Decorating inkjet printing

Obata S, Yokoyama H, Oishi T, Usui M, Sakurada O, Hashiba M. (2004) Preparation of aqueous pigment slurry for decorating whiteware by inkjet printing. /Mater Set 39 2581-2584. 

Detail on printing and decoration as applied to planar surfaces such as paper and board can be found in many textbooks. However, the decoration and printing of packs, packaging materials and packaging components, many of which are non-planar surfaces, involves processes additional to the conventional ones. This chapter therefore briefly discusses these many processes, which continue to increase (comparatively recent additions include inkjet, laser and thermal printing). 

Transfer printing uses specialist paper printed by an inkjet printer with sublimation or other dyestuffs for later transfer to a textile substrate. Bulk volumes for yardage will be printed onto rolls of paper for later matching with rolls of imprinted fabric, whereas smaller amounts of transfers are likely to be printed onto paper precut to size. Used extensively in commercial garment decoration, such papers are also available for the home or hobby market, often distributed like ink as compatible consumables by desktop ink jet printer manufacturers such as Hewlett Packard or Epson. Different types of transfers allow nonsublimation dyestuffs to be used as well as substrates of fiber types other than polyester, with transfer processes falling into four different categories (Kiron, 2012) ... 

The use of inkjet printers to deposit UV materials accurately and reliably for applications other than traditional printing is growing rapidly there are countless examples of inkjet being used in the field for coating and decorative applications. 

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