I’m tyring to make some home made decals. I’m using an HP C4100 printer and Inkjet/Clear Waterslide Decal Paper. I’m following the directions that came with the paper. I have the printer set to Best Photo Quality, etc. etc. The deals look great when they print out. I spray them with two coats of Testor’s Decal Bonder as instructed. The decals are gold lettering to go on black steam engines. Problem is, when I transfer the decals, the color is so thin that it simply disappears when applied to the black engine tenders. Anyone have any help thay can give?
Jim - Conventional light colored decals printed with an inkjet printer when placed on a dark background give poor to very poor results, just as you’ve discovered. This is because lighter colors depend on having a white, or very light colored, background to show up properly. This is the downfall of using an inkjet printer to create homemade decals. ALP was the only company that offered a widely available commercial printer that produced a white under layer for use with lighter colored lettering, allowing them to show up as they should. Their printers are now very difficult to come by. Laser printers will do the job, but are fairly expensive to buy and maintain.
About the only practical approach with an inkjet printer is to print your light colored decals on white decal paper, then cut them out such that the white background looks like a banner, or something similar. Alternately, you could paint a white rectangle on the locomotive/tender and put your decals on that. Honestly, working against a black background with light colored inkjet decals is almost futile. I’d try a darker color for your lettering if I were you…or buy some custom decals for your railroad.
Can you really do that with a laser printer? I wasn’t aware that you could get significantly better color saturation with a laser than with an inkjet.
If that is the case, the answer may be to take the artwork on a disk and a sheet of decal paper down to Kinkos or Staples. They will probably charge a very minimal fee to run it through one of their laser printers. Be aware, though, that you need different decal paper for laser printers.
One thing to try is printing on white decal paper and make a backgrond that matches the background color of the model surface. If possible, put the model on a scanner to make a color chip. You probably will get some color bleed from the edges of the decal, but that can be touched up with paint. Leave at least 1/16" to 1/8" decal border around your decal lettering.
Thanks for the replies folks. I am using MS Word 2010 to make up the decals. It has a feature whereby you can highlight text. I had already tried highlighting the gold text with black. It works fine except that the decal winds up with a fine black background but when applied to the engine, the gold disappears. I’m going to try your suggestion George and send off for some white decal paper, highlight the letters with black and see what happens.
I make decals to put signs on buildings. I paint a white rectangle on the building, and then apply the decal over that. This works great, but I’m working with a simple rectangular image, so it’s easy to deal with the edges.
If this is to be on a weathered model, the white background trick might work for you.
This is a “white lettering” job I tried on a white background. I basically printed a black decal with white letters. The color saturation of the black isn’t perfect, either, so I ended up painting around the image. It’s in a back corner of the layout, so I wasn’t particularly fussy with the less-than-perfect image.
This one is just a lot of light pastel colors. It worked out quite well. Of course, once again, it’s intended to be a somewhat weathered sign.
Indeed, a laser printer is much less troublesome when it comes to making decals. The inks used in an inkjet printer are semi-transparent and will only produce their true, solid-looking, colors when printed on a white background (like white decal paper, photo paper, or printer paper). Laser printers work by a different printing process, thus the different outcome.
Concerning taking a master sheet to Kinko’s or Staples and having it printed on decal paper, it appears some stores will laser print on your decal paper, while others refuse to out of (false?) concern for their machines. One may need to shop around to find a store that’s OK with doing the work.
Can you put your lettering within a black box as the decal image? Then print it on white decal paper. You’ll only have to cut out close to the imge, then Dullcote over it when it dries.
Thanks Modern Modeler. That’s exactly what my plan B is. I have sent off for white decal paper. It will be next week before they will be shipping after the holidays. The MS Word 2010 that I’m using has a capability to insert a dialog box. I tried it, filled its background with black and printed the gold lettering on it. I tried it on the decal paper I have and it looks really good. When I get the white paper, I’ll be able to put the whole thing together. I think the dullcoat will make it blend in.
I’ve spent a lot of time with this issue. You’ve gotten some very good input so far. My experience has been that it’s a total waste of time to even consider an inkjet. Yes, with an enormous amount of work you can get them to work…sort of.
Lasers are the way to go. No need to buy one. As was previously mentioned Staples or Kinkos have machines of much higher quality than what we could affort to purchase on our own. You’re looking at a about a dollar per sheet for them to print them which is virtually free. Just have them run a test sheet on blank paper first to make sure they have the sizing right. When you save your file make sure you do so at a higher resolution such as 600dpi.
In terms of paper I’ve had excellent luck with Micro Mark white for laser printers. I’ve never had any luck with clear paper for the reasons other posters mentioned. It’s white or nothing. The Micro Mark has a different feel to it. Rather than using decal set, which is the norm, with their paper I’ve had better luck just gently pushing downwards over the decals with a cloth rag.
Flashware - When I say a “darker color” I’m referring to a red, or blue. Being denser, they are at the same time much less transparent and will show up quite well.
As to gold, perfectly good results can be obtained, just as I suggest, by printing gold on white decal paper, as well as over-printing the white background of the decal paper black, as others have suggested here (as long as you are careful a
Great info, very creative methods given to solve the problem. If all else fails, a simple, small scale silk screen system can make the best decals. I don’t remember seeing anything in the trade publications on this for a few decades, but perhaps someone out there has the methods and supply sources required.
This would allow you to print on the clear sheets, and your screens can be used over and over. For one time decals, the cost (especially in time) and effort would not be worth it, so the other tips would be better.
This is my solution to making white letter decals, when I am ready for them.
Mister Beasley and Morgan got me to thinking…Wasn’t there a steam loco weathering article in the December MR? IIRC, the most weathered loco in the 3 they showed was more of a light gray rather than “Engine black” or the 1/3rd -cut-with-white from that dead black. So - is it possible that the Ink Jet decals would show up better on a well weathered loco?
