Thank you so much for joining me here. We are going to learn a lot in this class, but I also hope you will really enjoy the process too. Once you get started printing, I think you will quickly become addicted to printmaking, and you may start wanting to screen print on everything in sight!
You will find that there is an instructional video that will go along with three of the lessons in this class. Please be sure to read through the written lesson first before watching the video so that you will have an idea of what to expect when watching the video. Next, I would recommend reading the written lesson one last time before starting the process on your own. You may find that it helps to print out the lesson so that you can read along as you go. Find the way that works best for you, and have fun making art!
All words, images, and ideas are copyright 2013 by Tessa McSorley. This blog is made for private use only; please do not redistribute without permission.
NOTE: THIS WAS A CLASS I OFFERED SEVERAL YEARS AGO VIA MY ETSY SHOP, BUT NOW I'M MAKING IT A FREE CLASS. I AM NOT ABLE TO ANSWER QUESTIONS OR RESPOND TO COMMENTS, SORRY. THANK YOU FOR UNDERSTANDING, AND ENJOY THE CLASS!
First, we will talk about how to create the perfect image for screen printing. I’ll show you many examples of what will work and what won’t work so that you will have a crystal clear idea about what type of image will be perfect for your first attempt at screen printing. We will talk about drawing original images for screen printing and we’ll also discuss how to appropriate images you find elsewhere, in case you aren’t comfortable with drawing. After we have our images, I’ll teach you how to transfer your line drawings or Xerox copies of images onto the screen itself.
Lesson Two: Creating Our Screen
Method One: Drawing Fluid and Screen Filler
Method Two: Screen Filler Only
During this lesson, we will turn the drawings on our screens into useable screens that are ready for printing! I will teach you the super fun processes of using drawing fluid and screen filler to make our images a reality on our screens. You’ll learn how to paint with drawing fluid to create your image, and then I’ll show you the best way to coat your screen with screen filler. You will learn two different methods of getting images onto your screen, and you will be able to choose which one works best for you. Our screens will be all ready for ink and printing during the next lesson!
Lesson Three: Printing
Choosing the Right Fabrics to Print On
Setting Up a Printing Station
Printing
Heat Setting
The magic of printing will happen this week! Once we have our screens ready, we will talk about how to choose the right fabrics to print on. We’ll set up a printing station and get to work printing our images onto t-shirts and tote bags! You will be amazed at how much fun it is to pull your very first print with a squeegee! To wrap things up this week, we will talk about how to heat set our designs so they won’t come off in the wash.
Lesson Four: Reclaiming the Screen + Taking it Further
How to Reclaim Your Screen
Reusing Your Screen
Stretching Screens
Printing More Than One Color
Color Mixing
Conclusion
Think of this lesson as “extra credit.” I will show you how to take the process even further than you imagined! We will talk first about how to reclaim our screens for re-use. (You can use a screen over and over again as you get tired of your images!) We’ll also talk about how to line things up for printing in more than one color. And finally, I will share my special trick for mixing ink (and paint) colors to get the exact shades that you desire.
Screen printing is an art form that is full of possibilities, and I can’t wait to share them all with you!
*Original Speedball Kit, which includes the following: 10” x 14” frame, squeegee, 4 oz. fabric ink (black, magenta, yellow, and cyan), 4 oz. screen filler, 4 oz. drawing fluid, round brush, tracing paper.
Let’s get started by talking about your supplies in detail.
Getting to Know Your Supplies:
Your Speedball kit includes a 10” x 14” screen. Even though this process is often referred to as silk screen printing, the actual mesh used in the screen is not silk but a plastic monofilament. Silk was used in the past, but today, silk screen prints are made with this special plastic monofilament that is more durable.
Sometimes you will hear people refer to the size of the screen’s mesh. A 110 mesh means that there are 110 openings in the screen per square inch. A 110 mesh works great for most t-shirt designs, while a 220 mesh (much smaller holes) can create great detailed prints with fine linework done onto paper.
There are two sides to every screen, the “well side” and the “flat side.”
The “well side” is the side that is the back of the frame. It is the part of the screen that can hold ink. It looks like this when it has an image painted on it:
(NOTE: My screen has duct tape on it because it is an old repurposed screen. You will learn more about how to repurpose old screens in lesson 4. Your new screen will not have duct tape on the wood and does not need duct tape.)
