Free color separation: what exactly is free

What works with no payment and no sign up

Everything you need in order to know whether this artwork will print, and what it will cost in inks, is open from the start. An account is asked for at the export and nowhere else.

• Separation. Automatic palette, hand editing of any ink, bringing the count down.
• Print preview. What it will look like on the garment, with or without an underbase.
• Halftone. Real dots at your line count, angle and dot shape.
• Ink coverage. What share of the sheet each ink takes. That is your cost.
• Checks. Thin lines, narrow gaps and isolated pixels, painted on the artwork itself.
• Corrections. An eraser, growing features to the minimum width, dropping specks.

Paid: the export. Films, PDF, PSD, a report and an ink map in one archive. Priced per export rather than per month or per seat.

Why the line is drawn there

Because until the export you have not received anything. Looking at a separation is useful, but you cannot print from it: a shop needs a set of films, not a screenshot. Charging for a look would be strange.

And because it is the more honest way round. You see the real result on your own artwork before paying, not a demo on somebody else’s picture. If the separation does not suit you, you find that out for nothing.

No install, no plugins

It all runs in a browser tab. There is no installer, no Photoshop plugin, no licence tied to one machine and no Windows-only build.

The artwork is not uploaded either. The work happens on your own computer and the file never leaves it, which for a client’s work under an agreement is often the part that decides.

Where the limit actually is

The free part is not capped by number of jobs, by time, or by ink count. There is one technical limit: on a phone the working copy is reduced to two megapixels, because a phone browser will not hold more than that through a separation.

The export needs an account and credits. Credits from a pack do not expire; a monthly plan renews instead.

FAQ