Sublimation printing is awesome, but not magic. Expect imperfections around seams and folds. Here are some technical information and important tips you need to know and share with your customers.
Expect to have smudges, blurs, and creasing near edges, seams, and collars of the garment. When printing flat artwork onto a constructed garment, some imperfections will occur, particularly under the arm. Keep this in mind when designing, specifically the placement of important artwork.
Single-Sided Prints will show the bare garment color on the non-printed side.
Smudges & White Streaks near edges, seams, and collars are normal.
Design Within These Limitations by strategically placing patterns or graphics near problem areas.
Shifting On Press up to 2″ is normal. Prints are not able to be aligned front-to-back.
Garments do not size-up evenly.
Please see images below:
Single-sided prints will show the bare garment color on the non-printed side. We currently offer sublimation apparel that is only available in white. Single-sided prints will clearly show the unprinted side if you use the full print area.
When you are designing try to avoid black or very dark backgrounds if you are going to cover all t-shirt. The creases will be more noticeable in dark backgrounds.
Sublimation process is a transfer paper applied on a white t-shirt since the readily made tees have folds and seams on them the black ink from the background color would not be able to reach these areas. Therefore, they would remain white, unfortunately.
As can be seen in the image below, the second of the t-shirt is going to be printed after the back transfer is laid on it, and the folds under the armpit are not going to be covered by the paper, and there won't be any transfer.
These imperfections are not just with AOP+ process, these are a normal issue as well with other printing company who prints on a ready-made garment.
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