I often am asked about what to use for scooping ink out of buckets and onto screens for screen printing. There are many solutions to this that range from specially made spatulas for printing to the simple piece of cardboard. If you do any amount of screen printing on a regular basis, you know that is is necessary to have a good set of ink handling tools.
In this video I share with you the simple solution I use for ink scoops or what I sometimes call spatulas. The video is called, “How To Screen Print: Ink Scoops Or Spatulas”. This video is part of a new series of videos I will be doing called Quick Tips. Most of the time these will be shorter videos that feature a subject perfect for a quick 5minutes or less video. In some cases the video may run longer than 5 minutes but the subject will be simple and focused to a small aspect of screen printing.
I hope these will add more rounded information to the YouTube channel and provide you all with some inside information about the small things I may overlook or take for granted as an experienced printer.
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I would say go with cardboard. It’s cheap and relatively easy to handle. It’s probably readily available if your doing a fair amount of work on a weekly basis you can spare like 10 to 20 boxes per week. Plastic spatulas are great but they also get extremely dirty depending on the volume of work your doing and cause major problems when your trying to keep colors out of your under base or any other colors for that matter. but a lot of that depends on who’s cleaning your equipment. Just a thought love the blog.
I find the metal scraping knives are best for me. They are easy enough to clean and are pretty cheap. I think it reduces waste and keeps things more tidy. The scraping knives also scrape the ink off the screen very well leaving much less to waste and clean up. Cardboard can absorb plasticizers over time and with a big glob of ink, they can become unruly. I find it lacks the rigidity I want in an ink handling tool. And I use most all of my boxes for customers or storage. But if the cardboard works for you and you like it, then that is what matters most. Printing is one of those trades that each printer makes his or her own. Thanks for your input! I appreciate the comment, good luck to you. Glad you like the blog! Thanks.