoother gradient.
I also give free maths lessons


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## The Professor (Jan 2, 2010)

red514 said:


> The only difference i've seen is how well the pattern is generated (the spacing of the dots).


I think you've answered your own question.

Elsewhere in this forum someone had mentioned "Photoshop halftones are more like a filter" which I think is the best way to describe the fundamental difference. In pre-press in the offset industry I've worked with several different RIP systems in the $60-250k range over the years. How well the pattern is generated is _everything_. It's much of what you pay for on top of that $10-25k in speedy hardware. Last place I worked for added Stochastic FM dot capability to their RIP which, mind you involved no additional hardware just the software to do it. That alone was $20k.



red514 said:


> can you explain please, how so do they give 'better' dots?


Simple answer: Proprietary algorithms. High end RIPs use high end proprietary algorithms. Remember when computers were all 8-Bit and everyone was after the most "perfect" dither algorithm? Halftones are a lot like that.

For a long time I too believed a dot is a dot. 

I was working at a different printing place when they replaced their high end RIP system with a newer, (comparatively) cheaper RIP. I can tell you first hand there is a even a big difference from one RIP system and another. The old RIP had produced such beautifully fine halftones but the newer RIP halftones were noticeably coarse and grainy in comparison. Same dpi, same lpi. Under a loupe the dots weren't really much different at all. But how the dots were generated was somehow *very* different. Comparing even a solid area of spot color halftone was like night and day. I was amazed. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes no one could have ever convinced me that one 133lpi halftone could look so drastically different than another 133lpi halftone. And a designer at the time, boy did I ever miss those fine gradients.



PositiveDave said:


> Wasatch will manipulate the screens so that it uses a type of 'supercell' so that at 720dpi resolution it appears to be 1440 which is 686 levels of grey and a smoother gradient. I also give free maths lessons


*PositiveDave:* Sounds like you're using a Wastach RIP. How do you like it? I've compared the different screenprint RIP packages and Wastach is the only one that impressed me. There was that certain (high-end) familiarity to it.

I tend to speculate that some/many of the $500-1k RIP software packages geared toward screenprinters are using straightaway Postscript halftones the same as Ghostscript and simply adding to that the flexibility and convenience features. 

I did not get the same impression of Wastach. Your observations on their gradient handling suggest Wastach is indeed "rolling their own" as I suspected.

Great advice on the input/output resolution to avoid "noise" in your halftones, first I've seen this mentioned on the forum.


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## The Professor (Jan 2, 2010)

I think your print looks great Pwear. What screen and lpi did you use?


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## jsf (Aug 4, 2009)

Print was excellent Pwear. Good job.

I don't use a RIP and always play around with PS. I always do my halftones in 1000ppi and up. Like Red posted you'll still get sharper dots with the higher output resolution.


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## PositiveDave (Dec 1, 2008)

The Professor said:


> *PositiveDave:* Sounds like you're using a Wastach RIP. How do you like it? I've compared the different screenprint RIP packages and Wastach is the only one that impressed me. There was that certain (high-end) familiarity to it.
> 
> I tend to speculate that some/many of the $500-1k RIP software packages geared toward screenprinters are using straightaway Postscript halftones the same as Ghostscript and simply adding to that the flexibility and convenience features.
> 
> ...


Thanks Prof,
You are right in your deductions, screenprinting capabilities tend to get bolted on to RIPs as an afterthought, there are vast differences in the capabilities of different RIPs. Whether or not that is important depends upon whether you are pushing the boundaries.


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## red514 (Jul 21, 2009)

The Professor said:


> Simple answer: Proprietary algorithms. High end RIPs use high end proprietary algorithms. Remember when computers were all 8-Bit and everyone was after the most "perfect" dither algorithm? Halftones are a lot like that.
> 
> I tend to speculate that some/many of the $500-1k RIP software packages geared toward screenprinters are using straightaway Postscript halftones the same as Ghostscript and simply adding to that the flexibility and convenience features.


thanks, that's the info i was looking for. So using the bitmap photoshop method is the same as a RIP for screen printers. The difference is mostly noticeable for offset printers. I shouldn't have made that blanket statement about RIP's without mentioning i only deal with screen printing.


