All Over Printing Limitations and Helpful Tips

Art Requirements for All-Over Printing

All-Over printing is a unique style of tshirt printing that has a few more art requirements than a standard t-shirt print. Check out the How To Order page for more general ordering information.

One of the main unique features of how all-over shirts are printed is that the same artwork covers all sizes of shirts. This means the art work on the Small size shirt will show less than what is shown on the 2XL size shirt. By printing in this manner it allows a consistency between shirts while retaining some individuality, but does require some special consideration and fore thought as to the placement of elements.

HELPFUL TIP: If you have elements (logo, phone number, business info, etc) that need to be visible on all sizes, you should design these size/placements to fit on the smallest shirt size being produced.

Shirt & Color Restrictions

Due to garment dyes and the materials used in making shirts, some shirt blends and colors work better than others. The best fabric to use for All-Over printing is 100% cotton and certain Heather blends.

Shirt Colors that work best:

Good Discharge Ink Colors

Shirt Colors that WILL NOT work:

Bad Discharge Ink Colors

**Please understand that these charts do not cover ALL colors available. To check if the color you wish to use is usable, please contact us.

General Considerations

Printing large areas a solid color, especially under the armpit and over seams, may look misprinted due to small folds in the fabric. The best way to minimize any negative effects from this is to distress these areas to reduce noticeability.

All Over Prints are not wrap prints. You can do a front and back print, but not wrap around in a single movement.

When designing your back layout, avoiding putting any logo or important graphic element that needs to look perfect across the area that shows where the front collar will be. This is due to when laid flat the front collar can cause an uneven surface to print on.

Discharge Inks

All Over printing uses Discharge Inks which is a specialty process used as an alternative to traditional plastic inks in screen printing sometimes called Soft Hand or Water Base. Although not ideal for all materials, discharge does provide beautiful colors with very soft prints that let's the fabric's texture shine through.

Discharge printing is a specialty process that uses a water based ink product as its base and has a discharge agent added to the ink. The purpose of the discharge agent is to "discharge" the dark colored dye out of the cotton and leave the cotton in its natural state which is usually a cream or tan color. Discharge is formulated to work on garments with 100% cotton in the fabric content and that is one of the limitations associated with its use.

Gradients can be done with water base or discharge prints, but will typically require a lower resolution when done with water base inks. This is because fine gradients require the screen printer to use high mesh count screens and water base ink has a tendency to dry in this type of screen.

While we do charge extra for this Discharge service, the costs are minimal and will allow you to get that retail look and feel, and often will demand a higher price at retail.

HELPFUL TIP: To help you with your design, Broken Arrow would like to provide you with true to size shirt templates showing all sizes from small to 2XL. These are vector based files that are compatible with Adobe Illustrator CS3 and above. *Note: The template is not perfect for all shirt brands, but should work for most shirts.

These tips are not meant to be all inclusive but more of a guide to help you get the best possible end result. If you have specific questions please feel free to contact by e-mail or toll free at 800.810.4692 and we'll be happy to assist you!