I am new to direct garment printing and this dark garment printing has me baffled. I cannot get smooth prints. There is always shirt hairs in the print that lead to white spots in the colored areas once I heat press. I search the forums and almost no-one talks about this. Does no one struggle with this? Every dark garment I have printed suffers from white spots in the colored areas.
I pre-treat, I brush, I heatpress, I've even ironed the shirt on the pallet. I can get it pretty good. I can never get it perfect. Is this just how it is with DTG or are you all printing smooth crisp prints.
What brand of shirt are you using? How the shirt is manufactured is key to minimizing fibrillation. You might want to try a couple different types of shirts to see which one works the best for you.
You can also state what your pretreatment process is and maybe someone can provide you a trick that you can try to change that up as well. The whole process is an art form, but once you got it - you will be happy.
Mark brought up some good points. Without knowing your pretreatment process it is very hard to advise you on what to do different. Are you using a plain parchment paper as a cover sheet when you heat press the pretreat.
I am using a wagner paint sprayer.Mixing the pretreat 50/50 with distilled water. Hanging the shirt on the wall, spraying it well and then rolling it with a foam paint roller. THen I run it through the conveyor dryer. Then I heat press it lightly for about ten seconds. I don't have parchement paper thought, I have been using transfer paper. THen I go to press. The best results I have had are when I actually iron it again on the pallet. But still never perfect.
Does parchement paper make that much difference?
The shirts I have used are Gildan ultra cotton, Alstyle and American Apparel. Some are wose than others. The Gildan has the best results, but still never perfect.
Ok For your pretreatment, I would not be diluting it as this can cause the problem you are talking about. I also found that using a regular paint brush with china bristles ( they are like boar bristle brushes) makes a major difference of how smooth the pretreat goes down. The foam brushes for me leave little foam particles and do not smooth the fibers well. I brush only one direction on the garment with the brush to make sure all fibers are going the same direction (I usually brush down, although some say they brush the direction the printhead prints). Another thing I see wrong with this method of yours, is the dryer. I think its really needed to press the pretreat in a heat press, to make sure the fibers are pressed down well, to give your print more definition.
The parchment is absolutely necessary But dont use the silicone treated one, make sure to use the untreated parchment, which is called quilan. I press for about 10 to 15 seconds with the paper, then remove and press another 10 seconds. This makes for a good drying of the pretreatment.
Here is another thread about this exact problem you are having, with a ton of info on how to correct it. http://www.t-shirtforums.com/direct-...ng/t52278.html, Hope this helps. I don't think your shirts are the issue, as I have had great results with both gildan and American apparel.
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Sunnydayz has some good advice. Let me share my technique.
We use Hanes Tagless shirts. If they're wrinkled, stick them in the heat press for 5 seconds before spraying. Then spray them with undiluted pretreatment. Cover it with uncoated parchment paper and put it under the heat press with heavy pressure (but not very heavy) for 10-15 secs at 330 degrees or until it's pretty dry.
The pressure should keep the fibers down. You can crouch down to the level of the heat press and look across the shirt to see whether fibers are sticking up.
believe me there is not hard and fast rule -- you have to practice and you will get better at it (it a looong learning curve). The best option for the t shirts is for a small combed carded cotton which are made from long cotton yarn fibres -- that give a much better smooth surface with very little hairs which create the problem
I have this problem on large color fill areas on dark garments.
While all the pretreatment things are good advice, I have found that using a lower resolution and more passes on the underbase - and then a higher resolution equal to the number of passes for the color.
Using tjet as an example - I will take a large fill area and give it either a single or sometimes double pass (depending on the design/colors) @ photo 720 for an underbase. Then I will always follow up with 2 1440 color passes to insure rich color and that any fibers covered with white are adequately covered.
This is definately a problem with these shirts - and I have yet to find a way to truly get *crisp* heavy ink saturation with underbases. However using the method above I am able to produce acceptable results - just that it's not the most cost effective.
When you go to press the shirt - give very very very light pressure at first to keep the colored ink from being mixed with the white fiberous goo underneath.
Brand of shirts can cause this problem as some have mentioned. The softer the better. You will notice the white spots more on solid colors and doesn't look bad on images with tons of colors that blend. If your not doing a bunch of shirts what can help is taking a hair dryer and dry the underbase as the shirt is coming out. You wont need to dry it completely, just a few swipes. I've done it a lot. Another thing is before you spray the pretreatment, take a spray bottle with water and just lightly mist the shirt,(not a lot cause you dont want to dilute it) and then spray the pretreatment on it. This will also help in the pretreatment not showing as much on the shirt and helping it absorb evenly across the shirt. The non silicone paper will sometimes stick to the pretreatment if you use to much so little water helps. Also, just try using silicone paper to dry your pretreatment. I've done it many times and never saw issues. Something to keep in mind.
fibrilated print 
But dont use the silicone treated one, make sure to use the untreated parchment, which is called quilan. I press for about 10 to 15 seconds with the paper, then remove and press another 10 seconds. This makes for a good drying of the pretreatment. 
