Archive of the former Yahoo!Groups mailing list: Homebrew PCBs

I think that the method you recall are far most complicated and prone
to failure than to apply a real soldermask. As you stated you have to
be very precise with the alignment and the squeguee. If you use a real
dry-film soldermask you only have to create your soldermask artwork and
align it over your bare copper pads. Once you are ok with the alignment
you only fix it with scoth tape and that is all. You only then expose,
develop, cure, and you can have any pitch that you want, even LQFP or
smaller.