Placing an ink image on a garment can be achieved four ways.
- Screen Printing - the process of separating an image by colour,
creating a screen for each colour then pushing ink through each screen
to create the image. Screen printing can produce very bright images
and textures, but the process of setting up screens for small quantities
can be costly, so this printing style is the most economical option for
high volume jobs.
Screen printing can use many different systems which can allow for a
verity of inks and effects.
Discharge: This is a process of taking the dye out of the garment and leaving behind the image, so no surface ink is left on the garment unless we tint the discharge so the image color remains consistent.
Waterbase: This is a process where the ink permeates the fabric so the shirt remains soft and supple. Other options are sublimation and 3D effects.
- Direct to Garment Digital - a machine that can place any image
that you can see on a computer screen directly on to a t-shirt.
Digital printing shirts is like using a fancy ink jet printer it is a one at
a time process, and could be the best choice for small quantities of
complex images, but the ink system is limited to only a waterbase and
therefore unable to create textured effects.
- Heat Press Transfers - This is a process of screen printing an image
on to a transfer paper and then pressing the image on to the garment
with a heat press. This allows for specialty applications like stretchy
inks for technical athletic garments, or when a reflective image is
desired for high visibility.
- Sublimation - a process of gassing an image into the fabric so that it appears to be knit right into the garment (common in bike jerseys). The process can only be achieved on white polyesters, so the use of this application is limited. We create heat press transfers on our in-house equipment.
Not sure what's best for you? Call one of our experts at 604.855.1850.
