Heat transfer or silk screen for photographic t-shirt designs?
I’m starting a t-shirt business with my own designs, comprised of 150-300dpi photographic collages. Some designs are full color and others black/white positives with a single color tone. I intend to print them on black and dark color garments.
Here’s a picture for reference – http://yfrog.com/31samplafmdesignsj
Which method should I use, heat transfer or silk screen?
appreciate any help, thx
sublimation?
Silk screening will provide the most durable images. A good silk screened image may out last the shirt, itself.
Yes, it’s a lot of work to produce the screens and do the actual printing yourself, but that’s why designers tend to hire out the actuall printing to a professional shirt printer. The costs tend to be nearly cancelled out, the greater the volume of shirts ordered.
For smaller runs, of, say one to twenty shirts, the heat transfers may be more economical, and well within the capabilities of a designer’s home studio. Just be aware that those buyers who recognize quality will also know a heat transfer from a silk screen and will only be willing to pay a correspondingly lower price per shirt.
Interestingly, people, even conniseurs, are willing to pay the highest prices for custom airbrushed shirts, even though airbrushed designs are about the most fragile and ephemeral of wearable images. But then, they are paying for one of a kind, original artwork and not some mass produced images.
Quality is hard to define.