# What good rip software do you recommend?



## mtmob (Apr 21, 2007)

What good rip software do you recommend? Besides Fast Rip? That puts out good halftones....

And has anybody ever used smart vector pro? I saw a tutorial they had on there website and i was pretty impressed on how fast and easy it was to vectorize an image is it really that easy or are they overrating there product?


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## tpitman (Jul 30, 2007)

There are other RIPs, but those of us who are too "thrifty" (aka cheap) get by nicely with Ghostscript and Ghostview. I had FastRIP which worked great, but you have to get it for a specific printer, and all RIPS seem to use Epson printers which clog if you don't use them constantly, and are expensive to boot. I sold my copy of FastRIP and, while I do all my art on a Mac, I'm networked to a PeeCee that I run Ghostscript and Ghostview on, and output to an HP9800. I get film positives dark enough to print good halftones. OR if you've got Photoshop, you can skip the RIP altogether and output your separations as bitmapped halftones. I've done that also and get very usable films. If you're working in vector format, though, and want to output vector rather than bitmap images, use Ghostscript and Ghostview. Some have trouble setting it up, and occasionally the output will come out wrong, but you can't complain about the price . . . free.


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## DCInkCo (Nov 15, 2007)

mtmob said:


> What good rip software do you recommend? Besides Fast Rip? That puts out good halftones....
> 
> And has anybody ever used smart vector pro? I saw a tutorial they had on there website and i was pretty impressed on how fast and easy it was to vectorize an image is it really that easy or are they overrating there product?


I just bought ScreenRIP Pro from Screeners Choice, and it works great. For around $500, I got the RIP program, and it also came with the Advanced Artist training bundle for Coreldraw as a bonus. If you don't use Corel, you don't have to get the training bundle. ScreenRIP pro is so easy to use, I just installed it and it was ready to work. I use an Epson R1800, which I bought new for $400. I was very weary about spending that kind of $ for a rip program and printer, but once i printed my first positives, it was more than worth it. Very opaque positives, with crisp clean lines and halftones. Customer service is excellent as well. I spent months trying to decide which program to buy, and I am confident in my desicion to go with ScreenRIP Pro. I hope this helps.


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## DAGuide (Oct 2, 2006)

Definitely check out the iProof RIPs. Same RIP as Screener's Choice. So you will not go wrong.


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## JMD (Mar 16, 2007)

Tom, a computer guy I am not. I looked at the ghostscript and find the site and loading it very confusing. Is it as hard to use? Can you take me thru the steps to load it? Are there any other rip programs that can be used for HP inkjets. Thanks Joe


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## DAGuide (Oct 2, 2006)

PowerRIP SilkScreen supports the following HP Printers:
HP DesignJet 120PS, HP DesignJet 10PS, HP DesignJet 20PS, hp Designjet 50PS, HP DeskJet 1220, HP DeskJet 970 series and HP DesignJet 30 and 130 models

Here is the link to the page where I got the information from: InkJet Printers - PowerRIP ImageSet for Epson, Canon, HP Inkjet Printers - Software Downloads


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## tpitman (Jul 30, 2007)

I got this link from the US Screenprinters.net forums to a video in outputting from Corel. Any other postscript program will work pretty much the same.

GSGVvideo

this is a pdf of instructions for using ghostscript and the ghostview viewer.

http://www.coloryourworld.us/files/GhostviewPDF.pdf

I just installed ghostscript, then when I started ghostview I just had to browse to my .ps file created from the original program and output.


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## SpotMatrix (Nov 10, 2007)

Here is the link to the version of Ghostscrpt you want if your running Windows. After download just run the executeable and it self installs.

SourceForge.net: Downloading ...

The download and install GWview from GhostGum software. There is a nag screen each time you open it but just bypass it. You don't have to register.

Ghostscript install add an independant device postscript file to your printer list withing your application. I use Corel X3 as well and it works fine. when you select it as your printer you can make changes to your rip setting and print to file. It actually creates a postscript file which you open using GSView and from GS view print as normal to you regular non-postscript printer.


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## SpotMatrix (Nov 10, 2007)

Sorry I forgot the link to Ghostgum.