The “flat side” is the side that is also referred to as the front of the frame. The flat side of the screen is the part that will be touching your t-shirt or paper as your print with your screen. Here is an example of what the flat side looks like:
The squeegee is the tool that we will use to drag screen filler and ink across the screen. It is essential to printing, and it looks like this:
You have four different colors of fabric ink in your kit. You will have process cyan (blue – not pictured), process magenta, process yellow, and black. The black is the best color to use for your first time printing because it is the easiest to work with as far as consistency goes. The cyan, magenta, and yellow inks are a bit too drippy. Please be advised that these inks work best on light colored shirts. If you try to print with the yellow on a black shirt, it will not show up because it is too translucent.
If you really want to print dark colored shirts, Speedball also makes a line of Opaque Fabric Screen Printing Inks that will print well over black t-shirts and other dark colors.
When buying additional colors of ink to print on fabric in the future, please be advised that Speedball also makes Acrylic Screen Printing Inks that are for paper only and cannot be used on fabric.
The fabric ink we are using is specially made for printing on t-shirts, totes, and other fabrics, because it can be heat set with an iron to ensure that the design will not fade in the wash.
Screen filler is used to block out areas of the screen where you do not want the ink to travel through. It is brick red in color, and the bottle will look like this:
Drawing fluid acts as a resist when creating your image on the screen. It is used in conjunction with screen filler, and it is blue in color inside a bottle that looks like this:
You will also need some sharpie markers, but any permanent black marker will do. These will be used to trace your drawings or designs onto the screen.
The kit also comes with a paintbrush, but you may want to use some brushes you already have on hand – I recommend having a brush that is smaller than the kit’s brush, plus a brush that is larger as well.
A spoon or a spatula is very useful to distribute ink onto your screen while printing. I keep several studio-only spatulas by my printing station at all times.
You will also need access to an outdoor hose, preferably with a spray nozzle attachment. If you don’t have a spray nozzle, then use your finger over the top of the hose to create a bit of added pressure when rinsing. Alternatively, if you do not have a hose, you can do most of the washing out in a bathtub or large sink using a sponge – the process will just take a bit longer.
You’ll also need old newspapers to protect your work surfaces, paper towels for cleanup, and a sponge to help you wash out ink from the screen.
It is very helpful to have a small piece of cardboard from an old box to put inside t-shirts and totes while printing. My cardboard piece is 12” x 12” and fits nicely inside each t-shirt while I print. It will create a nice flat surface for printing, and it will also absorb any excess ink and keep it from leaking through the shirt and onto the back of the shirt as you print.
In order to heat set the shirt at the end, you will need an iron and an ironing board plus a piece of parchment paper. By heat setting the shirt (which we will discuss further in lesson 3), you are ensuring that the image will not wash off in the washer or dryer during your laundering process. If you don’t heat set your image, part of it will likely wear off very quickly after laundering and could stain other clothes in your load of laundry.
I hope that was a good overview of the supplies. Of course, you will learn more about each of them and everything they can do as you start to use them in the upcoming lessons!
Creating an Image to Print
Let’s talk about the kind of images we can use for the silk screen process! For your first image, I’d like to keep things simple and follow a few guidelines to make it as easy as possible. As you get better at silkscreen, you can use more complex images, but keeping it simple in the beginning is a good idea as you are learning the process.
For your first image, please follow these rules:
*No text or letters
*Use a silhouette (of an animal, object, or a person)
Think about an animal, object, or person you love and would like to screen print over and over again in many different colors. The nice thing about screen printing is that once you make your screen with an image on it, you can print that image many, many times and even save the screen for use for several years!
I often keep my images around for at least three years, and some of my screens are 15 years old with images I created 15 years ago! They still hold up and make great prints even to this day. They may even have 15 more years left in them if I am careful with the screens and wash the ink out of them very well after each use.
To create a nice silhouette, you can use tracing paper and trace a photo you already have of a person’s profile. Then you can Xerox and enlarge that image to use it for your screen. Or try your hand at drawing a freehand silhouette! I love to draw and will often make many “drafts” of an image before finalizing the image for my screen. Spend a lot of time making an image that you will love, and don’t be afraid to keep re-copying and refining your image until you get something you are truly happy with.
