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twentyfivemike · July 3rd, 2007

Good morning.

So this is my first question. How can I produce graphics on shirts like Monarchy, Salvage, Drifter, Obey (artist series) etc.

Not talking about the graphics themselves, but the way they appar on shirts, very faded, soft, multi-layered, etc. etc. For those that are familiar with those brands then I probably don't need much more explanation.

Coming from the graphic design world I am familiar with all the programs, can create the separations etc. etc...but when I comes down to actually reproducing what I have on-screen to fabric...i'm clueless.

Any advice, links to other posts, etc. etc. would be much appreciated.

poshpol · July 4th, 2007

theres a dude on here who prints for Morphine Generation or that has worked with them... thats pretty cool and definitely similar to the brands you mentionned. im sure you will get a lot of quality replies soon.

im a nub, but i can tell you that these brands enzyme wash and soften the hell out of their garments prior to printing and use a lot of waterbased inks and foil to do funky artsy stuff.

Annushka · July 5th, 2007

My guess is discharge printing.

neato · July 5th, 2007

It's probably just waterbased inks.

Discharge printing is only for dark fabrics where it is necessary to remove the color of the fabric before printing the color.

Fluid · July 5th, 2007

possible it is plasticols reduced with a cureable reducer. As always everyone never mentions it. I get a waterbased hand to a plasticol print on lights and towels all the time.

neato · July 5th, 2007

Fluid is right. Actually, I've been playing with the Chino based plastisol inks lately and I think the hand is actually softer than WB! I'm pretty impressed with it. I think Chino and discharge might make a great combo.

Richard, how much do you reduce your plastisols down with curable reducer? I've heard so many people say to never use it, or just add 5-10%. Seems like to get a really soft feel, you need to reduce much more than that. Will it still cure ok? After all, Chino base just seems like a plastisol that has a TON of reducer.

Fluid · July 5th, 2007

we have gone as far as 60-70% depending on the application and color. The color will lighten considerably when reduced this much. This is how we print towels.

Reduces by about 30% and a high mesh frame should get a great result on shirts.

Dark shirt printing we only reduce by 10% at the most in order to retain the opacity. mainly just for better blending and less buildup on sequential screens when printing multi colored designs

Make sure it is a cureable reducer though and not soft hand

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My first question...reproduce graphics like Monarchy and Salvage?