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Identify a print type

1151 Views 10 Replies 7 Participants Last post by  TLK, 
V
Hi everyone,

I am new to printing and trying to duplicate a certain type of printing. I have been looking at sublimation vs DTG vs screen printing.

The t shirt is 100% cotton but the ink appears to be inside the fabric itself. Ive heard that DTG lies on top of the garment, and that only sublimation can put the ink in the shirt so that you can not feel the print itself. But again, this a 100% cotton shirt.

I dont think I can post pics, so I uploaded some high quality images to photobucket.

http://s1343.photobucket.com/user/vonwehren/library/

Any help is greatly appreciated!!

Best,

Lucien
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joeshaul
DTG on light colored shirts will not leave what is known in the industry as a "hand" (the feel of the print vs that of the garment) as it's using a water based ink. This can be achieved via screen printing as well with water based inks.

When white ink is introduced, the white ink is no longer a water based ink, it needs a binding agent/pretreatment, this creates a hand for the garment.

On darker colored shirts, discharge screen printing is used to create a hand-less feel.
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V
Hi Joe, thank you for clarifying! So DTG on very light colored shirts can give me a 'hand-less' print. Could you give me any real examples of this? What would you guess the t shirt design i uploaded was made with? It seems it could indeed be a screen print with water based ink. The shirt was produced by american apparel.
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kimura-mma
Yes, that shirt was likely screen printed with water based inks.
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joeshaul
vonwehren said:
Hi Joe, thank you for clarifying! So DTG on very light colored shirts can give me a 'hand-less' print. Could you give me any real examples of this? What would you guess the t shirt design i uploaded was made with? It seems it could indeed be a screen print with water based ink. The shirt was produced by american apparel.
Click to expand...
It's hard to say what was used. Generally anything in bulk becomes more profitable for a company to screen print it vs DTG'ing it, because of the production time and the ink costs. As for real examples, you're on the internet asking about a physical product. I've attached a photo of some 4th of July shirts I printed last year for my city, one's inside out so you can compare. There is no hand since it's a white shirt, all you feel is just cotton!

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V
Thanks everyone for your help. The shirt was pretty widely produced, so taking into account production costs screen printing makes sense!

For my purposes I am looking to do limited runs in the neighborhood of 100-150 and I need them photograph quality with many colors. Would that be possible with water based screen printing? or is DTG the way to go?

Im realizing after looking at the prices of DTG that I probably want to outsource this rather than get my own printer. Is it kosher to ask for pricing here?
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T
joeshaul said:
It's hard to say what was used. Generally anything in bulk becomes more profitable for a company to screen print it vs DTG'ing it, because of the production time and the ink costs. As for real examples, you're on the internet asking about a physical product. I've attached a photo of some 4th of July shirts I printed last year for my city, one's inside out so you can compare. There is no hand since it's a white shirt, all you feel is just cotton!
Click to expand...
What Joe said - screen is usually the choice for bulk work.
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carpediemandmore
2
it looks like sublimation transfer to me, check my print on viscose+cotton & poly you might find some similarities, second is water based screen print closely look at "the dog's face".

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V
Hi Carpe Diem,

Thank you that was really helpful. Sorry I didn't see it until now!

If I am understanding you correctly, the first print (leaves) is a sublimation.
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J
Its really very informative.
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TLK
vonwehren said:
Thanks everyone for your help. The shirt was pretty widely produced, so taking into account production costs screen printing makes sense!

For my purposes I am looking to do limited runs in the neighborhood of 100-150 and I need them photograph quality with many colors. Would that be possible with water based screen printing? or is DTG the way to go?

Im realizing after looking at the prices of DTG that I probably want to outsource this rather than get my own printer. Is it kosher to ask for pricing here?
Click to expand...
With the quantities your thinking of getting you'd be best off with screen printing. Find a decent screen printer that can do CMYK (4 colour process) printing or maybe better still simulated process printing.

The original image is screen printed in my opinion, most likely with water based inks, although it could be plastisol ink through a higher mesh with a soft hand additive. Looks like it's been washed a few times.
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