GSview


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## fooledbyfresner (Feb 24, 2008)

I tried fastrip on an epson 1510 which my brother bought through them and then recently on an epson 2400. The 1510 worked maybe once a day. It seemd like after one print and a laborious setup, it would error out and not work again until I shut it down for a day or so and tried again, even this was not consitant. So I bought the epson 2400 and tried that. I could not get it to work so I called and e-mailed support untill I finally got ahold of someone 2 days later. The guy quickly put me off with "you need and update" and hung up on me saying he would e-mail it to me. He forgot to ask me what I was running on. The update did nothing. So, after some more calls (it's best to call every 15 mins to try to talk to someone there) The tech guy tells me my computer is too new to work on it that they did not have an update for the intel macbook. No prob, I had an older g4 sitting right next to me. So I tried that and he said it was too old. Keeping in mind that the manual said it was set up for OS9 and OS 10 I said fine, how about I run this computer on OS9 since it says it was written for it. He said no, the OS9 version never really worked well. I updated that computer to what he said it needed and there was no change. A lecturer I met at a trade show suggested downloading a trail version of Accurip. I was sure it would not work since fast rip requires a dongle and a manual. Accurip says it can just be downloaded and works with your programs without being lauched. I figure this is pure BS noticing that the price was a few hundered cheaper than fastrip. I went ahead and called the number on the website and the owner and programmer of the software picks up and walks me right through the setup which turned out to be totally unessasary since it is pretty much pre configured. It was also written for my specific purpose of printing out film positives. Apparently through some research I learned that Fastrip is a program that was not written for screen printing and hacked to try to fool your printer into doing what you hope for. 
Anyway- accurip worked amazingly. I was completley floored and it made me feel like a big idiot for trying to get fastrip to work for so long. I ended up printing seperations almost day and night up until the day the trial ended. I stayed up the night before printing out as many future jobs as I could knowing the trial software would end in a few hours. As should always be the case in our business ( but not always) I made enough money from those jobs to buy the software. I can't say how happy I am with it. Maybe other rips work as well too, but my only other experiance was with Fastrip. It should send up a red flag when oyu have to set up a software application to work straight out of the box. If you order an app for mac, shouldn't it be pre-configured to run? If you google accurip you should find the site quickly. I should also say that during my trial period I had a seperation that was not coming out solid black. I called the support who returned my call within 10 mins being that it was the end of the work day eastern time and a guy in California figured out my problem which turned out to be non rip related. He tried my file out on the same hardware I was using and determined what I had to change in photoshop. I was impressed, this was just a trial version I downloaded in a few minutes- no manual or dongle, and nothing to open up after I answered the setup questions.


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## fooledbyfresner (Feb 24, 2008)

I tried fastrip on an epson 1510 which my brother bought through them and then recently on an epson 2400. The 1510 worked maybe once a day. It seemd like after one print and a laborious setup, it would error out and not work again until I shut it down for a day or so and tried again, even this was not consitant. So I bought the epson 2400 and tried that. I could not get it to work so I called and e-mailed support untill I finally got ahold of someone 2 days later. The guy quickly put me off with "you need and update" and hung up on me saying he would e-mail it to me. He forgot to ask me what I was running on. The update did nothing. So, after some more calls (it's best to call every 15 mins to try to talk to someone there) The tech guy tells me my computer is too new to work on it that they did not have an update for the intel macbook. No prob, I had an older g4 sitting right next to me. So I tried that and he said it was too old. Keeping in mind that the manual said it was set up for OS9 and OS 10 I said fine, how about I run this computer on OS9 since it says it was written for it. He said no, the OS9 version never really worked well. I updated that computer to what he said it needed and there was no change. A lecturer I met at a trade show suggested downloading a trail version of Accurip. I was sure it would not work since fast rip requires a dongle and a manual. Accurip says it can just be downloaded and works with your programs without being lauched. I figure this is pure BS noticing that the price was a few hundered cheaper than fastrip. I went ahead and called the number on the website and the owner and programmer of the software picks up and walks me right through the setup which turned out to be totally unessasary since it is pretty much pre configured. It was also written for my specific purpose of printing out film positives. Apparently through some research I learned that Fastrip is a program that was not written for screen printing and hacked to try to fool your printer into doing what you hope for. 
Anyway- accurip worked amazingly. I was completley floored and it made me feel like a big idiot for trying to get fastrip to work for so long. I ended up printing seperations almost day and night up until the day the trial ended. I stayed up the night before printing out as many future jobs as I could knowing the trial software would end in a few hours. As should always be the case in our business ( but not always) I made enough money from those jobs to buy the software. I can't say how happy I am with it. Maybe other rips work as well too, but my only other experiance was with Fastrip. It should send up a red flag when oyu have to set up a software application to work straight out of the box. If you order an app for mac, shouldn't it be pre-configured to run? If you google accurip you should find the site quickly. I should also say that during my trial period I had a seperation that was not coming out solid black. I called the support who returned my call within 10 mins being that it was the end of the work day eastern time and a guy in California figured out my problem which turned out to be non rip related. He tried my file out on the same hardware I was using and determined what I had to change in photoshop. I was impressed, this was just a trial version I downloaded in a few minutes- no manual or dongle, and nothing to open up after I answered the setup questions.


