[neghcho]

I am going to be printing text and a small image usually with white letters onto black T-shirts, and I want to know what is the best result I can expect? If I cut 1/8" to the image and press it for a decent ammount of time, how much of the transfer material will be visible? Will it be obvious to the general consumer? Also what kind of paper and practices should be used to lessen the visibility of it?

 

[Twinge]

You need a different kind of paper to transfer to a dark shirt; regular transfer paper will not work at all. You can get opaque papers which need to be cut exactly to the image and really won't work with text because the opaque transfers will fully leave the white in the paper fully visible. Also, the opaque transfers tend to be of lower quality than the normal ones, and will often crack after several washings - though, some people do have decent luck with them.

Other options for dark shirts include plastisol and vinyl/flock, both of which can be applied via heat press.

 

[neghcho]

I see. So the opaque paper is basically a white matter that you print onto, and anything you don't put ink on or cut away will remain white. Thanks

 

[neghcho]

Does anyone make opaque transfers with letter sets already cut out?

Oh one more question. Would it be possible to use a regular transfer and say double print onto it. Print a base undercoat of white ink, then reprinting over it with the other colors you wanted to use? (I know that normally printers don't print white, but there are white inks out there I believe.)

 

[MarkSD]

Does anyone make opaque transfers with letter sets already cut out?

Oh one more question. Would it be possible to use a regular transfer and say double print onto it. Print a base undercoat of white ink, then reprinting over it with the other colors you wanted to use? (I know that normally printers don't print white, but there are white inks out there I believe.)

You can get plastisol number sets from places like Ace Transfer, First Edition, Transfer Express. There are some out there that carry apparel vinyl number sets also.

Second question- No.

Mark in SD

 

[jdr8271]

There are no white inks out there for inkjet or laser printers.

 

[neghcho]

There are white opaque inks out there, i know i've seen them, but it's probably not worth the effort trying to track them down.

 

[grumpster]

There are white opaque inks out there, i know i've seen them, but it's probably not worth the effort trying to track them down.

I've never seen such a thing except for DTG printers. All printers work the same way that photographs do. They begin with a white surface and then add verying amounts of colors to dreate a image. The lightness of a color is due to the fact that the ink is thin enough for the white surface to show through. A printer makes colors by putting ink down on the page. To make white, it simply does nothing. In other words, if you were to print a red page, you'd put down a lot of red ink. To print a white page, you'd simply eject a blank page with no ink on it at all. With all that in mind, I'm not sure what a printer would do with white ink. It thinks white comes from the paper.

DTG printers are the only exception that I know of. They have specially writter print drivers and the fermware of the printer is replaced with a re written version to teach it how to use white ink. No printer in the normal comsumer market can be made to do that that I know of.

Only option that I can think of is to give it white ink in the black slot and tell it to print black. Basically, that's exactly how the laser white toner will work when it comes out in a couple of weeks from now. However, that process will require two separate laser printers. One for the color, and the second for the white toner.

 

[jwhite]

i used opaque transfers and cut my images out this past weekend and here are how they turned out.

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g73/white8785/LR/ts1.gif
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g73/white8785/LR/ts4.gif

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g73/white8785/LR/ts6.gif
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g73/white8785/LR/ts9.gif

sorry about the terrible quality of pics, the flash on my D50 just took a crap on me a couple days ago.

 

[MotoskinGraphix]

Heatpress vinyl is a great way to go for words, numbers and simple graphics. Plastisol transfers work quite well and can be custom ordered. Also the number and name sets previously mention will give you great results. I think at the bottom of the barrel for quality, durability/washability are the opaque home printed transfers. I'm not saying what you want cant be achieved with this process...just seems to be a bit tedious and frustrating from what I have seen in this forum.

 

[grumpster]

Images look great. I can't wait to hear how well they hold up to a dozen or so washings.