What Are Flexographic Ink Drawdowns?
Flexo Ink Drawdowns
Drawdowns are created with your target colors. The experts in the “Ink Kitchen” formulate the pigments to get as close to the target as possible on varied substrate colors.
What are Ink Drawdowns?
Flexographic ink drawdowns are samples of custom ink builds created by packaging manufacturers to match target PMS colors.
Flexographic or “flexo” drawdown approval is an important print specific approval needed whenever you run a new print design or change your ink color and you use Flexographic print.
After you’ve submitted your final art proofs with color targets and before your boxes go to press, ink colors are formulated and painted onto cards that match your selected substrate. These inked cards are called drawdowns. In most cases, drawdowns are snail mailed to you.
In order to print your boxes, your team needs to review the drawdowns in person and sign your approval of the ink build.
Flexographic print plate for corrugated
Why do you need to approve drawdowns when you chose a color target?
Flexographic inks are water based and have a degree of transparency. The substrate (paper color of your box) shows through the inks and can change how we see the selected color.
That’s where the ink kitchen experts come in. Let’s look at the example below.
Flexographic ink drawdowns
Our friends at Peak Cocktails chose the PMS color 1655. Like many sustainably conscience brands, they considered 100% recycled Kraft substrate for their packaging.
Kraft paper is darker, so it’s easier to see the transparency of the inks in the photo above. However, even mottled white paper, shown on the right, effects how we see the PMS target color.
In this example, two different pigment builds were used to produce an ink that looks as much like the target color as possible on each respective substrate.
Why can't you approve drawdowns digitally to save time?
Computer screens convert all color output to RBG format. When you compare a photo of drawdowns in person to a photo on a screen, you’ll notice some differences in the tones.
Seeing your ink build in real life is the best way to ensure your custom printed boxes will turn out just how you want them.
What are some other things to consider?
Printing on mottled white or coated white substrate will make flexo inks look brighter and bolder than Kraft.
You can change the color of your ink without purchasing a new print plate, however, you can only use one color on each full run. You can do one order in color A and the next in color B, but you can’t do part of an order in color A and the rest in color B.
If you need more opaque, sticker like ink coverage, we recommend digital print rather than flexo print. Digital print does not require drawdown approval and it’s plateless!
