WaterSlides or ... ?

[GenoBluzGtr]

I'm seeing a few very nice looking pedals in the build reports thread and was wondering how some of the graphic images are so nice and sharp and very colorful. Is it because of using a color laser? perhaps something other than waterslide produces sharper results?

I am using an Inkjet and clear coating the image before dunking, but I also notice there is no such thing and printing WHITE letters... they just come out clear. Any advice or pointing me to a good link would be appreciated. Thanks!

 

[Barry]

I use a color laser jet, if you want white lettering you can get white waterslide paper, haven't used it myself so not sure if dark colors would bleed through, I recently bought some vinyl adhesive sheets that are white but haven't tried them yet

 

[JetFixxxer]

I have use an inkjet and I'm not happy with the print. It looks nice with the backing paper, but once you removed it the its' so see through it doesn't look good.

 

[Barry]

I have use an inkjet and I'm not happy with the print. It looks nice with the backing paper, but once you removed it the its' so see through it doesn't look good.

Yeah I stick with darker ink and light colored enclosures, started out using inkjet, laser is a little better

 

[Ratimus]

The white decal paper is thicker than the clear (at least the stuff I've used is) so that's something to be mindful of. This causes a visible white outline around the decal, so you have to find some way to deal with it. If the decal is black at the edges you can use a sharpie.

For the clear, think of it like the opposite of a movie projector. You can't project "darkness" so the darkest image you can get is the screen itself with no light at all. That's why you turn the lights down- to increase the contrast between maximum dark (i.e. minimum light) and maximum light. With clear decals, it works the opposite direction. The lightest you can get is where the decal is clear, so the lighter enclosure = better contrast.

If you apply some tricks from black and white photography, you can take advantage of how local contrast can make things much brighter or darker than they would on their own, like this space dude: