Sunburst Logo LLC

Technology has had a tremendous impact on almost every sector in our economy and custom T-shirt printing is no exception to that rule. Because of new artwork programs such as Photoshop and llustrator, people are rendering intricate artwork like never before. The St. Louis custom screen printing industry has been challenged with the most complex graphics. The common everyday person is now able to access these particular software programs and incorporate them into their apparel requirements. This would have presented a problem for the old-school shops of 10 to 15 years ago. I remember back in the day when the amount of colors that the image was composed of was the biggest part of the equation regarding how complicated the image was going to be to screen print as well as the quantities that the job required. It used to take the same amount of time and effort to set up a job, whether it was for one piece or whether it was for 500 pieces and would also involve the same amount of time to break the press down and clean up after yourself. We used to have to start with color separations which meant all the colors had to be pulled out from one another in order to generate individual films. For example, if an image was made up of five different colors it would require five different screens. Nowadays an up-to-date state-of-the-art shop is capable of digital T-shirt printing which does not require any color separations or films at all. It significantly cuts down on the time as well as labor involved for setting up a job. A typical screen is composed of nylon mesh surrounded by a wooden frame. The size of the mesh will determine how much ink will pass through. The smaller opening the finer detail you were able to hold. Digital T-shirt printing does away with all that. Think of a typical ink jet printer. But instead of feeding it paper, you feed it textiles and of course it uses a different type of ink. It is capable of replicating the most complicated graphics within a matter of minutes. Quantity does not play as significant of a role either, so that customers who were not looking for high volumes can still be able to acquire a small run reasonably.

Never in my wildest imagination would I have thought that we would be where we’re at today when it comes to efficiency. It makes me scratch my head and wonder where we will be at 15 years down the line? Remember the old cliché it’s a small world? Well with the advances in technology that the internet provides it truly is. Artwork can travel halfway around the world in seconds. We outsource our graphics to a company in Thailand and it is usually produced within a 24-hour turnaround. People would rather get on a major search engine and perform a relevant search such as St. Louis screen printing company then get in their car and drive 5 miles down the road and back home. The whole process from start to finish can be performed via website including payment. The finished product can then be shipped anywhere in the country. My point is that someone in California can find someone in St. Louis to process the order and still be working from their kitchen table and never have to leave the house.