Below is a silhouette that I drew freehand onto a decorative piece of paper. You will see my original drawing on the left. I copied the image with a copy machine and used white out to refine it a bit, then I copied it again, and I ended up with the image on the right:
The profile of a person would make a great first image for screen printing because, aside from the nose and the lips, there aren’t too many tiny details. The smaller the detail, the harder it will be to transfer your image onto the screen, so we want something easy to start out with. Small details can also prove to be difficult during the printing process, so you want to avoid anything too detailed for your first attempt and printing.
I also decided to do a second screen featuring my dog, Ruby Roo, so I found this image of her inside one of my scrapbooks:
Next, I copied and enlarged Ruby’s image until it was the size I wanted it to be. I used the t-shirt I wanted to print it on as a guideline for how big to make my image. I ended up making the image of her about 6 or 7” wide.
My next step was to take a sharpie or permanent marker and draw an outline around the dog so that I would have a guideline to follow. Take a look at how I did this in the next photo:
Now you have an outline to trace onto your screen!
Transferring the image onto your screen is as simple as tracing…
Transfering Your Image Onto the Screen:
Step 1:
Place your image face up on your work surface, then place your screen on top if it, flat side down. It will look like this:
You can see your image and outline by looking through the screen.
(NOTE: I am using a different type of screen here that I had on hand which has a yellow mesh. Yours will have a white mesh.)
Step 2:
Now trace the image onto your screen with a sharpie or permanent marker using the outline you made as a guide:
Please watch the video below to see me transfer my images onto the screen. Transferring the image is a pretty simple process, so most of your time during this lesson will be spent drawing and creating the image you wish to use for your first print. Take your time selecting an image to use and make sure your image is something you will love, considering you will be printing it over and over again onto shirts, fabric, and tote bags!
Before you do the next lesson, it's a good time to start raiding your closets and find some blank shirts you can print on! I don’t recommend buying new blank shirts to print on initially, unless you find some that are under $5 (try Michael’s Craft Store or CVS sometimes sells cheap blank shirts too). You should stay away from buying pricey new shirts because first time printers do not always make perfect images, and you are likely to mess up the first few times you print with your new screen. You don’t want to invest a lot of money into a new blank shirt only to misprint it and get disappointed. Use a bunch of stuff you already have around the house first to practice on. Scraps of fabric, fun papers, and old skirts are some other ideas of things that would make great surfaces to print on.
Here are some fun ideas for screen printing to get your mind going and help you think of some things you may have around the house that you can print on:
*Print onto scraps of colorful old t-shirts, then cut your printed image out and appliqué it onto a pair of jeans or a tote bag.
*Find a skirt that has a light pattern (floral, plaid, etc.) and layer a screen print on top of it! Printing on already-printed fabrics gives your clothing a unique and unexpected look.
*Spruce up a boring old khaki trench coat with a screen print on the back of it!
*Make throw pillows featuring your screen prints.
*Try printing on those plain white cotton curtains that you are getting bored with…
*Do you have a shirt with a stain on it? Screenprint over your stain, and the shirt will look good as new!
*Are your bedsheets too plain? Screenprint a pattern onto them…
The possibilities are truly endless! Come up with some ideas of your own and be sure to jot them down so you can save them for Lesson 3 when we start to print.
There are two ways to get an image on your screen. Please read through and watch the videos first before starting so that you can have all the information you need before choosing what method will work best for you.
In short, the first method, which uses drawing fluid, is a bit trickier, but in the long run, it will lead to an easier printing process for next week and a more durable image on your screen. This is the method I recommend going with.
However, if the first method is a bit confusing to you or involves too many steps, try using the second method, which does not use drawing fluid. You won’t notice a huge difference in printing ease between the two methods; method 1 will only make things slightly easier. The real difference is in the image’s durability. Your image will last longer on the screen and hold up for more printing runs if you do method 1. However, if you do method 2 correctly and follow my special tips, your image should hold up pretty well and will last for at least 100 screen prints.
If you’re still not sure which one to use after reading through this week’s whole lesson, try method 1, and if you don’t like it, you can always re-do your screen using method 2.
(NOTE: If you have trouble and need to re-do your screen, simply wash out the screen filler using Greased Lightning cleaner OR a mix of 1 cup of Arm & Hammer’s Washing Soda dissolved in one 1 gallon of water. Spray or pour the cleansing solution on the screen, use a scrub brush to scrub it in, then rinse thoroughly. Repeat until the screen is clean.)
Ok, now let’s get started!
