FAQ

Screen print art

We have an amazing in-house ink color mixing system that allows for us to create and stock all Pantone C (Coated) colors. That’s around 2000 ink colors on the shelf. Not sure what Pantone colors are in your art file? No problem, just send us what you have and we can determine the best match. Keep in mind that ink color matching works best with Plastisol printing and ink colors can vary when using discharge or waterbased inks.
Good to know that you’re thinking about your next shirt design while eating lunch. Our experienced design team can work with pretty much anything that you can provide to help create your next custom design. The more you can provide the better, but even if you can only describe what you’re looking for, we can work to make what’s in your head a reality.
300 dpi at actual print size jpg, tif, psd, pdf, or ai, eps at actual print size. Vector (like ai or eps) is always best, if available. Does this make no sense to you? Send us what you’ve got and we can steer you in the right direction.
We can generally screen print up to 14 colors on most garments. However, we can print what looks like millions of colors via simulated process screen print or using one of our digital printing techniques (check out Hybrid printing).
Absolutely! We will always send you an artwork proof with a mock-up of how the final shirt will look. This is for technical confirmation of things like print size, ink colors and placement. This is an important step in the approval process to ensure that your order happens smoothly and correctly.
Our mock-ups will show the design and indicate the technical stuff needed to make sure that all is the way you want it. However, it is important to realize that actual printed ink colors, design placement and sizing may look somewhat different from mock to physical printed shirt due to variations in monitor / phone color calibrations, garment size, etc. Mock-ups should be used as a general reference to ensure that all of those technical things are correct. If you ever need a “realistic” mock-up for a webstore or ad that looks like a real shirt and not a blueprint, we can do that upon request.
A little design school 101: Vector means that the design elements are created with points and lines and is the preferred artwork format for most designs that do not involve photos or photorealistic images. This is because the design can be scaled infinitely, so you don’t need to worry about it being create too big or too small. This is generally the type of file that you’ll create when using Adobe Illustrator. However, raster can work just as well. A raster image comes from a program like Adobe Photoshop and means that the design is composed of thousands of tiny dots, kind of like a TV or computer screen, that all work together to create the colors in the design. Raster works great for printing as long as the resolution, dpi (dots per inch) in our case) is high enough to create a clean, high quality image. As a general rule, the dpi for a design file to be screen printed should be 300 dpi.
While that would seem like the logical thing to do, unfortunately, making a small image larger by simply increasing the dpi can actually make the image blurry and therefore not so good for print. Designs must be created at 300 dpi from the beginning, so double check that resolution setting when you start to make your design.

Garments

Sure! We offer contract printing to verified resellers and distributors. If you are a reseller or distributor, please be prepared to provide us with a copy of your sellers permit or trade membership information (ASI, PPAI).
Yes. Assuming all of the garments that you include on your order are compatible with the decoration method, size and color specifications and design being printed, you can mix and match between garment colors, sizes and styles to get to the next price break.
We do. Check out many of the products that we offer here (https://www.sportswearcollection.com/?site=QRAOGSDXWU ).  Not seeing what you’re looking for?  Don’t worry, we offer tons more.  Just contact us and we’ll get you what you need.
We carry in house inventory for our DTG Print on Demand offering. However, since there are millions of different items that we offer in total, much of what we offer outside of Print on Demand comes from regional suppliers with even bigger warehouses than us. We have great relationships with these suppliers and bring in product every day to make sure that there is no delay in getting you what you need when you need it.
We can get you samples but we need a heads up. Since much of what we offer is not on our floor right now, we will need to bring it in for you so it may take a day or two.
Unlike the sample booths at Costco, we do charge a small fee for blank samples. Want printed samples of your design as well? We can do that, too. Just tell us what you’re looking to see and we can confirm pricing.
Resellers / distributors, you will receive free incoming freight on order of any size shipping to us from S&S, AlphaBrorder and Sanmar (PSST).

