DTG printing is not cheap iron-on transfer or cut out vinyl you used to find on t-shirts back in the day, or on boardwalks, that would start to peel off after one wash. We pride ourselves on quality and stand behind our product from poor washing and fading after a single wash. DTG is actually a relatively new method of garment printing that produces full color high-quality images and a process that is set to stay put for some years yet!
Direct to Garment printing is the process of printing directly to the shirt from an electronic inkjet printer with a printhead that houses CMYK colors and white ink. Similar to your desktop printer at home, but more advanced,bigger, waterbased inks, and includes white ink. The garment will be preateated first with precise amount of pretreatment(yes that is really what it is called), dryed and than pass through the machine. The printhead will move back and forth at a resolution of 1440 to generate the image whether 1 color or full color picture images. The ink is than cured to correct temperature.
What makes DTG printing no minimums is that there’s very minimal setup time involved, and the entire design only require one single pass to be printed. That’s regardless of the number of colors in the design unlike screen where you basically need a new screen for each additional color. Images are adjusted by our design team to make sure each one is print ready, than it’s sent off to the print team. Print team preps the shirt with pretreatment(so the ink will bond better) loads the graphic and prints. It makes perfect sense therefore to use DTG for small orders, the prices for each t-shirt being a lot less when many colors are involved. Of course, for bulk printing, the price for each tee goes down further.
Here at Breakthrough Custom Clothing, DTG printing is our specialty. We do however offer other methods including screen printing, embroidery and heat transfers(for specific athletic wear that requires a stretchable vinyl).
Each method that we use has its own pros and cons. So, before deciding on a method of printing for your order, we need to consider the details of your project and how you envisage your final apparel to be.
1 color image under 12 pieces
2 color image under 18 pieces
3 color image under 24 pieces
4 color image under 36 pieces
5 color image under 48 pieces
6 color image under 60 pieces
Full color image under 150 pieces