Why does every batch of silk scarves,fabrics color is not consistent ? How to minimize it ?

Color is an important part of branding. This is usually the first impression people have about the brand. No matter what kind of silk products, scarves, fabrics, clothes, etc., the color determines people’s willingness to buy. The continuity and consistency of product colors are critical to brand awareness.

Maintaining the color consistency of each batch of silk scarves, pillowcases, fabrics or other products can be a difficult and often disappointing challenge, because there are many factors that affect color, and each batch of products can only maintain relative consistency, but not completely same. Because in the printing process, the color is affected by many uncontrollable factors.

The first is the limitation of the unsolvable printing process issues. The current popular printing include digital printing and screen printing.

Digital printing: Digital printing is to spray dyestuff onto the fabric by a nozzle after high pressure atomization. This process is greatly affected by temperature and humidity, just like when we painting same colors on both a piece of dry paper and a piece of damp paper, The colors presented are definitely different. Digital printing also requires a medium "sizing" to promote the combination of the fabric and the dye. The concentration of sizing also affects the printing color .

Screen printing: Screen printing is not only affected by humidity and temperature, but also by the force applied by the printing workers when squeegee the dyestuff. The greater the force, the easier the pigment will penetrate into the fabric, the final color will be brighter. And vice versa, the color is lighter.

When the printing is finished, the fabric needs to be steamed and washed to show the final color. One of the characteristics of reactive dyes is that as the temperature rises, the chemical reaction speed becomes more active, and the color becomes brighter.

In addition to temperature, humidity and many uncontrollable factors that affect the consistency of printing color, the fabric is also a factor. Silk fabric is a kind of protein fiber. Silk fabric woven from fresh raw silk in season is usually ivory white. With the extension of storage time, the fabric will gradually become yellowish. Printing on different silk fabrics will naturally deviate in color.

The printing process and fabric are uncontrollable factors, there are also other controllable factors that can also cause color deviations:

Different monitors

Now everyone uses different monitors, and the images displayed by different monitors are different. In order to avoid this problem as much as possible, you can provide factory the Pantone color number of each color or the physical print proofs . If your design is too rich in color, you can also coordinate with your factory to try to use the same brand of monitors. And try to tune it to the same brightness and contrast,

Different machines

Different printing machine has different ink volume control and color curves even they are same model, so there will be deviations in printing. Printing workers will need to go through a complicated color mixing process to make different machines present close colors. Many factories always have one machine for sample proofing, and another machine for bulk order production, which makes it difficult to maintain color consistency.

Change design details after sample confirmation

Digital printing generally adjusts the color as a whole, rather than adjusting individual colors or details. If the color needs to be modified after sample is confirmed, the factory actually needs to re-adjust the entire design color once again, and the previous confirmation sample is meaningless.

How can we ensure the color consistency of each batch of silk scarves, fabrics and other silk products as much as possible?

1. If you choose digital printing, provide RGB color design drawings, if you choose screen printing, provide CMYK color design drawings.

2. Try to provide the designed Pantone color number or give the factory a more accurate physical proof for reference.

3. The interval between sample and mass production should be shortened as much as possible to ensure that the color of the fabric is consistent.

4. If you need to adjust the details or color of the design after the sample is confirmed, it is recommended to reprint the sample to confirm the color.

5. Before mass production, the factory is required to provide a comparison chart between the pre-production sample and the confirmed sample to ensure that the color is within the acceptable color difference range.

6. The factory is required to use the same machine to print samples and produce bulk orders.

In general, chromatic aberration is inevitable but can be greatly minimized, but all this requires a professional factory.