On Body Print in London & the UK

This is the process to print onto the face of a CD or DVD. There a two types of printing used for this process; Screen or Litho (offset) Printing.

• High speed silk screening printing up to six colours
• High speed off set litho printing up to six colours
• Spot colour choices including all PMS colours, pastels, fluorescents and metallic.
• On Body Print

• A screen is made of porous, finely woven fabric (originally silk, but typically made of polyester or nylon) stretched over an aluminium frame.
• Areas of the screen are blocked off with a non-permeable material (a stencil), this is a positive of the image to be printed, open spaces indicate where the ink appears
• The screen is placed on top of the disc
• Ink is placed on top of the screen and a rubber blade (squeegee) is used to push the ink evenly into the screen openings and onto the disc
• The ink passes through the open spaces in the screen onto the disc below
• If more than one colour is being printed on the same surface, the ink is rapidly dried under a UV lamp
• The process is repeated with another screen and different colour ink

• Litho (offset) printing is a widely used printing technique where the linked image is transferred (or offset) from a plate to a rubber blanket, then to the printing surface.
• When used in combination with the lithographic process, which is based on the repulsion of oil and water, the offset technique employs a flat (planographic) image carrier on which the image to be printed obtains ink from ink rollers. The non-printing area attracts a film of water so this is kept ink-free.
• Litho printing is mainly used for more complicated designs where images need to be very clearly defined.
• The advantage of offset printing is that the different images in the design will be separated and not run together.