It's All About the Layers, Not the Dots

This is the big one. A digital printer, no matter how expensive, works by spraying millions of microscopic dots of ink (usually Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black) onto paper to create the illusion of an image. Look closely at a digital print with a magnifying glass and you'll see the dot pattern. It’s a simulation of colour.

Screen printing is the complete opposite. It’s a stencil-based method. For every single colour in my design, a separate screen is created. We then push a solid, opaque layer of specially mixed ink through that screen directly onto the paper. There are no dots. It’s a block of pure, physical colour. This is why a screen print has a tangible quality to it; you can often feel the raised layer of ink on the paper's surface. It’s a physical object, built colour by colour, layer by layer.

The Human Touch vs. The Machine's Code

When you print a photo from your computer, you press a button. The machine whirs to life and spits out a near-perfect replica of the digital file. Do it a hundred times, you get a hundred identical prints. There’s zero artistry in the printing itself.

A screen print is a performance. The pressure of my pull on the squeegee, the viscosity of the ink on that particular day, the tiny, almost imperceptible shift in the paper's registration—all these things introduce minuscule variations. They’re not mistakes; they’re the life in the print. It means that while every print in an edition is almost identical, each one has passed through human hands and has its own subtle character. It’s a craft process from start to finish, not an automated one.

Colour That You Can't Just Click On

Digital printers are limited by their four-colour CMYK setup. They do a decent job of mimicking colours, but they can never achieve true vibrancy. Screen printing inks are a different beast entirely.

I mix my colours by hand, by eye. This allows for a depth and intensity that digital printing just can't touch. We can create colours that are punchier, brighter, and more saturated. Better yet, we can use inks that are impossible for a digital printer to replicate. Want a searing fluorescent pink? A shimmering metallic gold? A super-flat, chalky matte black? You can only get that by forcing that specific, physical ink through a screen. It’s the difference between looking at a picture of a gold bar and holding one in your hand.

So when you buy a piece from Oli Fowler Art, you're not just buying an image. You're buying a series of decisions, a physical process, and layers of real, tangible ink. It's an object with texture, depth, and a human story embedded in the paper. It's a world away from the sterile perfection of a machine's output, and that, for me, is what makes it a genuine piece of art.

See the difference for yourself. Have a look at the layers and colours on the prints in the shop.

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