Cheap T-shirt print methods

spinningmagnets

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If you have a lot of time on your hands, but you don't want to spend a lot of money, there are a couple of methods I have recently seen (on you tube, etc) that provided better results than I had anticipated. I thought I'd pass it along. I recently ordered some T-shirts to be professionally screen-printed, but you have to order a lot of them to get the individual price lower.

There are videos about using bleach to make a pattern, art, or letters. You make a stencil out of "freezer paper" which is waxy on one side. Then you insert some cardboard inside the T-shirt to make a firmer base, plus to prevent the bleach from bleeding through to the back. Locate the stencil and then iron the freezer paper with the waxy side towards the T-shirt so its sticky and won't move around.

Mix bleach and water 50%/50% in the spray bottle, pure bleach will burn a hole in the cloth.

You use a spray bottle that is adjusted to produce a mist, and wet down the letter cut-outs. Wait about ten seconds, then dab the wetness with paper towels to stop the bleaching (it will continue to fade for a dew seconds after you dab). Then pull out the cardboard, and dunk the T-shirt into a bucket of water to completely stop the reaction. Wash and dry, then its ready to go.

The freezer paper I found is 18 inches wide, and 100 feet long. It was the only size that walmart had that day, and it was $7. So...its seven cents a foot. If you used 2-feet per shirt, you could do 50 shirts, but...its very time consuming.

The first shirt I am trying this on is black because...I figured that if the bleach bled out sideways from the stencil, I could re-draw the edges sharp with the permanent black felt marker.

The font I chose is from Microsoft "Word", it is called "Arial", I made it "bold", the letter size is 150 pt.
If you like the curve of the arched letters, the radius is about one foot, I traced it from the lid of a 55-gallon drum. Arching can easily be printed out in Photoshop, but I didn't have that available today.

The most important tip is...try this out on an old free T-shirt before doing it to a new $5 t-shirt.

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1/2 gallon of cheap bleach
spray bottle that can produce an even mist
$5 dark T-shirt with a front pocket
$7 roll of freezer paper that is waxy on one side
clothes-iron (used one from a thrift store?)
bucket (or sink) of water
tape
razor blades or x-acto knife
sheet of cardboard that will fit inside T-shirt
paper towels
sharpie black felt marker

I added safety glasses and rubber gloves, but...this can be done without them if you exercise caution.

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I don't have pics yet, but I would like to try a combination of transfer paper imaging and bleaching. I bought a "Brother" brand black & white laser-printer for $120. The toner lasts a really long time (hundreds of pages), but best of all, the refills are very cheap. My last printer was a common $45 Hewlett-Packard unit. The printer was cheap, but the ink cartridges did NOT last long, and replacements were $30 each.

If you use a waxy-feeling "transfer paper" (cheap), the image that is printed on it will easily transfer off of it onto a T-shirt. You have to reverse the print image, then place it on the shirt, then iron it to "melt" the image onto the shirt.

My idea is this: I bleach a rectangle onto the back of a T-shirt. Then, the image I type onto the computer screen and then make it a reverse-image. Then I make it a negative color so the words are white and the space is black. Print it out, and iron it over the pale rectangle.

If this works, it will be a cheap and easy way to make as many shirts as you need...if the style is acceptable: Imagine a shirt is dark green, the border of the words is a black block, and the letters are pale green

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It's actually pretty easy to make your own, hand lettered, silk screens. Then you can screen print endless copies.

Paint your letters in wax resist that you find in the ceramics section of the hobby shop. Then coat the bare screen with something rubbery. Latex roof paint thinned down, diluted latex caulk, whatever. Then the wax can be removed with hot water.

Paint and screen is there at most hobby shops as well.

Really nice embroidered logos don't cost much either, except for the one time set up costs with the shop. Once you have it in their computer, pretty cheap to take any garment down to them and have em stich up a nice custom shirt or jacket.
 
Very old school look,the t-shirt you made looks like its from the 1920s. :)
 
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Know those pics well,i made a electric board tracker rode 7 miles and switched the handlebars. :)
 
Just found this: "Remember to neutralize the shirt with 1 part hydrogen peroxide to 10 parts water and soak for 15 minutes so the bleach does not continue to eat away at the fabric over time!!

Edit: thanks so much for the awards and upvotes!!! It is indeed just the regular 3% peroxide solution sold at any drugstore, mixed with 10 parts water. Sorry about not clarifying that!"
 
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