subject: Sticker Printing as an Art Form [print this page] Sticker Printing as an Art Form Sticker Printing as an Art Form
Pop culture has a popular avenue for expression in the display of bumper stickers. These vinyl travel companions have been sharing wit, political views, and advertisements since the 1930's. These quick blurbs are brought to the public by the hard working professionals of the sticker printing industry. They deserve a hearty thank you for the levity that they provide to rush hour traffic.
A lot of hard work goes into creating these posterior accoutrements. The entire process of sticker printing is the domain of trained professionals. The process starts with skilled and imaginative designers. They use specialized software to create the clever slogans and eye catching designs that the public loves. With their talents, graphic designers can reproduce virtually any image and any two-dimensional shape on a bumper sticker.
After the designer has finished their layout, the concept moves on in the sticker printing process. Its next destination is the screen printing procedure. Screen printing is a long used process that basically uses stencils. First, a piece of screening material is stretched over a frame. Portions of this material are impermeable, while an area in the shape of the sticker's design will allow ink to pass through. Then, ink is poured onto one end of the screen, creating a reservoir. A squeegee is dragged across the screen, forcing the ink through the stencils and onto the sticker. In screen printing, a separate screen must be used for each color, and each screen will only have stencils for the portion of the design that is in a particular color.
In professional sticker printing, multiple quantities of the same sticker will be on one screen. This makes it quicker to print a large quantity of stickers by printing several on one page. Now, the stickers have to be cut. The sheets of stickers are set out in large stacks. Each of the stacks will be entered into a machine that cuts them quickly and accurately.
After the cutting, the sticker printing process is almost complete. All that is left is the packaging, shipping, merchandising, and all the steps that put the stickers into the hands of the public. It sounds easy when the sticker printing process is laid out in a few paragraphs, but the reality is quite different. It takes the efforts of many professionals in the sticker printing industry to provide this much loved service.