Method One: Using Drawing Fluid and Screen Filler to Create an Image on Your Screen
Step 1:
You should have an image on your screen that you created in the last lesson. Grab your screen, your drawing fluid, and a paintbrush or two. Shake up your drawing fluid really hard before you open it. After opening, stir it with a paintbrush or chopstick until it has an even consistency.
Step 2:
Now it’s time to paint your image with drawing fluid! Place the screen so that the well side is facing down and the flat side is facing up.
Simply paint inside the lines you made during the last lesson with your drawing fluid.
Don’t let the drawing fluid get super thick and gloppy, and don’t let it get too thin either. Somewhere in the middle is just right and will work the best. Don’t worry if you see little bubbles form – they will pop eventually as they dry.
Here is how it looks when you apply the drawing fluid too thick:
Here is how it looks when you apply the drawing fluid too thin:
This is how it looks when applied correctly:
The drawing fluid can feel a bit gloppy and odd to paint with at first, but you will get used to it.
Do your best to make a nice, even coating of drawing fluid inside the lines of your drawing.
If you get some areas that are too thick, use your brush to thin then down.
If you find you are painting the drawing fluid on too thin and wispy, be sure to go over it with a second or third coating.
You should be able to hold your screen up to the light when you are done and not see any holes that are open with screen peeking through. Be sure to do a check for those open spaces before you take your screen outside to dry.
When you’re finished, your image should look something like this:
Now, take it outside to dry in the sunshine!
(Note: If you can’t take the screen outside for some reason, you can let it dry indoors too – it will just take a bit longer. If you have a fan to speed the process along, that would help reduce the drying time.)
Step 3:
Once the drawing fluid is dry to the touch (it should take about 45 minutes in the sun or a little over an hour indoors), it’s time to add your screen filler. Do this outside too, if you can, so you don’t make a mess on any of your tables inside the house! You could work indoors instead, but you’ll need to lay down some newspapers to protect your table surfaces. Screen filler can be really hard to clean up if it dries on your table or any other surface.
You will need your squeegee and your screen filler for this step. Shake up your bottle of screen filler, then pour a line of screen filler along one of the short edges of your screen. You should use about this much:
Now, take your squeegee and drag that line of screen filler across the entire screen. Try to get your coating even and smooth if possible. You should only make one pass. This is important, because if you go over and over your drawing fluid again and again or from multiple angles, you will start to dissolve the drawing fluid, and the next step (washing the image out) won’t go so smoothly. So be sure to pass just once over the image! It’s okay to scrape away some excess when you are done or to fan out your excess with a paintbrush on the edges (where there is no image) so that the screen filler will dry faster.
Here is what my screen looked like after I did this one pass:
Use a paintbrush to fill in all the areas that did not get hit with the pass that you made. Be sure to paint all the way up to the edge and fill in all of the blank areas. This will help you to block the ink from leaking out of the screen when we print the images next week. It will look like this when you are finished:
Now it’s time to set it outside in the sun again! Let it dry until the screen filler is totally dry to the touch. This will take about 45 minutes.
Don’t forget to wash your paintbrush and squeegee as soon as you can– once the screen filler dries, it’s very hard to wash out!
Step 4:
Now your screen is ready for wash out! For best results, use a garden hose with a spray nozzle attached set to a flat wash. If you don’t have a spray nozzle, simply put your thumb on the hose’s nozzle, and give your water hose a little extra pressure that way! (If you don’t have access to an outdoor hose, you can do this in a large sink or in the bathtub too – just saturate the image with water and use a sponge to loosen the drawing fluid. It will take a little longer, but it will still work.)
One thing I want to emphasize strongly during this process is that you should not use hot water at all! Please use only room temperature or cold water for the wash out process. Using warm water could result in washing out too much and ruining your image, plus, you don’t want anything too hot to touch your screen, since the mesh itself is made of plastic microfiber. Please keep that in mind, and do not use a hair dryer or heat gun to accelerate any of the drying times! Sunlight will work just fine, and it won’t ruin your screen either.
Set your screen in the grass, and spray cold water on each side of the screen (both the well side and the flat side). Do a spray initially on each side and let it start to sink in. Now choose a side (either will do) and concentrate on spraying that one side continually with your hose. Keep it about 12” away and keep your stream of water moving at all times so that no one area gets too saturated with water. Do this for about a minute, then flip it over and do this to the opposite side.