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## DTFuqua (Jun 26, 2008)

Will I need a RIP? I want to do photo heat transfers and heat press the on T's. I have a brand new epson 1400 printer. Will the drivers that come with it be fine or will I need to tweak it or get a RIP or something else?


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## A Perfect Pixel (Jul 4, 2008)

I primarily use Adobe Illustrator to do my art... it can create CLEAN CRISP art, even on inkjet printers with NO rip softs

if there's halftones in it, I still create in Illustrator, then I rasterize the finished art in Photoshop and halftone it there...

If my image has both halftone AND solid areas, I will do the gradients in Illustrator, rasterize in photoshop to halftone it, then place the resulting file BACK into Illustrator again... that way I can keep my crispy clean illustrator lines and have my halftoney goodness too... it's an extra step, but worth it in the long run

I output them all on an old Epson 1270 wide format inkjet on Vellum and have NO problems creating CLEAN art


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## DTFuqua (Jun 26, 2008)

Thanks Brian. You make it sound easy. I gather you said that I won't need to alter my system with either software or hardware, otherwise I have only half an idea what your describing as your methods. I have never been a graphics person so I don't know the terminology. I bought a copy of corel X3 and have been trying to struggle through learning it, with little success. I believe I need to check out the library for a corel for dummies book, or maybe take a course if I can find one localy.


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## A Perfect Pixel (Jul 4, 2008)

no problem. 

I'm a Mac user, so I don't know if you'd get the same results, but I would imagine there wouldn't be a difference.

I'm using epson factory drivers and getting great results without any RIP software on an inkjet printer

I have over 15+ years doing graphic design, so I started there, and then got into screen printing after designing tee shirt art for a company

Now i do the whole deal start to finish myself 

good luck


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## DTFuqua (Jun 26, 2008)

Cool. Thank you and good luck to you also


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## Trimere_Ink (Jul 23, 2007)

During my RIP research I came across Software For Screen Printers - Rip Software for Epson printers. Depending on what printer you have in most cases it's $100 cheaper than Fast RIP and if you have the option of networking, the software allows you to share to all your printers. For me it's a better deal, plus I've gotten the Bulk Black ink option. All 6 cartridges in my 1400 are black ink and the RIP software takes care of that as well. So technically it's only $52 more and I utilize better ink usage. But, you be the judge and do what's good for your shop. Just putting the info out there.


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## psyblade (Oct 12, 2008)

I have HP deskjet 3845 can i use it for RIP?


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## Mrs Lovett (Aug 22, 2008)

A Perfect Pixel said:


> no problem.
> 
> I'm a Mac user, so I don't know if you'd get the same results, but I would imagine there wouldn't be a difference.
> 
> ...


I am researching a new epson and I am also an Illustrator/Photoshop user that has never had trouble creating halftones. The only trouble I've had is with clogged print heads or useless color ink cartridges. So if I'm understanding your post right, and I hope you can see this because I know this is an old thread, you are using an "off the shelf" epson printer without the RIP software? We are thinking about an epson 1400 with the all black cartridge set. Can I really skip the RIP software save the $500 and continue on my merry way?


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## ewitsseth (Feb 13, 2009)

I don't understand this.why and how would some use a printer for silk screen.
The stencils? You can use photoshop to make almost any kind of stencil.
And what's up with the printers???someone pleeeeease explain.email me
Please. [email protected]


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## tpitman (Jul 30, 2007)

ewitsseth said:


> I don't understand this.why and how would some use a printer for silk screen.
> The stencils? You can use photoshop to make almost any kind of stencil.
> And what's up with the printers???someone pleeeeease explain.email me
> Please. [email protected]


Unless I'm not understanding your question, you use the printer to output your files to film to burn the stencil. If there's no postscript info, you can output directly to any inkjet printer. If you're outputting halftones, or trapping, you'll have to use a RIP, use Ghostscript, or set your halftones up as bitmap .tiffs in Photoshop, and manually separate your colors and add any chokes or traps.


