Discuss the various aspects of heat press technology. Transfer paper, inks, plastisol transfers, vinyl cutters, printers, commercial usage, durability, suppliers, etc.
Hello,
I would like to print on a few t-shirt for my own use. I'm working with Illustrator, so I have some nice vector art.
The problem is that when I bought those paper for printing and ironing, I got a white/transparent square around my printed text. my text is grungy (and colored on the inside), and i have some splatters, so I can't just cut around the text and iron it.
Which method should I use for a clean t-shirt printing? I would like it to look just like any other t-shirt that is being sold on the streets, but again, i'm doing it for my own use, so I don't have/need industrial equipment.
What type of paper are you using?
If you are using opaque paper ( for dark colored fabrics) you have to cut out your design to avoid having the white box you refer to.
If you can't cut that much simply make your image's background the same color as the shirt.
Hope that helps somewhat.
If it's only a one colour print you could probably justify screenprinting it at home with minimal equipment. If it's multi-colour, outsourcing DTG might be the way to go (or even if it's one colour). Vector suggests vinyl, but grungy does not
What exactly is DTG?
I'm attaching two pictures of t-shirt prints. my work are very similar. notice the grungy/slick look. I can't cut around these, because it would take forever.
What would you suggest is the best option to have this kind of printing at good quality for personal use (one copy or two..)?
Direct To Garment - a printer (relatively expensive) that can print directly onto the t-shirt.
Quote:
Originally Posted by tomchook
I'm attaching two pictures of t-shirt prints. my work are very similar. notice the grungy/slick look. I can't cut around these, because it would take forever.
Things like the second, being just one colour, can be screenprinted at home with something like the print gocco system. Screenprinting isn't very cost effective at small quantities, but for personal use (where you would normally be paying full retail for the alternative anyway) it can sometimes work. Still, most people wouldn't bother.
Quote:
Originally Posted by tomchook
What would you suggest is the best option to have this kind of printing at good quality for personal use (one copy or two..)?
Finding someone who has a DTG printer and getting them to print the shirt for you. It probably won't be any cheaper than buying a shirt at retail, but it will have your customised design on it.
What would you suggest is the best option to have this kind of printing at good quality for personal use (one copy or two..)?
If you just need one or two of the design, I think I would just use a service like cafepress.com,spreadshirt.com or printfection.com and upload the graphic there and have them professionally print the shirt and ship it to me. You'll get better print results than your home iron and office supply paper.
If you want to start your own professional t-shirt line, then I would say either go with screen printing (either yourself our outsourcing) or plastisol (screen printed) transfers.
please recommend :) 
