t shirt printing cornwall » t shirt printing

Port Eliot 2010 T shirt.

Steve — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 19:15:54 +0000

This weekend Port Eliot Festival plays host to a huge variety of creative talent, and as usual there seems to be something of interest for everyone.

Unfortunately for Advertees a consequence of this event is that we lose a highly valued member of staff for the duration. Our genius admin (who keeps everything here running in an orderly fashion) will be camped out at the Festival, no doubt enjoying everything the Elephant Fayre has to offer, and this could mean our efficiency levels for Friday this week and Monday next, could be effected. And while Admin take a wild swim, watch bands, films, talks and readings, we will do our upmost to leave desks, computers and phones exactly as we found them.

Tickets are still available at the gate, and we, or rather admin@advertees, can vouch for the pure magic of this festival.

And of course, don’t forget to take a look at the beautiful T shirts, a simple yet extremely effective design. and soft feel water based screen printing as pictured top.

Are Retensionable frames worth the time and money??

Steve — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 19:24:45 +0000

Possibly the only reasons any screen printer can give for not introducing retensionable frames to their workshop would be the costs. And all the time involved in maintaining mesh tensions. Having used Newman frames for nearly a year now, we can only wonder where we would be without them. Retensionable frames have surpassed all our expectations with many unforeseen benefits being added to the list of ‘fors’ and the ‘against’ list has now been thrown in the bin. First and foremost we invested in Newman screens for faster set up times, using the pin registration system. This has worked like a charm not only in reducing set up times, but also the knock on effect of a better organized art department who now take full responsibility for the artworks placement on the screen.

More accurate placement of artwork on screens also allows for more control of halftones, high mesh tensions allow for finer meshes when printing water based inks, these two things combined have allowed us to produce screens extremely quickly, with very predictable results. We are never left trying to compensate for screen errors on press, our T-shirt printers are now faster, and much happier. The times where these improvements really make themselves known are on repeat orders where retensionable frames were not in use, this 3 colour water based discharge print previously had to be registered by eye, and then, after the first print, adjustments were made with great haste for fear of ink drying in the screen. Once up and running many adjustments were made to print and flood speeds to compensate for dot gain, or not enough ink down. This week we put the screens in their predetermined positions filled them with ink and printed a test print which was spot on registration. The job was then printed with zero fine tuning of print flood speeds. A retensionable frame removes so much frustration on press (especially when working with water based inks in the summer) that the time required to maintain them is more than worth while.

This print was produced for The Alarm who are presently touring the UK.

Growing interest in water based screen printing.

Steve — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 19:41:58 +0000

Slowly there is a growing awareness to the advantages of a water based screen print. Customers are also showing a certain amount of understanding regards its limitations, and prefer to be flexible in their requirements rather than lose the obvious benefits of a soft dyed in the cotton print.

The more use we make of water-based inks, the more we realise some of the benefits offered from a production point of view. In the first 2 months of 2010 we have seen significant growth in customer enquiries specific to water based inks (and surprisingly further enquiries from fellow screen printers) .

This is an incredibly positive start to the year, even to leave the environmental benefits out of the equation, screen printing with these products sees added customer satisfaction and a very high rate of return custom. Many of the prominent online T shirt printers have now stated they offer this service, lets hope this continued growth in interest and use of water based inks will lead to faster product development, and availability.

Screen printed T-shirt for Enochian Theory

Steve — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 21:30:00 +0000

Prog Metal Band Enochian Theory recently supplied a very challenging design to us. We immediately thought the design would be suited to the waterbased bleaching method known as discharge. The distinctive artwork was created by Robin Portnoff for the bands most recent album, and we are very pleased to have had the opportunity of reproducing this illustration as a screen print on T shirts.

Prior to this design we had never attempted a 6 colour simulated process using water based discharge inks, a job like this can present so many problems (colour is especially difficult to control), but when it works the final result cannot be compared to any other method of getting designs on to a Tshirt. The result is a fully ironable, breathable print. The earthy tones which are an inherent part of discharge prints, match this particular design perfectly.

The newly installed TAS dealt with this job brilliantly. We are already starting to wonder how we managed pre TAS. This job was run without flash cures, so an incredibly quick print run and a good energy saving. Newman screens also played a very important part of getting this job done without any hiccups.

Enochian Theory are now on their way to the Prog Power festival in Holland, with some UK shows on their return. Be sure to check out the bands web site, and myspace pages. There is also some great you tube footage. We like them a lot, a full 10 out of 10 from us. If you want to support this hard working band, buy their album, and if you like what you hear why not get the T shirt too.

