Impressions - August 2017 - 32

Step 1:
To accommodate a larger-than-normal design, try loading the shirt
sideways onto the platen.

Step 2:
In your RIP or print driver, ensure the image correlates to how the
shirt is loaded. In this case, the shirt was loaded with the collar on
the left side and rotated 90 degrees clockwise. Ensure that the image
shown in the software corresponds to the shirt placement.

GOING BIGGER
What happens if you have a design that measures 23" high x 15" wide.
Some DTG printers allow for large platens, but most have a smaller,
standard-size print area. This means you can't print the entire image
at once, so how can you achieve such a print?
First, ensure you're not working with one big, solid image, as you
can't break such a design into two separate images to be printed. Because fabric is not rigid and will stretch, no amount of adjustment will
result in perfect alignment. The following steps can be helpful when
printing much larger designs:
Step 1:
Design the artwork so that
it can be printed in separate
panels but will fit together like
a jigsaw puzzle. Ensure components don't overlap, while
giving enough leeway so that
it doesn't require pinpoint
positioning. Load the shirt
sideways on a standard platen, print the first part of the
design and cure accordingly.
For the second portion of
the design, ensure correct artwork positioning in the print
driver. In this example, since it
is positioned at the "bottom"of
the shirt and measures about
11 inches high, the shirt's hem
line hangs off of the shirt platen. This keeps the first print in sight and
enables measurement to ensure the "puzzle pieces" fit.

Uni-Directional Printing
When performing an allover print, remember to
select uni-directional printing in your print
driver or RIP software.

Step 3:
After printing, the design can be cured as normal. Because most heat
presses are 16" x 20", you may need to load the shirt sideways onto the
heating platen just as you did on the printer to ensure a proper cure.

The reason for this is that the farther away
the print head is from the printing surface,
the the more blurry the image will become. This
is true in the case of bi-directional printing
when there is a larger-than-normal distance from
the print head to the shirt's surface. Bi-directional printing far away from the print head
results in a horizontally blurred image because
of the print head's speed and the distance that
ink has to travel to reach the shirt. The print
head's motion allows the ink to shift from side
to side as it prints.
Printing in uni-directional mode means the blur
will be in one direction, thus eliminating the
horizontal blur. The result may not be as crisp
as it would be if the print head was closer to
the shirt, but it's a much more attractive alternative. Just remember, printhead distance
is a factor.

P.32

i m p r e s s i o n s m a g . c o m AUGUST 2017

http://www.impressionsmag.com

Impressions - August 2017

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