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## red514 (Jul 21, 2009)

PositiveDave said:


> Printers rasterise at 300/600/1200dpi and then print on a 720/1440dpi printer. Don't. Rasterise at the resolution of your printer, otherwise you have to fit a 600dpi pattern into a 720dpi output and you will get moire.
> RIPs have a monochrome mode. You are printing from a single head. Windows drivers tend to use a 'rich black' containing CMY&K inks. Ignoring the relative densities of the different inks, the accuracy of placement is compromised by using 4 heads rather than 1.
> A decent RIP (Wasatch rather than Ghostscript) can give extra greyscales. If you have a gradient at 55lpi on a printer with 720dpi resolution, you have 720/55 squared shades of grey which is 172, you can see banding in the positive. Wasatch will manipulate the screens so that it uses a type of 'supercell' so that at 720dpi resolution it appears to be 1440 which is 686 levels of grey and a smoother gradient.
> I also give free maths lessons


thanks allot, that was very well explained. I think my statement needs to be adjusted as i don't use an inkjet printer, where a RIP really seems to make a difference. 
i'm using an ECRM Harlequin RIP


I now agree there's a big difference when comparing a professional RIP to creating halftones using the photoshop bitmap method. I don't believe the average user on this forum, manually printing using mesh counts of 280 or less, would benefit much from using a RIP and would be hard pressed to tell the difference. 
Allot of the forum members are working on tight or shoe string budgets so i try to give options with little to no investment while trying to achieve the best results for their job.

I think Pwears print could be improved greatly simply by adjusting the mid tones and shadows using the tone curve, to increase detail and compensate for dot gain on press. I think if he used a RIP his results would have been very similar to what he printed and we'd be hard pressed to tell the difference.


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## red514 (Jul 21, 2009)

Pwear said:


> We don't do many halftone jobs - most of our work is corporate logos and whatnot, so we haven't invested in any RIP software. However, we do get the occasional job that needs fading/shading. The pic below is one of our first practice prints using the "photoshop method" - it's a simple 1-color halftone print. This method works well for us and lets us hold off on the RIP purchase for a while, until we're getting enough halftone jobs to warrant it. I know there's alot of threads on doing halftones without a RIP, just figured I'd show an example of what the result can look like. It was done on a scrap shirt so there's some ink smudges here and there, but the screen itself was crisp.


would you mind sharing some details about the job with us?
What out put device did you use?
what settings did you use for your bitmap halftones?
what mesh count was used?


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## Pwear (Mar 7, 2008)

Thanks for all the input guys - I didn't expect the thread to become so informative but I'm glad it did 

For us, it works fine for the few jobs that we do need halftones for. I know each shop has their preference, and if we were doing these types of prints on a regular bases I'd definitely look into using a rip to make things easier/clearer. For us, for now, the photoshop method is acceptable.

Some great info in this thread though, thanks!


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## jayvorgraphix (Jun 30, 2014)

what is Pwears?


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## sben763 (May 17, 2009)

DNeeld said:


> Take a look at Accurip's youtube video:
> 
> [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUTNFU0xR08&feature=player_embedded[/media]
> 
> Of course it is touting the greatness of Accurip, but the section where they compare a bitmapped halftone to a RIP halftone (about the 1:55 mark) is very accurate.


This is actually a marketing tactic. The 2 images are clearly at different resolutions. Accurip doesn't produce ant better halftones then photoshop. I'm not sure of their output resolution I would guess 600 dpi or higher. The show the other image at 200-300 dpi or less. Not only Accurip has a better preview. Look at the preview in Corel its horrible but capable of doing better halftone output better then most rips. 

I know this a old thread but since it came up I know this is what everyone has been taught over the years but if you look at images I have posted 80% of the halftones were created either in Corel or Photoshop. The rest were Filmmaker. I have done extensive testing and all the RIP hype is just that a marketing strategy. That attach image is a Corel create halftones 45 or 50lpi 1440 dpi output. Before I purchased Filmmaker I did run trial of accurip, filmmaker, and printed the same design with both plus the graphic options. Filmmaker did have a advantage at the time due to is being able to capitalize on the variable dot technology in most epson printers.


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## Ozarkmountaintee (Aug 4, 2013)

Isn't half the reason to use a RIP to lay down a more opaque black?
Without a RIP does an Epson inkjet provide a dark enough black to allow for a crisp burn?
Thanks for all the info


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## sben763 (May 17, 2009)

Ozarkmountaintee said:


> Isn't half the reason to use a RIP to lay down a more opaque black?
> Without a RIP does an Epson inkjet provide a dark enough black to allow for a crisp burn?
> Thanks for all the info



This is what the Rip companies want you to believe. The fact is that the epson OEM inks whether is dye or pigment have great UV blocking properties. Its not about how opaque it is but blocking out the UV. There is 3rd party inks that also have UV blocking. I use a photo dye from inkjetcarts.us in a CISS and refillable cartridges. 

You can make a Epson print from all channels with no rip, use a lot of ink and as dark as any rip but epson has safeguards that won't allow you to use so much ink that it runs whereas the rips bypass and you can make a big mess in your printer that takes awhile to clean out.


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