SCREEN PRINTING vs DIGITAL PRINTING
Textile printing is the process of applying colour to fabric in precise patterns or designs. In printed fabrics the colour is bonded with the fibre. Textile printing is related to dyeing but in dyeing the entire fabric is covered evenly with one colour, whereas in printing one or more colours are applied to it in certain parts only. There are several methods of printing on garments, these include and not limited to ; hand block printing, perrotine printing, engraved copperplate printing, roller, cylinder, or machine printing, stencil printing, screen printing, digital printing. In this article we will cover two of those methods. Screen printing and Digital printing. Why? Well, at Create A Tee, we do digital printing and many a time people compare us to screen printers. But we are not. So we will draw a line in here.
SCREEN PRINTING VS DIRECT TO GARMENT PRINTING
Screen printing is a technique whereby a mesh is used to transfer ink onto a substrate, except in areas made impermeable to the ink by a blocking stencil. A blade or squeegee is moved across the screen to fill the open mesh apertures with ink, and a reverse stroke then causes the screen to touch the substrate momentarily along a line of contact. This causes the ink to wet the substrate and be pulled out of the mesh apertures as the screen springs back after the blade has passed.
Facts on Screen Printing
- Screen printing is versatile as it generally works just as well on other apparel, such as hats, bags and jackets, as with T-shirts.
- There is generally a setup fees charged for screen printing to prepare the screens needed for the different colors in the shirt.
- If you only want a dozen or fewer shirts, the additional cost to prepare the screens and ink for screen printing will make your order expensive.
- The larger the order the less expensive the cost of screen printing. So for very large orders, you can usually save money relying on screen printing.
- There is a lot of equipment needed for screen printing, including the inks, the screens, emulsion fluids and the T-shirts or whatever canvas will be used.
- Screen printing can be a time-consuming project that allows for only one color to be printed at a time.
- Difficult to Reproduce Photos. Reproducing a photo can be less then desirable. In order to achieve good photo reproduction, a skilled artist must modify the photo and reproduce it onto the screens.
DIRECT TO GARMENT PRINTING (DTG)
Digital printing on the utilizes a specialized inkjet printer and specially designed inks to print directly onto textiles. The Apparel decorating process involves a garment being placed on a platen as it would for screen printing, but instead of a screen, a print head moves into place and prints directly on the garment over the desired print area then the printed garment is cured with heat. DTG prints look better than traditional apparel printing processes. You cannot feel the design on the garment since the design is printed into the fabric of the apparel.
Facts on DTG
- There are no setup costs, as compared to screen-printing. Direct to garment printers are essentially a push button operation. Start it up, let it warm up and you are ready to go.
- Small orders and one-offs print at a reasonable price.
- Print images on direct to garment printers are highly accurate and detailed.
- Unlike screen-printing, direct to garment printer shops do not have to charge by the color, so full-color printing is extremely affordable.
- Direct to garment printer inks attach directly to fibers, with a superb hand that almost feels like part of the fabric.
- DTG inks bind to the fiber of the garment. This is why a fibrous material, such as 100 percent cotton, is better than polyester on direct to garment printers, which is extremely smooth.
Conclusion.
What makes digital printing faster is that you aren’t mucking about with the screen prep, press registration, ink mixing, reclaiming, emulsion coating or other set-up steps that analog printing employs. Normally what would take time would be art prepping. But in our case, that is automated as we have the art sent directly from our webpage (after simple self designing process) to the print queue in the digital printer. The garments are staged, and the job is printed. No order entry. Packing lists are printed at the end. The order is packed up and is ready to go in about the same amount of time it would take just to burn and dry the screens if you printed it the traditional way.