Keep going – flipping and washing – until your image is revealed!
Here is the finished image:
Hold your image up and look at it closely to make sure all of the areas you want ink to pass through are open. If you have some areas that are stuck, try nudging them along with your nail or an old toothbrush on both sides, then washing just that area out again.
You want to be sure that you don’t wash the entire screen any more that you have to, because too much washing can lead to too much image wash out, and you might end up washing out areas you did not want ink to pass through.
If you have some areas that are REALLY stuck, try this trick: You can use Greased Lightning or Arm & Hammer Washing Soda dissolved in a bit of warm water (make sure to cool it down before applying it to the screen!!) and work that in to your stubborn areas with an old toothbrush. Wash that stuff out fast though, being careful not to let it seep onto parts of the screen filler that you do not want to see dissolve.
Let your screen dry in the sun again until the water evaporates, then be sure to bring it inside so that it will be all ready for printing in the next lesson. You don’t want to leave it outside because sometimes the screen filler will get cracked from the sun and start to flake off after a few days of sitting outside. Believe me, I’ve made that mistake before, and it isn’t pretty!
Here is a video showing Method One; I hope it helps to explain thing even further:
Method Two: Using Just Screen Filler to Create an Image on Your Screen
Step 1:
Set your screen up well side down and flat side up so that you are ready to paint. Shake up your screen filler before use.
Now fill in all the areas that you don’t want ink to pass through, working negatively around the lines you drew onto your screen in the last lesson. Basically, your screen should be covered in screen filler except for in the areas inside of your lines.
When you paint, please be sure to not let any areas get too blotchy and thick, and also do not let any areas get too thin.
Here is how it looks when applied too thick:
Here is how it looks when applied too thin:
In the next photo, you will see the amount of screen filler that is “just right.”
If things get too thick and blotchy, when the screen filler dries, it will be bumpy and hard to print. Also, it could end up cracking and areas will flake off. If it’s too thin, it won’t block the screen, and your ink will go through in areas you don’t want it to. So be careful! If you get the thickness just right, you are going to cut down the amount of problems you could have with printing the screen in the future.
Also, please note the bubbles in the above photo. Don’t worry too much about these, as screen filler can get quite bubbly. The bubbles will pop and fill in the spaces underneath as they dry.
Keep going until you have blocked out all the areas that aren’t part of your image. When you’re finished, it will look something like this:
Step 2:
Let your painted screen dry in the sun until the screen filler is dry to the touch, about 45 minutes. Be sure to dry your screen flat as shown in the photo! If you dry it standing up leaning against a wall or something, the screen filler will drip as it dries and leak into areas where you do not want it to go. It could ruin your image if dried standing up.
(NOTE: In the photo above, you see some white areas outside the image area. That is just glare from the photo since the sun was shining bright and hitting the wet screen filler, creating a reflection. You do not want to see any white areas in your screen; the only part that should be white is your image area.)
When it’s ready, bring it inside so it is ready for the next lesson.
Let’s start this lesson by talking about what fabrics we can use to print on…
Choosing the Right Fabrics to Print On
The best fabric to print on should meet the following criteria:
1. It’s flat. Not ribbed in any way or full of ridges and texture. It should be flat like a t-shirt or a tote bag or a scrap of quilting fabric. To use a t-shirt as an example, always print on the flattest part of the shirt – it will be problematic (gloppy and unpredictable!) if you try to print on the ribbed collar or on a seam of a sleeve.
2. It’s 100% cotton and able to be ironed. You shouldn’t be printing on any kind of fabric that cannot be ironed, since ironing is a major part of this process as you will see at the end of this lesson.
3. It’s light in color. For best results with your first few images, please stay away from dark fabrics and light inks. Instead use light fabrics and darker inks. You will see why when you start experimenting later, but to give you a warning, regular Speedball yellow inks are too translucent to show up on black fabric. If you want to print in yellow or white ink onto a black t-shirt, your best bet is to buy Speedball Opaque Ink in yellow or white and try that out instead.
Setting up a Printing Station
To set up your station for printing, you’ll need the following:
*A spoon or a spatula to get ink out its container
*Ink
*Squeegee
*Paper & fabric to print on
*Some newspaper
Some optional things you might find useful are some paper towels and a cup of water in case you make a mistake. I also keep some stain remover by my printing station just in case I get ink in a spot I didn’t want it to go on… Mistakes can happen, and having a tube of Kiss Off or a Tide To Go pen can sometimes be a lifesaver! Two more optional things you might need are an apron to protect your clothing and a friend to help hold down your screen as you print.
