Spots before the eyes: Can ink jet printers match expectations?

The mechanism by which the coloured image is formed by digital ink jet printing is very different from that of conventional screen printing methods and success depends on the use of sophisticated software and hardware. Some commercially available systems are listed in this paper and the basic principles of the standardisation of scanners, monitors and jet printers given. Ink jet printing machines at present available for textiles are reviewed and their limitations with regard to dye selection, shade gamuts and reproducibilty are quantified. Repeatability and shade reproducibility tests of digitally printed textiles are reported showing that improvements are required in the transformation of pattern data to the printed output.