5 Commonly Used Finishing Terms

Every industry, every product, and every job function tends to build up their own definition of words over the years. For example: in the print finishing industry if someone asks for “Tab Paper” you would immediately think of Tab Dividers. However, if you are in the musical instrument industry, “Tab Paper” refers to paper where you would write notes/chords on.  So imagine my teacher’s confusion after I walked into my first guitar lesson with the wrong kind of “Tab Paper”.  To avoid these misunderstandings and communication errors, we have decided to start a new Blog Series titled “5 Most Commonly Used Terms”. To start off the series, we decided to focus on finishing terms. When it comes to what finishes you are looking for for your products, it is important to know all the options out there; as well as the correct terminology (to avoid any confusion). So without further ado, here are the 5 Most Commonly Used Finishing Terms:  

1. Silkscreen:

   A lot of materials cannot be printed on using traditional printing methods (copier, printing press, etc.), that’s where silkscreening comes in. It gives your material the look of print using screens and paint. There are some limitations with silkscreening, such as no shading or gradients, but you can add multiple colours. Just remember the more colours, the more screens to use (1 screen per colour) and the more drying time in-between.

 

2. Foil Stamping:

   This process adds a shiny or matte foil to your material. Foil comes in every colour of the rainbow, so you don’t just have to stick with the traditional gold and silver. Foil can be added to products such as binders (all materials except for Poly), certificate holders, plastic bindings, pad folios, paper and imitation leather report covers, vinyl pouches, and more. The foil can also add an emboss depending on material.

 

3. Emboss/Deboss:

   Embossing is creating using a metal die and a lot of heat. The hot die is pressed into the material making it indented. Debossing uses the same method but instead of indenting the company name or logo, it indents a portion of the material around it. So the company name or logo appears to be raised from the material.

 

4. 4-Colour Process:

   This refers to printing with a printing press or copier. It's called 4-Colour as a reference to the 4 colours of ink in your printer (cyan, magenta, yellow and black). So if you are looking for something using all the colours of the rainbow, different shading, gradients, etc., then 4-colour process is what you want.

 

5. Heat Burnishing:

   This one is not as common as the ones above since it only applies to certain materials, specifically Imitation Leather. Not all Imitation Leather works with heat burnishing so it’s important to ask your Sales Associate first. This method refers to adding heat to the material and in the process, the material actually changes colour.  A Bright Red won't turning into Blue once heat is added, but it will turn from that Bright Red to more of a maroon colour. Heat Burnishing goes hand in hand with embossing, so not only will the material change colour, it will be indented as well.