You can make custom screen printing ink colors at home or in a small shop, but there is an important difference between mixing ink and manufacturing ink.

Blending professionally formulated inks or combining concentrated pigments with a compatible ink base is practical. Attempting to adjust the formulation with additives to make a custom series, that requires testing, is not recommended.

For most screen printers, "making your own ink" should mean creating custom colors from a tested mixing system. This gives you control over color while preserving the curing, stretch, opacity, bleed resistance, and printing characteristics built into the original ink system.

What Does Making Your Own Ink Mean?

The phrase can describe three very different activities:

The first two methods are realistic for home printers and professional shops. The third requires formulation knowledge and experienced quality testing.

A properly formulated ink does more than just looks good on the shirt. It also:

Combining our finished inks with additives and other ingredients may create something that passes through a screen, but that does not make it dependable.

Can You Mix Two Screen Printing Inks Together?

Yes. Mixing finished inks is the easiest way to create your own colors, provided the inks are from the same series and have the same characteristics.

Our ELT Mix & Match System is an ink-to-ink system for simulating Pantone® colors. It includes 17 printable colors plus a mixing white. The finished inks retain the ELT system's low-temperature performance, opacity, bleed resistance, and stretch.

What is An Ink-To-Ink System?

A Mix and Match System uses finished inks designed to work together to create custom colors. Any given formula will call for different combinations of red, blue, white, yellow, or other components to produce a target color.

Every component is printable by itself. You might use the blue on one job, the red on another, and then combine them to create purple for a third job. Ink-to-ink systems are generally easier to understand than pigment systems because every ingredient in the formula looks and behaves like normal screen printing ink.

What Is A Pigment Mixing System?

A pigment system uses concentrated colorants that are added to a compatible ink base. Unlike an ink-to-ink system, the pigment components are not complete screen printing inks.

Our ELT Pigment System includes 17 concentrated pigments that are mixed with a base of your choice. Our usual recommendation is ELT Base because it provides extreme low-temperature curing, opacity, bleed resistance, and stretch.

The base carries the primary performance characteristics of the finished ink. The base controls:

If a low-cure, bleed-resistant base is used, the finished color can retain those properties when it is mixed according to the system formula. If a soft, transparent base is used, the final ink may be softer and less opaque.

Ink-To-Ink Versus Pigment-To-Base Mixing

An ink-to-ink system is often the easier choice for a beginner. A pigment system can be more efficient for shops that mix many colors and understand how base selection affects the finished product.

The most important distinction between the two systems is whether the components are finished inks or not.

With an ink-to-ink mixing system all components are already printable. Concentrated pigments in the Pigment Mixing System are not printable.

Pigment concentrates do not contain the complete balance of ingredients required to create a printable, curable ink film. They must be added to the correct base at the proper ratio.

Think of pigment as the coloring component and the base as the functional ink. The pigment changes the color, but the base is what allows the mixture to print, cure, stretch, and remain attached to the garment.

Can You Mix Inks From Different Brands Or Series?

Sometimes two inks will physically blend, but that does not prove they are chemically compatible or that the mixture will cure properly.

Every ink brand and various series uses different concentrations of resins, plasticizers, and additives. Combining unrelated products can change:

The safest approach is to mix products that are designed as part of the same system. Do not assume that every plastisol is interchangeable simply because the products are all described as plastisol ink.

This is especially important when combining standard-cure and low-cure inks. The mixed ink should be cured according to the requirements of the least-forgiving component.

Use Additives Properly

Adjusting ink formulations with ingredients and additives is not recommended. Each additional component must be used at the correct concentration and measured accurately.

At One Stroke Inks we will do the adjustments for you. We offer:

We offer these components at different concentrations so that printers can adjust inks precisely to their personal preference without the headache of doing it themselves.

Final Thoughts

You can make custom colors at home. The most reliable method is to use a professionally formulated mixing system.

The two options for mixing systems are ink-to-ink or pigment-to-base. The ink-to-ink system is more beginner friendly.

Adjusting ink formulas with additives and mixing inks from different brands and series is not recommended.