Production

Most orders are completed within 5-7 business days of order and artwork submission, approval and payment. Larger orders or orders with special handling may take a few more days. However, our goal is always to make sure that you have your items when you need them. Be sure to tell us if there is a date that you need us to hit and we’ll work to make it happen.
Just one! Keep in mind that generally the more you order, the lower the cost, but whatever you need, we’ve got you covered.
An underbase is a layer of ink that is printed below the rest of the colors in a design and is generally used when printing standard plastisol ink onto darker colored garments. It is our common practice to use an underbase on standard orders that involves plastisol and dark shirt colors. The purpose of the underbase is to give a lighter surface for the top colors to print onto in order to achieve maximum color vibrancy and brightness. While underbase ink is generally white, on 100% polyester garments, we use an a grey underbase specifically designed for polyester. However, sometimes not doing an underbase can leave a really cool “vintage” look and feel to a print. Be sure to talk to your sales rep about NOT using an underbase or moving to waterbased / discharge ink if you’re going for a vintage look or softer feel to the print.

Go big or go home! Our standard print size max is 14” wide x 17” tall, but we can go much larger, all the way up to 39” wide x 32” tall (all over printing). There are different pricing tiers based on print size.

NORMAL: 14” wide x 17” tall
OVERSIZED: 15” wide x 20” tall
JUMBO: 17” wide x 23” tall
JUMBO WIDE: 21” wide x 23” tall
JUMBO TALL: 17” wide x 27” tall
ALL OVER: 39” wide x 32” tall

Get in contact for pricing and details.

