When you print on clear, metallic, or colored materials, standard inks (CMYK) can appear semi-transparent or have their color altered by the material underneath.
To solve this, we use white ink printing. It serves two key purposes:
To print solid white text and graphics. Without a white ink layer, any white areas in your design file will simply be transparent, showing the material color instead
To act as a solid base layer under your CMYK colors. Printing a layer of white ink first and then your color design on top makes your colors look opaque, rich, and vibrant, just like they would on white paper
File Setup for White Ink
All elements to be printed in white must be vector:
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Create Two Layers: Your design file must have two specific layers, named exactly as follows:
"Artwork": Place all your standard CMYK color graphics on this top layer
"White": Place all the elements you want printed in white on this layer underneath.
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Create a "White" Spot Color:
Create a new color swatch and set its type to Spot Color.
Name the swatch White (it is case-sensitive).
Set the color value to 100% Cyan (C=100, M=0, Y=0, K=0).
Why is it Cyan? This is a technical instruction for our printing software. It tells our machines "print white ink here." Your final product will have opaque white ink, not blue.
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Apply the Spot Color & Overprint
Select all the elements on your "White" layer.
Apply your new "White" spot color to them.
In your Attributes panel, set these elements to Overprint Fill (and/or Overprint Stroke). This is crucial for the layers to print correctly together.
Ensure Perfect Alignment: If you are using the white ink as a base for your color artwork, make sure the objects on the "White" layer are perfectly aligned with the corresponding objects on the "Artwork" layer.
If you still have any questions, please contact us. We're happy to help!