What You Don t Know About Printed Tees May Shock You

With screen printing t-shirts, you can either design your own t-shirts or use one of the standard designs offered by those firms that concentrate on t-shirt printing. However if you want to design your own t-shirt, there are certain facets of screen printing you should understand, while they impact on the kind of design you may use.

For starters, a brief description of what is linked internet site to screen printing:

Screen Printing T-Shirts: the Process

The Screen - At one time this process was called silk screen printing, because the screens used were made from silk. It was a popular printing technique in China, hence the silk, but modern polymer fibres now enable us to use synthetic screens that are considerably less expensive.

However the artwork will be needed before the screens may be made, an explanation of the technique will be necessary so you may understand the limitations within your design. Foremost, a mesh is necessary with holes large enough to enable the ink to be squeezed through it. The average mesh will be 110 (110 threads/inch), with lower for thicker inks and block images, and better for thinner inks as well as more definition.

The mesh is coated with a light-sensitive emulsion, and the artwork placed under it. Light is exposed up over the screen, and where the light hits the screen, the chemical solidifies and covers the mesh. The design area stops the light, so in the event the screen is washed, the place of the design is clear of emulsion, while the rest is solid. This is true whether screen printing t-shirts or any other item.

The Printing - The screen is mounted in a box, and the garment is placed under the box. Ink is poured in to the box and also a tool described as a 'squeegee' is pulled across, forcing the ink through the mesh. The ink is then dried, leaving the image on the t-shirt.

When you can imagine, this process is suitable only for a single colour per printing because only one colour may be poured in the mesh box or they might run together. For more colours, the process has to be repeated. Only delineated areas of individual colour may be printed, so it really is not possible to merge one shade into another when screen printing t-shirts.

It should be apparent that a new screen is required for each different colour unless the pattern is precisely the same. This adds to the cost, and screen printing t-shirts is expensive for individual garments. There's a fixed set-up cost and after that yet another cost for each colour. The greater t-shirts that can be printed in a run, then the cheaper it gets for each individual garment.

Other printing methods, such as digital printing, can print multiple colours without any increase in price. So why use screen printing for t-shirts rather than just digital? There are a variety of reasons:

Advantages of Screen T-Shirt Printing

Screen printing is advantageous if you design your own t-shirt with large areas of block colour. Digital printing, and other methods, can't print large areas as effectively as screen.

Screen printing t-shirts can be very opaque, and may cover any deep colour beneath it. Digital printing struggles to print light shades along with dark, for example pale blue on bright yellow, without it looking green.

Screen printing is great for whites, and even with DTG jet printers, white on dark often lasts no more than two or three washes. Screen inks are much more stable and also are thicker so give greater coverage. You need offer no specific washing instructions.

Screen is incredibly cost effective if you have only one colour, and should you have longer runs screen beats most other methods for economy and price.

The colours are brighter and stand out more when screen printing t-shirts