Today we will learn a little more about textile printing and about one of the newest methods: digital printing on textiles.
Printing on textiles has been a part of society for many years, as with other types of printing, with technological advances, the methodologies used to print on textiles are changing and adapting to new technologies.
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What is digital textile printing?
As the name implies, textile printing is simply a process (or series of processes) in which a design is stamped onto a textile piece.
The purposes for which it is printed on fabric can be totally different, many companies use it as an advertising method and clothing designers also use it to personalize some of their pieces.
We have been able to print on textiles for many years, but with the passage of time we have managed to optimize processes in such a way that today the prices of digital textile printing are really low and can be perfectly adapted to company budgets and natural persons.
Types of textile printing
There are different types or processes for textile printing, some of the most common being digital printing on fabric (or direct printing), screen printing, hot print, vinyl text, sublimation, among others.
Let’s know a little about the most relevant processes today.
Direct printing
Direct printing is also known as digital printing on fabrics and is one of the most important methods today. Later we will learn a little more about this way of printing on fabric.
Serigraphy
Screen printing is perhaps the most widely used method today (followed very closely by direct printing today) as it has a great advantage: production costs are reduced when printing in large quantities.
But it also has a great disadvantage and that is that the number of colors to be used in printing can be a limitation.
Sublimation
The sublimation printing process is used by those people or companies looking for higher quality in their prints. The process is quite interesting and has to do with heat transfer.
As we mentioned before, today we will learn more about digital textile printing (also called direct textile printing).
Knowing more about digital textile printing
What is digital textile printing? This is the first thing we must answer to know a little more about this way of printing on textiles.
Digital textile printing works in a very similar way to traditional printers, the process consists simply of making a print with inks of different colors on the indicated textile.
On what kind of fabrics is it possible to print?
Many people also know it as digital textile printing on cotton and this is because this method can only be carried out on garments that have a percentage of cotton in their composition (usually the percentage of cotton should exceed at least 55%) .
Therefore, the recommended digital printing fabric should be a high amount of cotton that way, not only will the results be much better, the print will last much longer.
Is the digital textile printing process very complex?
The truth is that when we think of a printer that can print on fabric we could imagine a very complex process and extremely difficult machines to handle, but the truth is that the process is quite simple and consists of the following:
- Step 1. Treat the garment
The first step in the digital printing process is to treat the fabric where we are going to print.
Whether they must do this step manually or not will completely depend on the printer they have. Older models do not include the garment treatment step so you must spray the liquid on it. - Step 2. Drying the garment
After being impregnated with the liquid that will help improve the results, you should wait for the garment to dry (or help it with a drying process, which happens with the most advanced printers).
- Step 3. Introduce the fabric to be printed on
The following two steps are the simplest, now we must introduce the fabric as if it were a sheet of paper in your home printer.
Of course, remember that wrinkles can cause the image to be completely damaged. - Step 4. Print
The final step is to start the printing process and wait for your piece of clothing to come out with a beautiful design or print that is full of color and life.
How expensive are digital printers on textiles?
The price of digital textile printers will depend completely of the type of machine and the functionalities that it may have.
Similarly, currently prices could be between 8 thousand and up to 20 thousand dollars. A price that seems quite high, but when you realize the quality of printing on T-shirts and other textiles you will see that it can be an excellent investment for your company or business.
T-shirts with digital printing look totally different and for that reason they can have a somewhat higher cost than those that carry out another type of printing, such as, for example, printing to sublimate.
Despite this, there are many people who still maintain the more traditional methods and adhere to the processes and machinery that they have used all their lives.
By this we do not mean that sublimation printing is not a worthwhile process, simply that digital printing on clothing is the future and that it will possibly overthrow all other textile printing processes in a very few years.
Have you learned enough about textile printing and one of its most revolutionary methods or processes: digital textile printing? What do you think? Do you think that digital printing is the future of textiles?
Do you want to know more about textile printing? visit this article.