How Does Offset Printing Work

Printing service is used by most companies for different functions such as marketing and corporate communications. Therefore it is helpful to learn about the basic working of the commonly used printing process called offset printing.

The clients and the printers like offset printing due to its cost effectiveness for printing of large number of prints. This is the reason good printing service providers suggest the use of offset printing for bulk prints.

The ink employed during offset printing has oil as the medium and is insoluble in water. In offset printing, rubber blankets act as intermediate for copying the image on the paper, which is originally on the plate.

The process starts by preparing the designs. When offset printing started, the images had to be developed by the use of film negatives and they were later transferred to aluminum plates. This is no longer needed as the technology is available for making the plates in one go through an image setting system. After this, the plate is stuck to a cylinder with the proper side facing upwards. Thereafter water, and then ink, is spread on the image plates. The ink is poured over the image and to prevent it from overflowing, a thin layer of water is spread over the remaining part of the plate.

The image is then taken from the plates to the rubber blanket spun on another cylinder, so that it is reversed. The image is then printed with its right side looking up by cutting sheets of papers into correct size and putting them on a third cylinder.

The work of printing is completed by the printing company by consolidating the printed sheets using staples or paste or in any other way as per the needs of the client.

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