Hubble Studio Cocktail Napkin Printing

"Hi, I have a crazy question for you". Something that we hear on a daily basis by people who call our shop wondering if we can help them out with printing with some random crazy idea that they have. Having worked in the printing field for so many years, I understand how other screen printing shops think and operate: They care nothing more than profits. They want their days to be filled with the absolutely the most productivity backed with money as possible, and the least amt of time they can spend talking to someone about a job that they would never take on, the better. (this mainly stems from them not branching out and taking on odd jobs and thus, have no ability or skillset to do such things).

At Print Renegades, we are very different. We see things differently. We have a completely different outlook on business, our clients and our workflow. First off, we love to take on odd jobs. When we have the opportunity to accept a job that we have never done before, we take it head on!! We have professionals that help us figure things out that we can call if we have questions about ink types, mesh counts or ways to do things: but more than anything, we, ourselves, have amazingly creative minds to figure things out on our own: to take a problem, then a solution and draw a line between the two.

Aside from that, taking on jobs that are difficult and require extra work might not make us the most money, but they definitely help in our ability to be better printers and this is invaluable. We have had this mindset for years and years now, and Im sure you can imagine how many crazy odd jobs that we have had to force ourselves to figure out, how much better of printers we are now, after the fact. (which is constantly ongoing).

Here is an example of a job that we had to just figure out: Hubble Studios located in Downtown LA, wanted some cocktail napkins printed for an event they were having, and they only had a few days until their event. We swooped in and helped save the day by figuring out HOW and NAILING the production of these napkins. We were able to print 12 at a time, and when printing 2500 pieces, it is indeed time consuming but also leaves a great feeling that we were able to help someone out in time for an important event they were having. (which is kind of what we live for as workers in the service industry!)

Hand Pulled Art Prints for The Dreslyn

Chloe Parks is a graphic artist, set designer, and illustrator based in Los Angeles, CA. She is currently the resident graphic artist at LA’s TheDreslyn.com, a high end independent fashion boutique in the heart of Downtown LA, and her passion for art and design within the context of the fashion industry is growing daily.

The Print Renegades team most recently worked together with Chloe creating some really rad hand pulled Screen Printed 16" x 20"  posters. Basic color design, really rad end result!

These posters were printed using French Pop Tone paper (110# cover) with Permaset Ink, custom Pantone color matched, according to their specifications. Our favorite part about working with artists is their abililty to know exactly what they want, and we act as the medium to take what is in their mind and make it real. 

Print Renegades, producing hand made goods straight out of our shop in the heart of the DTLA Fashion District. 

Lori Fenn 12 Color Hand Pulled Archival Art Prints

Lori Fenn is a true artist. Based in Phoenix, and after calling dozens of print shops in 3 different states, she finally found us. She told us that she had a 12 color poster job, 24" x 24", and that everyone she called either told her that they wouldn't do it, or it would cost her over $50 per print. As always, we stood out as being the diamond in the rough: the print shop that not only says YES to things most wont touch, but our prices were extremely competitive.

So, off to the races. We were able to cut these posters down ourselves to prep for this job, and given the larger-than-normal number of colors in this particular print, every stage of prep just seemed to take a whole lot longer. Mixing 12 custom Pantone colors, burning 12 'Tier 4' sized screens, registering each color...very time consuming.

The printing process is really a science: it doesnt matter if you are printing a 2 color or 200 color job: the process and steps are all the same, and if you have everything down pat, its like anything else: you get into a rhythm and slowly chip away at the creation process. The cool thing is that as you layer color on top of color on top of color, you are able to see the artwork develop in front of your very eyes. 

This is why we, as printers, love what we do. Yeah, we print for other people, mainly using their own artwork that they have created, but to be able to have a hand in building the art from a production stand point; to create something identically to someone specifications by using the skills artistic abilities that we have: this is the true art of print!

Ray LaMontange Hand Printed Tour Posters

Hand Screen Printed posters are amazing. One of our favorite things in the shop is having the chance to print amazingly well designed tour posters. The difference between cheap full color offset printed posters and hand screen printed posters is obvious: one is cheaply made, bland and something that is machine made; and the other is beautifully crafted, hand made, ink that you can feel, and something that is as beautiful as it is unique. As screen printers, the ability to print flat stock is extremely more difficult than something like apparel...so for an artist-run shop like ours, we prefer printing things like posters because of the high caliber of experience it takes and the artistic value of the final product.

We had the ability to work with artist and illustrator James R. Eads to print some posters for Ray LaMontagne and his live show at the Red Rocks in Denver, Colorado. These posters were 5 colors and printed on French 110# coverstock, sized at 13" x 26". The pantone colors were selected by the artist, and we were able to do a run of about 200 of these. The posters turned out amazingly and we stand behind the idea that the print is ONLY as good as the artist: if you get a great artist and have the ability to print their artwork, the print will always look good due to the great illustration.