Laser Color Printers White Text

[kurtlives]

Are laser color printers cable of printing white text.

I want to do some white decals and I am not sure if this laser printing will actually print the white text.

Anyone know?

Thanks...

[theehman]

Not unless you've got a magic white toner cart in it.

[DavidRavenMoon]

No, color laser printers print in CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow and black).  White is formed when there is no ink on the white paper.  So what looks like white ink is just paper showing.  If you printed on red paper, you would have red instead of white.

So you would have to have a white background on the pedal, and then print something with a colored background, so the white text would show.

[The Tone God]

There are some laser and sublimation printers that can print actual white but they are expensive and are generally for commercial use.

I have a preference for flat black cases. This makes creating labels hard as I like the text to standout as much as possible. In exploring possible labelling options for my products one thing I tried was stickers that I had custom made at a local sign shop. They have these types of printers and maybe willing to do a short run or even a single print for you particularly if you provide the artwork ready to go meaning formated for size and the correct file type.

Andrew

[R.G.]

From GEOFEX: you can make silver lettering on toner decals by using the IBFoil products. They are designed to iron onto the toner side of the sheet, and leave silver aluminum on the letters. Then you make decals the same way you would otherwise.

Not white, but nearly as good.

Then there's the old standby, stamp printing. There are many companies that make rubber stamps from artwork. You print up your artwork for the pedal, or just several with names like Volume, Drive, Tone, Treble, Bass, etc. Then you roll a thin layer of acrylic paint onto a sheet of window glass with a brayer and stamp the glass to pick up paint, then stamp the enclosure. Good for even small runs.

[danielzink]

Look for an Alps printer on eBay.

Dan

[Rodgre]

I have an old Alps printer which uses specific ink ribbons and is capable of printing white and metallics.  I haven't taken mine out of storage in years, but when I had it running, I was able to do some very very cool things.

Roger

[ilcaccillo]

I would like to have that in the closet!!!!!!!!!!

[Rodgre]

Yeah, I know. I feel like that guy who has a super rare guitar that I never play. It's been so long since I used the Alps printer that I wouldn't even know where to start because I'm 100% Mac now, and I the last computer I used it on was a 133mhz Windows 95 machine.

I originally bought it to make decals, but only had it set up for a short time before I got sidetracked and haven't been able to get back to it. If anyone knows offhand whether it would work with a modern computer, preferably a Mac, that would be awesome.

Roger