Screen Printing of Water based inks

Steve — Sun, 31 May 2009 10:41:50 +0000

May has been a very busy month for us, this blog has only seen one post at the beginning of this month, as printing T shirts has been required from waking to sleeping. Our new gas dryer has been a very worth while investment, with more jobs being printed using water based at a much faster rate.

An increase in our output has been matched by demand, water based printing jobs are up, the non Formaldehyde discharge has been very well received by customers. What is down is blog posts, so a little more effort will be made in the next couple of months to publish something informative and helpful about T shirt printing, suggestions of topics are welcome.

And as we ran around busy as can be, the chickens relaxed, and while our backs were turned the Fox payed a visit! Seven of the Advertees chickens were killed, new fencing has been erected and a new member of the Advertees team ( a Jack Russell ) has been given the job of patrolling it. Pecking orders have been re-established and things are slowly returning to normal in the chicken house.

T-shirts that incorporate everything we like, The Present.

Steve — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 17:28:48 +0000

Every now and then we come across T-shirt prints which have all the qualities we like, water based printing is a must, good design for screen print is another plus.

T shirts which are organic, or at least sweat shop free are always good. The T shirts featured tick all these boxes, a promotion for a UK tour of, The Present, a new Thomas Campbell film. The follow up to surf films Sprout, and The Seedling covers West Africa, New Zealand, Australia, Sumatra, Java, Hawaii and California. For more information about the film and the venues visit thesurfscreen.com.

Looking at the featured surfers and locations this is probably going to be another classic, we can’t wait to see it.

The tour dates and venues are:

* Wednesday 22nd April The Royal Cinema, St Ives
* Saturday 25th April The Sallis Beeney Theatre, Brighton
* Friday 1st May The Carnmarth Hotel, Newquay
* Saturday 2nd May Woodlane Theatre, Falmouth
* Saturday 9th May The Lighthouse Centre, Poole
* Sunday 10th May The Cube Cinema, Bristol
* Saturday 16th May Braunton Village Hall, Braunton
* Sunday 17th May The Reel Cinema, Kingsbridge
* Saturday 23rd May St Merryn Village Hall, St Merryn

Sucker Punch

Steve — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 09:44:46 +0000

This T shirt design by Murkin uses 6 colours and is printed at our maximum proportions of 14×16. We prefer to print slightly under these dimensions especially when using half tones, but will make exceptions when customers are not in a hurry. This print was post old dryer and pre gas dryer, as a result it had to be printed using pthalate free plastisols rather than water based inks. This is our first multicolour job on Newman frames, a rather long set up time made clear the need to organise a pin reg system as soon as posible.

Metallic inks, screen printing

Steve — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 09:13:16 +0000

More metallic inks are added to the our range, we are currently experimenting with new binders and pastes from Grafco. Such was the response to our new gold ink solutions, we are now taking a look at copper and aluminium pastes. Straight out of the pot they look great and we look forward to incorporating them into designs. New water based binders are available too which should enable us to achieve subtle differences in the final result. All we need now is a little time for research and development, the new year has started well and some experiments may to be put on hold as we only have a couple of months before we enter the T shirt printing season.

Fluorescent T Shirt Printing

Steve — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 10:49:45 +0000

Now classed as a retro look, fluorescent T Shirt Printing is synonymous with the 80’s. It is not a regular customer request, but now and again it crops up. The key to a good quality fluoro prints is underbasing, the pigments are not very opaque and a good white background is essential. For the T shirt print in the above image we put down 2 whites before printing the fluorescent green and magenta, the colours consist of an opaque water based binder with 10% pigment. Good quality pigments are always advisable.

Cromatex 2000 is made by Grafco and supplied by Screening West

This job was printed on organic T shirts from Okarma, and printed using water based products. Geeks in the basement was produced for a competition winner and will be flown out to Oz! So although these T shirts are printed using environmentally sound methods, the air miles clocked up by them will make a nonsense of it. First and last time we ship this far I am sure.

Vectorising sketched artwork and drawings

Julian — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 12:14:12 +0000

Somebody sends us their artwork that they would like printed out onto T shirts.
How is it done?
Follow me into the studio…

We get artwork in a whole variety of forms from finalised vector graphics to a quick sketch on a shopping list.
For this demonstration, I will use a sketch of Woody Allen put together in photoshop.

To start with, this has a wide variety of textures and is fairly colourful. The idea here, is to produce a stark, single colour print. Woody’s going to need simplifying and that means combining all the tonal areas into black.