Until the kinks are worked out of the Flux Capacitor, we’re ready to do whatever it takes to get your order moving now. Talk to a sales representative about any potential rush that may be involved with your needed timeline.
Yes. Printing without an underbase can be a great way to reduce ink deposit thickness and soften up a print. To get the softest feel to your print, waterbased or discharge ink might be the way to go. Get in contact with us to go over printing options that will keep your print feeling as soft as whatever soft thing pops into your head right now.
Yes, we can accommodate drop shipping an order to one or thousands of locations. There is generally a charge of $10 per location for multiple ship-to locations.
Like any manufacturing process, sometimes the ink hits the fan and a few pieces may be damaged during the printing process to the point of non-repair. If you provide us with the garments (contract printing), we may not have replacement items to use to completely fulfill your order. We always recommend padding your order with a few extra pieces when possible, especially if the order involves specialty or high color printing. Our misprint / defect allowance for contract based orders is 2% by location. If more than this is found to be defective due to our fault, we will replace the missing pieces or offer credits accordingly. If you need your contract order to ship complete, be sure to indicate this on your PO and we will hold your order and contact you to work out what needs to be done in the event of a shortage. If you are relying on us to provide you with both the printing and the garments (full package), then your order will always ship complete. If you receive a full package order and see that items are missing, please contact us and we’ll get to the bottom of it right away.
DTG stands for Direct To Garment. DTG involves the use of an inkjet printer with extremely fancy printheads that print right onto a garment. If a DTG print requires white ink to be printed, then a “pretreat” application that is sprayed onto the shirt prior to printing is necessary to achieve ink adhesion. DTG is generally best for small orders or orders that involve a high amount of ink colors or photographic images. Not to say that we can’t screen print just about anything, but sometimes the costs involved with screen printing lots of colors on a lower quantity of shirts does not make sense when DTG is also a great option.
100% cotton generally works best for Direst to Garment (DTG) printing. Many 50/50 blend and heather materials can also work well, but colors are generally more vibrant on 100% cotton. 100% polyester is generally good to avoid when printing via DTG.
Yes. Our equipment is ready and willing to print pretty much anywhere on a garment. We might suggest fashion base, waterbased or discharge inks when going over seams, collars or zippers to get into the seams and keep the print as smooth and crisp as possible. We’re really good at printing over seams, but it’s important to realize that some distress or distortion to the design can happen over and around seams so it’s often a good idea to create your design with this in mind.
Although it might sound like a ska band that went to your high school, halftones are actually tiny dots that we use to achieve gradients and fades within a design. Since screen printing is done using a screen that either allows ink pass through and onto the garment or not, halftones are necessary when creating shading between colors and even blending colors together to create the appearance of additional colors. These dots are tiny, so you need to look closely to see them. Our standard output for halftones are 55 lpi, elliptical at 22.5 degrees. Brrr!
Spot color generally means a color that you can point to and determine within a design. Although spot colors can involve halftones, we generally call something a spot color if it’s a solid area of color and we can clearly determine it’s color value, like a Pantone color. If you can look at an image and say “that image is blue, red and orange” then it’s probably a spot color design. If you look at an image and say “wow, that image has tons of colors and is tripping me out” then we’d probably call it a process or sim process design.
CMYK. C-Cyan, M-Magenta, Y-Yellow, K-Black. These 4 colors can be used to create pretty much every color possible. 4 color process printing is often used in graphic printing for things like magazines, flyers and brochures. We can also print 4 color process onto apparel. Although we can achieve this print technique on dark colors, it works best on white and light colored garments. For full color screen printing on dark garments, we almost always recommend simulated process.
Simulated process is when we imitate the results of 4 color process using around 10-14 screen printed colors and is a great way to create vibrant, full color images on apparel. It involves halftones and blending of colors to create the illusion of new colors. Simulated process (we often just call it “sim process”) requires a decent amount of artwork prep to create the color separations necessary to create screens properly, so there are some additional artwork fees that you can expect to see. Because of the additional artwork time and materials involved with sim process printing, DTG or Hybrid printing is often a more cost-effective way of producing full color images on apparel at small to mid-sized quantities.
While embroidery can produce an image that contains fine detail, there is a point where the detail will become too small to clearly show up. We generally recommend that text be no smaller than .25” tall (around 18 points). However, it is also important to keep in mind the garment that is being embroidered. A finely constructed item like a baseball hat will allow for more detail to hold than something with a looser material weave, like a knit cap. If you think it might be too small, do us all a favor and size it up a bit. If we see something during the digitizing process that causes concern, we will bring it up and make suggestions to ensure a clean image once embroidered. If you supply the digitized file, please be sure to check with your digitizer to make sure they do not have any concerns or suggestions.
Plastisol ink is our standard ink type and is the most commonly used ink type among printers in the United States. It is traditionally made of PVC particles suspended in a liquid plasticizer with dye resins to create the color. While we do offer other types of ink (discussed next), plastisol is most popular due to its ability to achieve color vibrancy, opacity and maintain flexibility on a variety of garment and material types. When printed, plastisol essential sits “on top” of the fabric and then grabs onto the fabric during the curing process. Since the final ink deposit is on top of the material, it maintains color and detail even after many, many washings. All of our plastisol inks are phthalate compliant to CPSIA standards. We also offer PVC free “plastisol” for instances where a specific job require such.
Waterbased is an ink type that uses water and water-based solvents as the base to distribute the pigment dyes within the ink onto the garment. Unlike plastisol, which leaves an ink deposit that sits “on top” of the fabric, waterbased inks soak “into” the fabric. As the water then evaporates during curing, only the dyes and any other resin or binders involved in the ink are left which leaves a softer feel to the print than you might get with plastisol. Since standard waterbased ink does not contain a high amount of resins or solids that would otherwise create a heavier body to the print, the ink is less opaque and more transparent on the garment. Therefore, waterbased ink works best on light colored garments where the shirt color will not interfere as much with the ink color vibrancy. We also offer High Solids Acrylic (HSA) waterbased ink for times when waterbased is desired but more of that “on top of the shirt” feel and look is important. While HSA inks are a good option in some circumstances, the end result can be similar to plastisol, so we generally move to plastisol or PVC free plastisol depending on the circumstance. Now, let’s talk discharge! Waterbased ink is usually used when the end goal is to keep the print soft, maybe even unnoticeable to the touch. However, waterbased ink does not hold ink color well on darker colors due to its transparent nature. This is where discharge ink comes into play. Discharge is a waterbased ink, but is formulated such that the ink will also remove they dyes in cotton fabric during the curing process, leaving behind a super soft print similar to what a normal waterbase ink would achieve but on a dark garment. Discharge only works fully on cotton, so colors will stay brightest on 100% cotton material. However, blends, especially heather blends, that contain cotton can achieve a really cool result where a vintage or somewhat faded look is acceptable or desired. Since discharge ink relies on the natural or “gauze” color of the fabric prior to being dyed, and since the dyes themselves can display unique properties as they react to discharge ink, exact color matching is not possible with discharge ink and final ink color may vary from shirt to shirt and run to run. Mixed discharge inks have a shelf life of 4-8 hours and the process is a bit more tedious on our end, so you can expect discharge printing to involve some additional cost, but it’s totally worth it if as soft as possible is what you’re going for.
Chino ink, sometimes called “Fashion Soft”, ink is a type of plastisol with a thinner ink base designed to create a softer feeling plastisol print. We can make Chino based ink colors as full on 100% Chino base or mixed ratio with standard base. Chino base does reduce the opacity of ink colors, so this method is generally used where less color vibrancy is needed or on lighter shirt colors. A 100% Chino base print will feel very similar to a waterbased print and is a great option when going for a vintage look on light shirt colors.
We process hundreds of screens per day and therefore need to and reclaim and reuse our screens very frequently. Because of this, we do not hold screens on file for potential future use. However, fear not! Our digital direct to screen making process can recall and make a screen in just minutes, so we’re ready when you are to get a reorder underway. If you pay a set-up fee, you’re not really paying for the screens, but rather the time and materials involved with creating the items needed to set-up your job.
That’s kind of like asking a cook for his spatula. So, no you can’t have the screens. We need those.