For the first time you print, I recommend that you use the black ink that comes with your kit. It has a great consistency and is easier to print with initially than the other three colors. Try the black ink first, then use one of the other colors next.
Lay some newspaper down and get all of your printmaking “ingredients” ready!
Now you are ready to go!
Step 1:
Lay some scrap paper down onto your table so that you will have something to print on as a test for your initial pull. I am using some old construction paper to print on.
Now lay your screen on top, well side facing up, flat side down.
Step 2:
Make a thick line of ink on one of the short edges of your screen by using your spatula or spoon to scoop out a good amount of ink, like this:
Use about as much ink as I have used in the photo above.
Now tilt your screen up so that it is not touching the paper.
(NOTE: this is where having a friend to help becomes very useful as they can help you by holding the screen as you work.)
With the screen tilted up, drag the ink along the screen. This is called a “flood coat” and this lays down the ink that you will print during your “print coat.”
Please note that during the flood coat, you are not actually printing onto your paper yet; you are just inking up the screen. This lesson’s accompanying video will show you this process, so please don’t forget to watch it.
Step 3:
Now that your screen is inked up, lay it down where you want it to print, and press down firmly, holding your squeegee at a 45 degree angle like so:
Drag your squeegee like this (at 45 degrees) over the entire image area, remove your screen, and voila! You have your very first print!!
Troubleshooting: If your image is too light, you did not press hard enough. Try again, and add more pressure to your pull next time. If your image is too dark and started to bleed, try again, but this time, use less pressure.
Set your prints aside to dry until they are dry to the touch, usually 30 minutes to an hour. Keep working while your previous prints are drying! You don’t want the ink to dry on your screen!
(NOTE: Sometimes people will print without doing a flood coat and just place the screen down on the paper, dragging the ink along and therefore inking the screen and printing in one motion. I do not recommend working this way with the water-based inks you are using. If you do everything in one motion like I described above, your screen’s image area will be left with traces of ink in it after you lift up the screen after printing. These little traces of ink can dry onto your screen as you attempt to line up your next piece of paper or t-shirt, and the dried areas could ruin your image for future prints. The flood coat is done in order to buy you some extra time for arranging items underneath the screen. Since your screen is fully inked with a thick layer of ink as you arrange your paper or shirt underneath, that large amount of ink is less likely to dry and ruin your screen. Flood coating also creates a much more even looking print in the long run.)
Keep repeating steps 1-3 until you print on everything you want to print on.
Please be aware that printing onto fabric will take a little more pressure than printing onto paper. To get the hang of printing, I recommend printing on scrap paper first, then “real” or nicer paper after that until you get the process down and feel comfortable with it. Next, move on to scrap fabric until you are ready for “real” fabric.
Please, please, do not buy a brand new blank shirt at the store to print on first thing before you have practiced.
I have had a lot of in-person students insist on doing this first despite my warnings, and they all end up disappointed at the quality of their first pull. Please don’t make that mistake too! Practice really does make perfect, especially when screen printing is concerned.
Step 4:
Once you have mastered scrap fabric, it’s time to print the image onto your “real” project: a t-shirt or tote bag…or both! You will need to put a piece of cardboard inside and in between the layers of your shirt or tote bag so that the print will not bleed through the first layer and onto the next.
Lay your shirt out flat, making sure that it has no wrinkles in it. Make sure the image you are printing is going to land fully on the part of the shirt that has the cardboard underneath it.
Not only will the cardboard catch any leaks, but it will also provide a nice, flat printing surface for your image to land on.
Step 5:
Print as you normally would, then remove the screen and let your t-shirt or tote dry with the cardboard or paper still inside of it. Keep printing until you have printed all of your special items!
Step 6:
Wash the screen out when you are done printing. It’s important to wash the screen out as soon as possible so that no ink dries permanently on the screen, because dried ink could block your screen and be problematic when you use the screen again in the future. It is best to wash the screen outside using a sponge and a garden hose with a spray nozzle attachment. Spray the screen on both sides with the hose, then loosen any excess ink with your sponge. Keep flipping and spraying until the screen is totally free of ink. Let the screen air dry to get rid of the excess water after rinsing it off, then don’t forget to bring it inside once it is dry. If you leave it outside overnight, the screen filler could crack and fall off.
