What is colour separation?
Colour separation splits your artwork into one layer per ink colour — each layer becomes its own screen and its own pass on the press. A three-colour logo is three separations, three screens, three setups.
Why it matters
It determines the screen count, and the screen count determines the setup cost and per-piece price of a screen-printed job. Simplifying artwork from five colours to three is a real saving.
On our floor
Separations are prepared in-house from your vector artwork. We will suggest merging near-identical colours where it saves you a screen without changing the look.
Common questions
- What file do you need for separations?
- Vector artwork — AI, EPS, SVG or PDF — with colours as separate, named swatches ideally.
- Can you separate a JPEG?
- We can redraw it as vector as part of the job, which is what makes it separable.
- Does a gradient need separating?
- A gradient becomes a halftone within one colour's separation.
- Are separations kept for reorders?
- Yes — artwork and separations stay on file; a reorder needs only new screen exposure.
Related terms
screen printing
Screen printing pushes ink through a fine mesh screen stencilled with your artwork, one screen and one pass per colour. Setup is per…
halftone
A halftone breaks a continuous tone — a gradient, a shadow, a photograph — into dots of varying size so that one ink colour can appear…
Pantone TCX
Pantone TCX is the Pantone system for textiles: colours defined on dyed cotton swatches rather than printed paper, so they represent what a…
Where this applies
Put it to work
Price any garment, decoration and quantity live in the calculator, or send us what you have for a quote within a working day.
Get a quote