How Does Emulsion Work?

What's an Emulsion?

Basically, photographic emulsion is a colloidal suspension of liquid within another liquid. In other words, photographic emulsion is more of a gel-like substance rather than a substance that's totally liquid. It typically contains silver halide crystals, which disperses evenly throughout the gel.

The silver halide crystals, which are light-sensitive, rest in the gelatinous material; they can be incorporated onto a variety of mediums such as paper, plastic, fabric, or glass during the manufacturing process. In photographs, the silver halide reacts to the chemicals used in the film developing stage, which produces the image from the film on the photograph paper. It's a slightly different process when it comes to promotional products.

Photography and Emulsion

The emulsion process actually played a role in how the camera company Kodak was formed. George Eastman, who made the first camera in 1887, put an emulsion onto a plastic-like material eventually known as 'film' and enclosed it in a camera (which is why you aren't supposed to expose film to light before developing it – remember, silver halide crystals are sensitive to light!). Eastman's company would take the camera, develop the film, and return the pictures back to the customer. It was called the Kodak system!

Eventually with the advancement of developers, you could have your film ready to go in under an hour. However, with the advent of digital photography, and those smartphone cameras that continue to improve exponentially with each new generation, the use of photographic emulsion to print pictures isn't as popular anymore.

However, the emulsion process is still one of the most effective ways to imprint logos onto promotional products. Emulsion is great for tote bags, but it also works for round products such as tumblers or pens.

You can find all of our promotional products available for screen-printing with the emulsion method on the Quality Logo Products website. Check them all out now!