Step 7:
Wait 24 hours for the prints to dry completely onto the fabric and so they will be ready for ironing. Please do not skip this step! It’s an important part of the process if you do not want your newly printed images to wash off the first time you put them through your washer and dryer.
Step 8:
Now it’s time to heat set your designs so that they are washer-and-dryer-safe! Set up your ironing board, but don’t put any water in your iron. Grab a piece of parchment paper larger than your design and place it over the image, like so:
Iron on medium to high heat with no water or steam for about 10 minutes, keeping your iron moving at all times. After you’re done, let it cool, and you are ready to wear your wonderful new t-shirt out on the town!
Troubleshooting Tips:
If your image ends up printing a bit too light in some areas, you can always take a paintbrush and fill in the areas that need it with a little extra screen printing ink.
Don’t forget that if your image is too light, that means that you will need to add more pressure the next time you print.
Don’t try to re-align the screen and print again if it comes out too light. That almost never works out well, unfortunately.
Here is a video further explaining the printing process:
Have fun printing everything in sight!
Refer back to the last page of lesson one for some great ideas of things that you can print.
I think you will find that screen printing is a fun and addicting process!!
First off, let’s talk about how to reclaim your screen and what that means.
How to Reclaim Your Screen:
Reclaiming your screen means to wash off all of the screen filler in order to get the screen to be clean and blank. Once it is blank, you can then add a new image, starting from scratch. Screens can be used over and over again.
Step 1:
Get a cleaning solution. You can use Greased Lightning Cleanser OR 1 cup of Arm & Hammer’s Washing Soda dissolved in 1 gallon of water.
Step 2:
Spray on or pour your cleaning solution onto the screen. Spread it around with a scrub brush on both sides of the screen, then let it sit for about 10 minutes to really sink in.
Step 3:
Scrub a bit more, then wash off with a stream of lukewarm or warm water. You can use the hose outside with spray nozzle or you can use your shower.
Step 4:
Keep repeating steps 2 and 3 until your screen is clear and all of the screen filler residue has been removed.
Reusing Your Screen:
You can use your screen over and over again with a new image each time as long as you clean it out well and prepare it for use the same way that we did in lesson 2. If you clean your screen out well each time and do not allow ink to get trapped on your screen and dry, your screen will last for years to come.
If for some reason you do not clean your screen out well enough or if you get a dried area of ink that will not come off, then it is time to stretch a new screen, as I will discuss in the section below.
Stretching Screens:
I decided to add information about stretching screens in this lesson as an added bonus. You will only need to stretch a new screen if you have washed out and reclaimed your screen so many times that it is no longer useable. You will most likely not need to stretch a new screen onto your frame for a few years in most cases, so keep this information handy – you might need it sometime down the line!
You will need the following items to stretch a new screen: your old frame with its unusable old screen fabric removed (just tear or cut it out), new screen fabric (You can get this at most art supply stores – I typically use 110 mesh for my screens if I am printing shirts and 220 mesh if I am printing fine detailed pieces onto paper.), a staple gun, a hammer, and duct tape. It really helps if you have a friend with you to help stretch the screen too. It’s pretty difficult to get a good, tight screen by doing this alone, so I always have someone help me.
Step 1:
Cut your new screen fabric to be slightly larger than the screen itself. Give yourself about 5 or more inches of excess fabric on each side. It should look like this:
Step 2:
To hold the screen in place and start the stapling pattern, use your staple gun and place a staple in the center of each side of the frame, like this:
Step 3:
Now ask your friend to help you as you stretch the screen. Have your friend add the staples while you pull the screen tight around the frame. Put staples on each side of the initial 4 staples you put in the screen. Pull the screen tight as your friend adds the staples; they should be about 1” apart. Now you will have 3 staples on each of the 4 sides, for a total of 12 staples altogether. We are stretching the screen from the inside out for a tight center, instead of just adding staples in a row across each edge with no rhyme or reason. Be sure to pull really tight – the tighter the pull, the better the screen!
Step 4:
Keep rotating the frame and adding staples on each side until you get to the corners. It’s okay if the staples aren’t completely flat to the frame; we will hammer them down later.