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## ewitsseth (Feb 13, 2009)

i guess this dosnt really apply to me since all my designs are bigger than 
a normal sheet of paper.so a printer that burns out the stencils dosnt
really help me unless it can do so with 20"x30"


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## tpitman (Jul 30, 2007)

The printer doesn't burn the stencils. It prints a film positive that you use to burn the stencils. How are you imaging photoshop files to burn stencils if you aren't using film positives? A Linotronic imagesetter or equivalent?


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## ewitsseth (Feb 13, 2009)

i dont know all this lingo.all i know is i am an artist ,i make my designs on
photoshop.print it in sections.and then put it together onto the film.i took a short class in highschool and just did it myself after that.they didnt really teach me the lingo let alone anything besides an easy process.


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## tpitman (Jul 30, 2007)

So, what kind of printer are you printing your 'sections' from, and what kind of material are you printing them on? Sheets of paper and taping them together?


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## ewitsseth (Feb 13, 2009)

just some canon and ya pretty much i tape em together then spray it onto poster board and cut that out,so i have something sturdy to work with.my stuff come out pretty nice.something i would buy if i saw it.but im trying to get into screen printing so they can be top notch.but my problem is the size issue.i need to be able to cover entire shirts.up to large size.
any advice?
i havnt bought a kit yet just for this reason.


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## anglerboys (Mar 17, 2009)

If i am only starting out with one color prints do i need a rip program


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## tpitman (Jul 30, 2007)

You need a RIP to output any Postscript functions to a non-Postscript printer. If you are trapping or choking colors for a little overlap where they touch, or if you are printing tints of solid colors or halftone photos, you need a RIP, or, depending on your graphics program, some way of working around it. You can output halftones from Photoshop by saving your individual colors as bitmap halftones. You can also manually separate your spot colors in Photoshop and add a bit of a trap or a choke by expanding the border of each spot color shape by a pixel and filling it with the solid shape color (which should be black) to trap, or byshrinking the shape by a pixel, inverting the selection, and deleting the color from the subsequent selection to choke. You can add trap to Illustrator files by separating your spot colors into layers and adding whatever amount of trap you want by stroking the spot color shape you wish to add the trap to. There's no real way to output tints of colors created in Illustrator as halftones.

If all you're doing is one-color jobs that don't have any tints in them, you don't need a RIP. If you're doing multi-color jobs with no tints and manually separate your colors into layers or separate files and color them all black, you don't need a RIP. You should make all these single-color files black and white (not RGB or CMYK black) so they'll output as solid black on your film. Check your color in your program to see that it's 100% black, and not some combination of CMYK or RGB.

Alternatively, you can download Ghostscript and Ghostview and use them to output separations with trapping, chokes, and halftones, although as noted in other posts, using the program can be confusing and a little squirrelly to get to work. But it is free. That's what I use, and you can use it for any printer.


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## kbpp (Feb 19, 2007)

I have had ScreenRip Pro for a couple of years and have had trouble getting it to work. I posted two requests for help on Jared's website and have never gotten a response. Does anyone know if AccuRip is able to rip seperations?


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## Pvasquez (Feb 19, 2011)

ewitsseth said:


> just some canon and ya pretty much i tape em together then spray it onto poster board and cut that out,so i have something sturdy to work with.my stuff come out pretty nice.something i would buy if i saw it.but im trying to get into screen printing so they can be top notch.but my problem is the size issue.i need to be able to cover entire shirts.up to large size.
> any advice?
> i havnt bought a kit yet just for this reason.


Epson 7880 or the Epson 7700 is a 24" wide printer and uses rolls of film you can use it without a rip by bitmap image or use a rip Wasatch or Accurip will cut your time by hours if I understand what your doing correctly.


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## Pvasquez (Feb 19, 2011)

kbpp said:


> I have had ScreenRip Pro for a couple of years and have had trouble getting it to work. I posted two requests for help on Jared's website and have never gotten a response. Does anyone know if AccuRip is able to rip seperations?


Yes but make sure it's compatible with your printer as it's widely used on epsons.


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