[scottishjamie]

Some advice from your collective experience please.

We have just started our embroidery business, and getting some orders in. woo-hoo and I have talked the missus round to addinf t-shirt designing into our new business.

I am looking at doing a mix of image and text (slogan) T-shirts, pobabaly mainly slogan t's and I reckon a lot of them will be white text on black.

Can vinyl (with a optical plotter cutter) handle small text with dotted i's etc, or am I looking at needing DTG. I have been looking at a few solutions and am truly confused. Embroidery is soooo much more straight forward

I know that I can laser/inkjet print onto vinyl and get the images I am looking for, but the issue really is printing relatively small text and how easy/possible weeding and setting this would be on vinyl.

 

[slidways]

if you have a good plotter, and the art is done well, it should be able to cut really small, i have done some odd thousand jerseys for manchester united alot of company logos trying to get sponsers, i done all of them with heattransfer and there was some small details that came out that i thought wouldn't

 

[scottishjamie]

thanks slidways, I think I am gonna speak to the cutter disributer and see if I can take them some artwork and get them to demonstrate it for me.

 

[Louie2010]

I know that I can laser/inkjet print onto vinyl and get the images I am looking for.

Anyone know what types of reasonably priced printers are the best for doing this? Thanks.

 

[DTFuqua]

Anyone know what types of reasonably priced printers are the best for doing this? Thanks.

To do a good job and wind up with a decent product, a solvent printer would be best. Most inkjet printers used in heat transfer printers are Epson because of the way the print heads move the ink. Epsons use a pump of some type (piezeo?) and most others use a bubble jet printer head which uses heat to cause a bubble to "pop" to get the ink to spray out the nozzel?? Better explainations are available.

 

[Twanabee]

Your talking two different things. One colored vinyl can be cut real small with a cutter such as the one I have. If your talking printing full color onto vinyl...thats a different horse. You either need a printer cutter, (very costly) or you can print onto some vinyl with the right ink. I am not sure of this process. I do text as fine as 1/4" high with great results although it's a bear to weed.

 

[Louie2010]

To do a good job and wind up with a decent product, a solvent printer would be best. Most inkjet printers used in heat transfer printers are Epson because of the way the print heads move the ink. Epsons use a pump of some type (piezeo?) and most others use a bubble jet printer head which uses heat to cause a bubble to "pop" to get the ink to spray out the nozzel?? Better explainations are available.

Thanks, I wasn't aware these would print on vinyl. Is there a special vinyl used for printing or will most of the vinyl that is used to heat press on shirts work?

 

[Louie2010]

Your talking two different things. One colored vinyl can be cut real small with a cutter such as the one I have. If your talking printing full color onto vinyl...thats a different horse. You either need a printer cutter, (very costly) or you can print onto some vinyl with the right ink. I am not sure of this process. I do text as fine as 1/4" high with great results although it's a bear to weed.

Yes, I was under the impression that to print on vinyl was very expensive to do. But unless I am reading it wrong on this thread it sounds like there might be a less expensive option.

 

[DTFuqua]

Yes, I was under the impression that to print on vinyl was very expensive to do. But unless I am reading it wrong on this thread it sounds like there might be a less expensive option.

Yes, the epson printer and some of the "opaque" transfer paper which is actualy a specialy prepared vinyl type product that you print your picture on and then heat press it.

 

[Louie2010]

Yes, the epson printer and some of the "opaque" transfer paper which is actualy a specialy prepared vinyl type product that you print your picture on and then heat press it.

Please excuse my ignorance. So are you actually pressing the vinyl with art work on the shirt or is is the vinyl only a type of transfer paper for the ink? And if you are pressing the vinyl with art on it, can you print multi colors, shading etc., and it look nice? How durable is it?

Thanks

 

[sandollar]

I was trying to find out the same thing, also does the opaque for solids solve the problem with ink colors on different color shirts( ie. yellow ink on blue shirt makes green)? Is the printable vinyl the same as opaque for solids? What is ment by "special inks". I have read many blogs and I am still totally confused. Louie 2010 I hope these additional questions help both us with this issue

 

[DTFuqua]

Please excuse my ignorance. So are you actually pressing the vinyl with art work on the shirt or is is the vinyl only a type of transfer paper for the ink? And if you are pressing the vinyl with art on it, can you print multi colors, shading etc., and it look nice? How durable is it?

Thanks

yes, yes, Not the best and doesn't feel the best. You should get some samples and try it out. There are a lot of people that are satisfied with what they can get since the alternative is to do like me and just not mess with colored shirts unless insisted upon. I did some for X-mass presents and they wanted black shirts.

 

[DTFuqua]

I was trying to find out the same thing, also does the opaque for solids solve the problem with ink colors on different color shirts( ie. yellow ink on blue shirt makes green)? Is the printable vinyl the same as opaque for solids? What is ment by "special inks". I have read many blogs and I am still totally confused. Louie 2010 I hope these additional questions help both us with this issue

yes, yes, solvent type inks I believe although there are special pigment inks available for using with the transfer papers at a fairly cheap price