Step 5:
Once you get to the corners, fold the screen fabric like you would a present, creating a little triangle-like edge that you can staple down. Alternatively, you can just bunch the fabric up and pull it together then add a staple over the little bundle. There is no right or wrong way to do the corners, so don’t worry too much about this step. You really can’t mess up the screen at this point. Just staple a few times to get the fabric to hold down over each corner, and in the end, it will look like this:
Step 6:
Use a pair of scissors to trim away the excess fabric, leaving about 1” of fabric coming off the side of the frame:
It should look like this after trimming:
Step 7:
Now check to see if you have any staples that are not flat to the wood of the frame. I had a few that were not flat, and you can see them here:
Use a hammer to pound those staples down and get them to be flush to the wood of the frame. You don’t want to leave any sticking up, because they could end up poking through the duct tape layer that we are about to add to the frame.
Step 8:
Now it’s time to add duct tape to hold everything down and to protect the staples from water when you rinse out the screen.
Cut a strip of duct tape that is about the same length as the side you are about to cover. Wrap duct tape around each edge until it is fully covered. It might take two strips of tape per edge to cover the wood.
Once you are done, it should look like this:
Enjoy using your new and improved screen!
Printing More Than One Color:
Printing in more than one color is an advanced technique that might take you a bit of practice, but I am including it here because I want you to know how to do it should you decide you need a challenge and want to take the process a bit further.
You will need one more additional supply to really help you line things up with this multi-color process. You should get hinge clamps for your screen. I use Speedball Deluxe Hinge Clamps in my studio, and they can be found online here:
Set yourself up with the clamps using an old table or a board that you have designated especially for screen printing. If you do not want to get clamps, you can still just ask a friend to help you, but make sure they have a really steady hand as they hold your screen!
Ok, let’s get started with a two color process:
Let’s say you create a layered image that needs to be printed in two colors like this fox image I made below.
Here is the fox’s body color:
Here is the fox’s outline:
Step 1:
Print the first color as you would normally onto your t-shirt or piece of paper. Allow that print to dry.
Here is how my first color looked alone:
Step 2:
Find a thick piece of clear plastic or mylar, then tape one side of it down onto your table so that it can be lifted up like a hinge, like so:
(Please note that my plastic is only partially clear – there are still traces of previous images that I hadn’t washed off yet – oops!)
Step 3:
Now, print your image onto the clear plastic, and without moving the screen (keep it clamped down or held tightly), place your previously printed image below the plastic using the previous print to line the image up underneath, like this:
Step 4:
Next you will flip back the image on the clear plastic, allowing you to print directly onto the paper or t-shirt with your first image. As long as you didn’t move the screen during the process, your second part should print perfectly onto the first part:
Color Mixing:
For your first print, I’d like you to use the black ink that came with the kit. Not too exciting, I know, but the Speedball Black ink has the perfect consistency for beginning printers, therefore, it is the best ink to learn with. Some other colors of Speedball ink are too drippy or don’t have enough coverage, while the black is just right and will provide excellent results without a lot of troubleshooting.
For the future, here is a little primer on how to mix colors. Start with small amounts of color. You don’t want to make too much ink, and if you start by mixing up a tiny amount of your desired color, you can always add to it and make more later. Screen printing ink is kind of pricey, so don’t use a ton of it right away! Let’s say you want to make orange. Start with a small glob of yellow and add a tiny dash of red into the color, mix well, and see what you think. Add tiny bits of red until you get it where you want it to be.
Color Mixing Trick:
As a bonus, here is the best trick about color mixing that I learned in college…
Let’s say you have a bright red, and you want to turn it into a brick red. Most people would start by adding brown or black to red, but this is all wrong! It all goes back to the color wheel:
When trying to create a duller or darker version of a color, instead of adding brown or black, add a bit of the color on the opposite side of the color wheel. This is the color’s complimentary color. In our example’s case, to made bright red a brick red, you’d add a tiny bit of green to start, and you’d keep adding green until you got your desired brick red color.
The other complimentary color pairs are: yellow and purple, and orange and blue. This works great for any pair of complimentary colors! Have fun with this great trick!
Conclusion:
Thank you so much for making art with me! I hope you enjoyed making shirts, totes, and all kinds of other goodies with your new screen printing skills. I think you’ll find that with screen printing, the possibilities for new surfaces to print on are as endless as the amount of image ideas you can come up with! I hope screen printing is a new art form that you will enjoy for years to come.