One way is to adjust the levels (image/adjustments/levels), another way – and the one I have used here – is simply to pull the contrast up and the brightness down. When you’re happy, save the file.
For screening simple graphics like this, as with so many other things, vector is best. Vectorising a piece of bitmap artwork will give it ultra crisp lines instead of the blocky edges we associate with bitmaps.
Open up illustrator or another vector program, and take the image into it.
You can draw over the sketch using the pencil tool. This way, you can do some cleaning up of the lines as you go.
However, if it’s speed you’re after, you should always try vector tracing first. As well as, usually, making a very good job of it, tracing often introduces interesting and useful effects of it’s own.

Here we have the bitmap sketch (on the left) and a quick trace using the default live trace setting in illustrator.
Even at this size, you can see how a lot of the messiness has been cleaned up by the simplifying action of a vector trace.

If we go in closer, the difference in line edge clarity is obvious. This will print nice and cleanly.

It could well be argued though, that some of Woody’s character is lost – look particularly around the mouth where the shadow has become decidedly angular.
Here’s where the tracing variables can help.

This time, I’ve gone into the options and taken the path fitting down to 1 pixel. This gives a trace with a much higher fidelity to the original image. Too far in this direction, however, can result in the actual bitmap pixels being traced! If the original is of a low resolution this can happen, and will result in something which is still rough looking. You should make sure that your original image is of a good resolution to start with if possible.

Another setting which can make all the difference is blur. Using this tool can turn ragged lines into smooth, flowing ones which tend to look quite organic. For simple shapes particularly of an abstract nature, curlicues and the sort of floral patterns commonly seen in artwork today, this might be just the job. Also the blurring of a trace can impart a ‘glossiness’, or sort of plastic sheen etc. Depends what you have in mind.

Here’s Woody again with the blur turned up to 4 px. It’s often a trade-off, trial and error, but again, the higher quality the original artwork the better.

However, we have to try and work with what we receive and often all we have is a low quality piece of artwork. Tracing does not always work. Under these circumstances, we have to re-draw, and a drawing tablet, such as a Wacom can work wonders – so much easier than using the old mouse.

I Love Cornwall T shirt

Steve — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 12:58:32 +0000

The most simple T shirt designs are often the most effective, I love Kernow T shirts are a good example of this. A timeless design that utilises White T shirts, simple printing in two colours, with a clear message. Easy.

Waterbased t shirt printing by Advertees

Printing detail on a pique knit polo shirt

Steve — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:02:30 +0000

A pique knit polo can present problems on very detailed prints, to fill the holes in the weave with ink and maintain good edges is tricky. We find, as ever, that water based inks are a good solution. The very nature of water based ink allows for both an even and opaque print, without losing the edges. A plastisol ink has a tendency to sit on top of the fibres of the shirt, there is no absorbtion of the ink and as a result the plastisol may want to spread out when trying to fill the holes in the knit. This can result in very tiny details filling in entirely, below and above is a close up view of water based printing of a detailed design, its ability to cling to and shrink around fibres makes a big difference in retaining all detail.

Frenzy in the ball pool

Steve — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 09:09:37 +0000

This T shirt design from Chris Lanyon speaks for itself. A four colour screen print using opaque waterbased inks from Grafco. The colour came up good and bright, but we think we could have put more ink down with a coarser screen mesh.

Cheap T-shirt printing can be good

Steve — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 17:09:10 +0000

Making money go further is likely to become a necessity in the very near future for many businesses, but promotion of your business can not stop, it is an essential part of any company who wish to maintain growth, so how can we save money on a promotional T-shirt run. Here are a few tips on saving money when ordering promotional wear.

Use a white T shirt. White T shirts are cheaper, they are also easier and quicker to print than coloured T shirts. To achieve bright coloured prints on Black T shirts a white underbase is required adding to your set up costs. White T shirts can be printed in vivid colour and make use of water based inks at no extra cost, water based ink is ideal for large print areas as it is soft to touch and can be ironed, large designs do not cost extra.
Keep the design simple, every colour in your design adds to the cost of production, one or two colour designs are the most effective and memorable, it could be worth your while investing in a good logo design, it may save money in the long term, the extra costs of reproducing a complex design on vehicles and signage are worth considering.
The number of print positions on a shirt. This is where you can easily double the cost of your promotional Tshirts. Do you really need to print the sleeves and the more popular than ever web address on the hem of the t shirt? A front and back print is more than enough to get your message across, and a strong brand should be found easily on the web if promoted correctly.
Take a good look around at whats on offer, get a full breakdown of prices, screen printers have a bit of a reputation for forgetting to mention additional charges such as screens and artwork. Many screen printers have good offers on larger print runs especially on white T shirts, we always have them in stock and they present no print production problems.

