Sub or Screen?!?! I need advice please for my t-shirts!

[John G]

DTG for this one

[Ian M]

I have to agree with everything that Simon says. I was an experienced screen printer in my younger days & printing several colours on to T-shirts could be a nightmare & usually was. On top of this screen printing colour half tones you really do need that experience. Just getting the registration right for each colour was a skill in itself on a carousel.

If I was you Gayle I would have a chat with John at Stitch Up because I agree with John & Earl with regards to DTG.

[FairyD]

Okay....will re-think design for now...DTG might have to be the way to go.

Thanks everyone.

Next question....is 80% cotton and 20% polyester made from 320 GSM fabrication (anti-pill) too low a percentage of poly for sublimation!?!? Would it be okay with TMT papers only!?!?!?

[Craig]

Sublimation will only stick to polyester and it will wash/run out of the cotton so th answer is yes 20% is too low for sublimation

[mbprintsolutions]

Great design But........The only way you will achieve the design you show in the pictures, is with large format sublimation (A2+) and a very large heat press. Achieving the detail with screen printing would be possible but positioning of design over various sizes of garment would require all over platens for each size. TMT (as far as I am aware) only goesto A3 max, so really would not be possible unless on small garments only. You will probably find that it is cheaper in this case, to print the design onto material before making into garments This method is used to produce many of the all over sublimated garments that are becoming more common place.

[logobear]

As a print on demand garment print business, we frequently get great designs that we simply cannot print..... (and we have over a dozen different methods)
I would suggest that YOU commit to a decoration technology, and design within your own limits of that method.
There are countless posts on the merits of different methods, and a big factor is just how technical/anal you are, how much time & space do you have, and what are your aspirations?
Your current full frontal design is not (practically) printable by any affordable and accessable method, especially as a newbie....... don't be put off, maybe find that screen print course, play, design, read, learn.
IMHO - the best jobs are those created by true designers who fully understand the advantages and limitations of their chosen method of garment decoration.......

[Justin]

I saw this design when you posted on Facebook Gayle and thought how good it looked. I immediately thought DTG or possibly process screen printing. The biggest issue I can see is printing across the arms etc. When I released a clothing range a number of years back I had some designs that were very large and went around the t-shirt and right up to the edges. We decided against this to make the printing a lot easier and re-designed so that the designs were within a more acceptable print area. They still looked good but nowhere near as good as the original design. I hope that you can stock to the as closely as possible and will keep watching to see how you get on

[socialgiraffe]

I really do not think that any methods discussed will be able to do this print...

Transfers - Only go to A3 unless you sub it out which is probably cost prohibitive

Screen - Apart from the fact that it is a minimum of 6 colours as halftones which will need "proper" film, you can not screen print over seems

DTG - Unless technology has changed dramatically you can not print over seems with this either. When I had a DTG machine you effectively had to make the garment as flat as possible and as close to the print head as possible. The adjustments were very fine and to drop a platen to allow for a seem on the tee shirt would produce blurred images. You also can not allow the printer to print where there is no garment as this creates a horrible mess


The only way I could see this happening cost effectively as a trial would be as TMT transfers. Print out the image across a number of sheets and then slowly build the image by heat pressing each bit. Would be bloomin fidley and take forever though!

[FairyD]

Thanks everyone.....brilliant comments......I am going to try a wee experiment, so will report back on it's success/failure!!

Thanks Justin.....and did you see how people reacted to the colour one!?! Stupid ass that I am I should have probably asked here first before 'showing off' to my customer base and getting them excited!!! ;O)

[Renniwano]

Gayle.. they are crafters lmao.. what did you expect x

Hope you manage to find a suitable solution..