So I just wanted to get jawin' a little on our process we use at MDC to print shirts, koozies, flags, camp cups etc. It's a little process called Dye Sublimation. Quick and dirty explanation using a t-shirt example; the design is made, it gets printed with sublimation ink onto a special transfer paper, that printed image is heat pressed onto the t-shirt. Dyno-mite!
As with almost anything, there are pluses and minuses. The pluses are things like the print actually dyes the fabric of the shirt. A little important side note is that the shirt must contain a decent amount of polyester since that is what the dye ink bonds to. Cotton? No dice. That shit washes right out. So screen printed shirts have a layer of ink spread on top of the shirt fabric. You've all had that shitty t-shirt that wasn't screen printed the best and the graphic cracks and peels off and looks like hell after a few years. Dye sublimation will never do that. Along with that, the hand feel fo dye sublimation is nothing. Meaning the print is undetectable when feeling it on the shirt. You can feel that layer of ink on a screen printed shirt. This makes for a super smooth, super breathable shirt that will have a graphic that lasts longer than your sweet, sweet poodle, Tina.
Sounds MINT! What could be the minus here? Ironically, what make dye sub so money is the same dye process. Since the fabric is dyed, it makes it pretty tough to print on dark shirts - try to dye a black shirt any color... ain't gonna work. So the color palette for printing shirts with the dye sublimation process is limited to light to medium colored shirts. But that shouldn't scare you away... MDC likes to push those limits and have done some cool black on black styled shirts. We have literally printed thousands of shirt using dye sublimation and know a thing or two about it!
Need some shirts done for your event? We have lots of color options and can design you up some sweet options to make your idea come poppin' to life!