Remember, single colour large T shirt graphics can be extremely effective, katharine Hamnett is testament to this. We always give the first screen free of charge on orders of more than 10 shirts, so even a short run of T shirts does not need to break the bank. Cheap T shirt printing does not have to mean poor quality T shirt printing, less can be more, good design is key.

All over T shirt printing

Steve — Sun, 23 Nov 2008 19:05:11 +0000

One request we recieve on a regular basis is for all over T-shirt printing. The T shirt below is from design by Humans

To acheive an all over T shirt print, a particular kind of screen printing machine is required. Belt printers are capable of this kind of printing and can produce incredible results. The video shows an M&R belt printer in action. For many people, this kind of printing is not affordable with minimum orders often around the 144 mark, but one possible way around this is to enter competitions run by design by humans on a regular basis, their website is packed full of some of the most inspirational T shirt designs you can imagine, there are hundreds of fantastic examples of all over T shirt printing on this site.
Unfortunately Advertees do not have this facility at present, with nearly all belt printing machines being operated in America, but it is certainly something we can aspire to. For the moment we are able to achieve large printing areas by hand, but we do prefer to avoid seams where possible. Waterbased inks are recommended for large T-shirt designs, with a discharge printing ink is used for dark shirts rather than an opaque water based ink.

The Cheerleading T Shirt

Steve — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:05:37 +0000

It does not often happen, we think we have printed T shirts for nearly every kind of club or sport imaginable over the course of 30 years, but this week saw our first print run of cheerleading T Shirts. A quick look around the net reveals a thriving cheerleading scene within the UK, with a UK cheerleading website keeping us up to speed on events, competitions and courses.

London to Darwin Overland

Steve — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 22:08:26 +0000

Odyssey Overland are embarking on another epic journey to Darwin from London in the Spring of 2009. It looks like the trip of a lifetime if you have 26 weeks to spare.
Pete Deverson has many years experience in organising these trips, and you are assured a trip few people would ever experience in their lifetime, taking in more than 20 countries, from some of the worlds most remote places to some of its ancient treasures, simply too much to list here. Take a look at of the amazing images on the overland odyssey web site for a taste of what is on offer.

Meanwhile we at Advertees have to make do with providing some Promotional T-shirts for the lucky few.

direct to garment fundraiser

Steve — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 20:08:02 +0000

As a fundraising idea for schools direct to garment printed T shirts are never going to compete with the fundraising tea towel, especially in the current climate, parents will not appreciate being asked to fork out for a more expensive item. But we have had requests and some orders, as pictured above. Childrens drawings always benefit from a little boost in colour and contrast before printing, scanning the images does not have to be too time consuming if done at a sensible resolution. For now though, we plod on with the old favourite. The tea towel is still the most effective school fundraiser available with demand growing every year.

Glow in the dark T shirt print

Steve — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 17:41:41 +0000

Glow in the dark ink is a combination of a pigment (looking like a strange planet in the picture above) and a binder, either plastic or water-based binders can be used. For the best results the ink needs to be printed through a coarse mesh to allow the large phosphorescent particles to pass through the screen. It is also advisable to put down a very good white base as an under-print.

This T shirt design by Simon Allan makes great use of this technique.

You can purchase the angler fish T shirt from Nogunarmy.com plus many more excellent designs.

T shirt printing special effects

Cornwall film festival

Steve — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 12:57:02 +0000

Yesterday saw the start of the Cornwall film Festival (I intended to write this post before the event) running from the 6th to the 9th of November and showcases Cornwalls talented film makers, as well as featuring some international films.

This years Screen Actions, is a two day event for young people, combining workshops, screenings and partys, last year saw 300 young people take part from schools all over Cornwall.

Board shorts is the Festival’s board sports film event, held at the Sandsifter Bar in Gwithian on the 8th November. As well as screenings there will be live music from Mark Kermode’s skiffle band The Dodge Brothers and local DJs Sir Vinyl of the Fattest.

This is a great event and although I am unable to make any of the screenings this year, we were fortunate enough to be able to supply some printed organic T shirts, we used water based screen printing inks for all the designs. The designs were created by A-Side a graphic design and illustration studio based in Falmouth Cornwall.