Black and White Copies (Color Copies & BW Copies)
Black and White Copies are Ideal for Certain Functions
Black and White printing is the result of printing with black ink on white paper, therefore the black & white designation. In reality there is just one single ink color, black, that lays on top of one of the many substrates that can be used to print
- Black and white on copy paper
- B/W on cardstock
- Black ink on plastic substrates such as polyester or polypropylene
- Black and white pictures and reproductions
- Black ink can be also used to print on top of colored substrates such as paper and cardstock.
How Many Shades Can Be Obtained From a Single Black Ink?
NOTE: Shades of black will go from the dark 100% black ink to white, which represents 0% of black ink present. The transition from one to the other is a halftone print (as seen in the image)as opposed to a continuous color shift.
Our human eye sees the dots as a black and white shade...
Offset and Digital printing methods use dots to draw. The interesting thing is that through halftones, we widen the scope of “colors” that can be printed with just one color, in this case, black
Ways to Use Black and White Printing
The most common way in which people use black and white copies is to print a piece of artwork that has been designed in full color but can print in black and white. What happens when this concept is chosen is that according to the lightness/darkness of the full color image, a certain gray point is assigned to it. When the documents in full color are not very contrasted and are set in the same color range, it could get difficult to have good contrast in between different areas of the print.
The most efficient way of getting the best results, and achieve impact on a piece that could otherwise be considered “boring” is to create designs that from the initial stages are planned for black and white printing.
As mentioned above, grayscales will be transformed into halftones and the richness of the printed sheet will be so much better.
Gray Vs Halftone Effect - Left Image: shows a gray ink that fully covers the area. Because we use just black as the printing ink, we have to create dots of a size so that they render the same effect of the gray. Right Image: it requires 37% of the area to be covered with black dots to render the same effect
What Can You Print With Black and White?
- For schools, PTAs, PTOs,: Handouts, homework instructions, reports, forms required by the school, notepads, direct mailing campaigns
- Manufacturing companies can use black and white printing to print forms where records of the production process, reports on quality, internal memos, carbonless forms for inventory reports, training manuals, pallet labels and product identification, maintenance documentation, floor plans, evacuation, documentation, emergency operations manuals, notepads, direct mailing campaigns
- Medical field: Sign-in forms, first-visit patient information, consent-to-be-treated forms, educational materials to be made available for patients, charts, procedures and protocols, internal reports. Direct mailing campaigns
- Businesses: Black and white is perfect to print invoices, NCR invoices, receipts, reports, emergency procedures, file cabinet organization and record keeping, notepads, business cards, direct mailing campaigns
- Restaurants: Menus, order taking, reports of daily activity, loyalty cards, direct mailing campaigns
- Law firms: Reports, procedures, training manuals, note taking books, notepads
- Individuals / Home: Black and white photography, notepads, invitations
- Other industries and home: All of the above and more.
Most popular sizes of black and white copies
- 8.5x11 or letter size
- 11x17 used mainly in the restaurant industry
- 4.25”x11” which is half a page (portrait) used to create lists and more
- 5.5”x8.5” which is a landscape half page used for notepads, reports, etc
- 8.5”x14” which is a legal size, not very popular other than in law firms
Configure & Price
Next Step: Choose among the options