Ordering

If you know exactly what you want and have a PO and all artwork files ready to go, please email them to orders@redwallprints.com. If you have questions about placing an order or need pricing or help with anything at all, please email info@redwallprints.com. Or, just call us. We want to hear from you.

To place the order, email the following in an email or as a PO in pdf form:

  • full name, billing / shipping address, phone number.
  • design files (300 dpi at actual print size jpg, tif, psd, pdf, or ai, eps at actual print size). Let me know if you need help.
  • shirt colors, quantities, sizes, brand, style, etc. associated with you order.
  • indicate if you would prefer to pick-up rather than have them shipped (either way, we still need your billing and shipping address).
  • in hands date.
  • any other information that we should know pertaining to your order.

Once I receive this info, I’ll email you an invoice and mock-up so you can pay (credit card, paypal, check), and we can print.

We require full pre-payment via credit card, paypal, check or cash. We do offer terms to established and approved customers.
Resellers / distributors, you will receive free incoming freight on order of any size shipping to us from S&S, AlphaBrorder and Sanmar (PSST).
Yes! Folding, polybagging, UPCs, hangtags, stickers, inserts, hangers, scale pack-out, kitting, Individual fulfillment. When it comes to special packaging, you name it, we do it. Our experienced packaging team is able to accommodate even the most demanding packaging and fulfillment requirements.
Please call or email to make an appointment to stop in to check things out. We’re excited to see you.
Yes, we do offer custom decorated samples. We will always send you a virtual proof for your approval, but pre-production printed samples can be valuable to make sure that you or your client is fully on board with what the final product will look like. There is a cost to do this based on the design and print method. We can also arrange for emailed photo and in person approvals so that you can make sure that all is good to go while on press. Sometimes a photo approval is all it takes.

Shipping

We work with multiple local carriers to help facilitate the delivery of your orders. Let us know that you would like your order delivered locally when you place your order and we’ll confirm the cost and the details.

General

Cost for decorated apparel is generally based on 3 things. The design, the garment and the quantity. For screen printed designs, the lower the number of colors and print locations, the lower the cost. Garment brand and style will also play a factor into cost and we can suggest items based on your budget. And of course, the more you get, the lower the cost.
Once your order is approved and paid, consider it off to sea and without the ability to have changes made. However, please contact us and let us know what’s going on and what you would like to do. We are happy to see where your order is in production and see if changes can be made. Please note that if changes are possible there are typically charges associated with creating new artwork, new screens, pulling new garments, etc.
We do a LOT of contract printing. We also have relationships that we have had for many years with local and regional customers. Honesty and integrity are crucial to our business and way of life in general. We never want to step on anyone’s toes and customer confidentiality is top priority. We will never approach your customers and will let you know if one of your customers approaches us. If you are worried about anything relating to customer conflicts, confidentiality or anything else, please let us know.
Our print on demand DTG operation is able to provide fulfillment for online webstores. This requires a bit of work from both of our end, so get in contact to get into the details about how we make this happen together.
Since you’re getting custom decorated apparel made specifically for you, we do not accept returns due to changes of the heart. If you received an order and there is a problem with it, please notify us of the issue within 15 business days and we’ll work with you to determine the problem and come to a fair resolution that works for you. Mistakes are rare, but when they happen, we will make it right. Guaranteed.