 Re: question about printing on colored shirts?
there can be many issues with the discharge. First of all, discharge only works with fiber-reactive dyes. How do you know if you have fiber reactive dyes? trial and error, my friend. I keep a small file in the RIP with a couple of grey shades and a 0-100 ramp, and will print on the inside of a shirt before attempting to do a full print. If it discharges, great, if not, I know it's not going to work. I have yet to find a shirt manufacturer that discloses how their shirts are dyed. I would imagine it can vary within the company, and garments are often made in different countries. I can tell you that I have a batch of Alstyle black tees that don't discharge.
second factor is setting up your file properly. yes, you have to invert it, but you also have to convert it to greyscale, RasterLink won't print it otherwise.
thirdly, you need to check your printhead. if you can still get your hands on thermal fax paper, you can print a test draw on the paper, and wait for a few minutes. A pattern for the discharge will slowly appear on the paper. (this needs to be done once you've already "charged" the head with the discharge fluid.) If you've got a good pattern, then you ink delivery is okay. If not, you may have a problem. Keeping the discharge head cleared out takes a lot of work - I've had to replace mine twice in two years.
Lastly, what output profile are you using? I'm not in front of the RIP right now, or I'd put down the name of the one I use. it's a 360x540, variable dot, I can tell you that. If I'm printing graphics, I usually set the overprint at 2. If it's a photo, I overprint only once, but make a second file that's just 3/4 tones and below, and print that is discharge also. Makes the "blacks" discharge that much more, without blowing out the midtones and highlights.
Hope this helps...
D. | 
