UV Printing - Large Format

[Scheelings]

I'm looking at getting some prints from my M8 done and my local print shop informed me that they use UV printing on something called 'photoblock'.

Language is an issue (I don't speak Turkish), but from what I understand, they want PDF files. Does this use CMYK or is there only one standard file?

This is the first time I'm going to print something - so am I best finding out what printer they're using so that I can better understand its limitations?


Is this considered relatively new technology? I'd never heard of it - how does it rate against high quality photopaper with 'gallery standard' printers?

I am probably just guessing here, but it seemed that sizing was able to be customized. I couldn't find a chart anywhere...so I presume that I simply give them dimensions?

 

[x-ray]

This is a new one with me too at least as far as photography.

I do know that lithographic printers (digital printing presses) often use PDF files to print from. There are advantages from what my clients say. I'll ask today and post tge response.

There's no cmyk vs rgb in the PDF world. There are however different quality/compression levels. I'd save my file at the highest quality level.

 

[x-ray]

This might help

https://talkingpdf.org/why-pdf/

 

[Scheelings]

This might help

https://talkingpdf.org/why-pdf/

I understand how PDFs are beneficial outside of photography, but that link adds nothing new to what I already know about PDF files.

I don't know much about printing at all however am I'm surprised that PDFs might be used.

 

[gns]

UV refers to the ink. UV inks are cured by exposure to UV light. As opposed to air-dried inks. UV inks are used in a variety of printing processes, including some ink jet. My bet is that they are using ink jet and the inks set will be cmyk or cmyk+additional colors like most ink jet these days.

 

[Dwig]

...
There's no cmyk vs rgb in the PDF world. ...

Actually, there is.

PDF is a metafile format that can contain bitmap images, vector art, live text, embedded fonts, and several other entities. The bitmap images can be CMYK, RGB, Grayscale, or Binary and can be uncompressed or compressed with a range of methods. Vector are and text can be spec'd with RGB colors, CMYK colors, or with spot colors (e.g. Pantone).

@OP: I'm not sure what they mean by "photoblock". UV cured inks, though, are commonly used in outdoor sign and graphic production. Generally, they have some of the best durability under bright light, but have a history of being used in printers that don't yield photographic images that are a good as those produced by printer using air drying pigment inks. Printers improve continually and the newest are far better than those from just a few years ago. While all inkjet printers print using CMYK or CcMmYKk inks, you need to find out from the print shop whether their printing software expects RGB or CMYK source images.

 

[Scheelings]

I think the best thing I can do at this point, owing to language difficulties, is to find out what the hardware and software is

 

[Scheelings]

OK so I found out that the printer they use is an Epson surecolor S40610. Anyone have any experience of this range of printers? What I saw online didn't really tell me much.