Beginner's Guide to screen printing
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When I was 15 years old one of my sister's friends was printing T-shirts and selling them at a flea market. I asked him if he would print me a T-shirt with a guitar brand logo on it as I was learning to play the guitar. He just said, "No - But I can show you how to do it".
35 years later I'm still printing and have hardly learnt to play the guitar - Screen printing is something that I love doing and I can tell you how to start printing at home like I did - maybe you'll love it too. I've put together a basic beginner's guide to screen printing with all the different things you'll need to get started. Also have a Iook at my blog where I discuss certain topics in more detail.
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Inks
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When printing onto fabric you have a choice of waterbased or plastisol inks. For printing at home use water based inks. Water based inks are really eco friendly and you can clean them off the screen using just water after you print - they air dry and are soft to the touch. Plastisols require 160 Degree Celsius heat to dry and you need to clean them off using harmful chemicals. Plastisol prints have a plastic like feel and sit more on top of the fabric whereas water based inks sink more into the fabric and are softer. Once cured / heat set water based inks will wash incredibly well and they come in very vibrant colours. For more in depth info on what different inks are available for fabric printing, see my Screen Printing Inks for fabric printing blog.
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In our shop we are now offering Perfectly Opaque Fabric Inks. These are bluesign® approved, promoting environmentally and socially friendly products. These inks are suitable for printing onto light and dark fabrics (including cotton, polycotton
and polyester) and give brilliant colour prints with a soft feel and stretch.
When printing onto paper and board be sure to use a proper ink that is specifically made for paper/board/poster printing. Unfortunately a lot of people are reselling clear based fabric inks and labelling them as suitable for printing onto both fabric and paper. Fabric inks are not suitable for printing onto paper & board, the main reason being that they are not archivable and will fade over time. But a proper ink that is specifically formulated for screen printing onto paper & board is not only archivable and non yellowing, but will also give you much better and high definition results , which is especially important if you are a Fine Art or Graphic Printer. Inks such as Aqua Art Paper and Board inks, also come in a matt or gloss finish.
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Silkscreens
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Mesh count
Having decided to go with water based inks, the next decision is mesh count for your screen, the best mesh for printing onto fabric would be a 43T, it gives a good amount of detail and puts down a good amount of ink. A 43T is good for opaque inks and clear based inks too. For details about which mesh counts work best for different substrates have a look at my blog on mesh counts.
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Size
The size of the screen is important, if you want to print an A4 sized print, don't cram it onto an A4 sized screen, get a bigger A3 screen and give yourself some space to work with.
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Frame
You can get a cheaper wooden frame or go for a more professional aluminium frame. Originally my screens were home made frames with organza fabric attached with drawing pins but these were slack in some places and didn't give the best results. An aluminium framed screen will have a great tension across the mesh and will have a lot more life than a wooden framed screen. When coating a screen with emulsion, a tight mesh will give a more even coat of emulsion. Starting with good equipment will help lead to more consistent results.
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Squeegee
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I personally prefer aluminium handled squeegees, as they are really easy to clean, whereas wooden ones often are not sealed and can end up being quite messy. All you need to start out with is one a few centimetres bigger than your print with a square blade. The blades on squeegees can have a V-cut, a D-cut or be Square cut - to start out a square cut blade should be perfect. I've always screen printed with a square cut blade and have never needed a different cut.
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Making up your screen
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There are various ways of getting your design onto the screen from making stencils out of paper, sticking vinyl onto screens, to coating screens with emulsion and using a UV light to expose a printed positive or a positive cut from Rubylith film (blocks UV light during photographic exposure).
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Exposing screens photographically can be easy once you get it right. Have a look at my blog on Photographic Exposure, it outlines the steps to getting your screens coated with emulsion and then exposed. There are a few tips on things to look out for and the information should help you get things right.
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If you don't want to bother with making your own screen , we offer Custom Screen Exposure as well as an option to get help with your artwork.
Printing
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You need to use some packaging tape to mask off the edges of the screen where there is no stencil to stop ink going where you don't want it. Make sure you stick the packaging tape all the way up to and against the edges. Tippex is great for touching up any mistakes in your stencil, it won't wash away when you clean your screen with water.
Place a board inside the T-shirt that you want to print onto and make it as straight as possible, this will help line up your print and keep it straight and centered. I've screwed wood onto my board making an "L" shape so that I can put the screen down in the exact same place each time.
Place ink on the screen in a line, put enough ink to allow you to flood the screen with ink. It's good to use a squeegee that is a few centimetres wider than your design. If your squeegee is only big enough to reach the edges of the design you might not apply even pressure while pulling the squeegee and even not pull straight and miss edges of the design.
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Now you flood the screen by pulling the squeegee along at about 45 degrees with very little pressure. You want to coat the screen with a layer of ink, this is loading the mesh with ink. Notice the squeegee is at a low angle and not bending, there is hardly any pressure.
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Now you do a print stroke which is harder and the angle is closer to 70 degrees, you scrape the ink off the surface as you move the squeegee. You can do another print stroke to make sure that you have cleared the ink from the mesh.
Lift up the screen and you should be looking at your first print.
To get your print more opaque read through my blog post on Printing on Dark Fabric
Well done. Now you can keep printing. Put the next shirt on the board, flood the screen with ink and then do a print stroke to clear the ink from the mesh again. Repeat until you have finished printing all of your shirts.
If you need to take a break from printing to take a phone call, visit the toilet or something else you need to make sure the ink doesn't dry in your screen. Water based ink air dries so the smaller details will block up slowly and you will start missing parts of your print. Some people flood the screen and leave it flooded to help slow the drying out from happening. A really great method that has worked for me really well is to do a final print stroke, clearing the mesh of ink and, scoop up the extra ink around the edges. Now get a cloth and wet it with water, squeeze out the excess water so that it is not dripping wet and wipe the print side of the screen (the side that touches your t-shirt or fabric). Wipe the print area and then take a dry cloth and dry the screen. Now when you hold the screen up to the light you will be able to see that the mesh in the design part of the screen is clear. You can take your time now and come back to printing when you are ready. If while printing you notice small areas getting blocked you can do the same thing, wipe the print side of the screen down with the wet cloth and then dry it. This will keep the mesh clear of ink that is drying.
Once you finish scrape ink up off the screen and squeegee and return it to your ink tub. The squeegee and screen can now be washed down with a hose or even wiped clean. If you don't have a garden hose, wipe up the ink and then use wet cloths to clean the screen. You can leave the screen to air dry or dry the screen with a towel, have a look that the mesh to make sure that it is clear of ink - if ink dries in your design it will block your mesh for future prints.
Curing the prints
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You leave the prints to air dry. Once they are completely dry you can iron the prints to cure them. There are binding agents in the inks which need to reach 160 Degrees Celcius to start cross linking so that the ink bonds with the fabric. You can put a tea towel or piece of fabric over the print so that the printed fabric doesn't get browned by the iron. You could iron the print for 2-3 minutes depending on the size. The best thing is to cure one print and then do a wash test. Leave your print for at least an hour after curing before you do the wash test as the ink will still be bonding (cross linking) with the fabric after you heat it up.
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An iron will work well when you start out , but once you start printing bigger quantities a heat press will save you a lot of time and will ensure consistent results as it lets you set the exact time and temperature required.
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For more details on heat presses have a look at my blog on curing.
Semi Automatic heat press