Hard Light Productions Forums

Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Galemp on November 22, 2005, 02:50:37 am

Title: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Galemp on November 22, 2005, 02:50:37 am
Need I say more.

Now I don't have any art formatted for black yet (they like transparancy) but now's your chance. I can only print on one side, but even so, now's the chance for everyone to finally get the Freespace and HLP shirts they always wanted.

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Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Ghost on November 22, 2005, 06:15:22 am
I'd wear it.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Setekh on November 22, 2005, 06:50:04 am
How high-res do you need it to be to make a decent shirt out of it?

Edit: put a few variants up at www.hard-light.net/staff/setekh/shirt. Go check it out.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Martinus on November 22, 2005, 07:07:06 am
I've heard from more than a few people that their printing quality sucks so I've never bought one from them.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Fineus on November 22, 2005, 07:59:52 am
Can anyone confim that? I'd love to own a t-shirts like that but not if it's a tricky thing.

As an aside... I don't suppose anyone knows a place that prints onto patches or black shirts? (the idea behind the patches being that they could be sewn onto an existing black shirt). I think that'd look rather smart personally...
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Martinus on November 22, 2005, 08:22:09 am
Can't vouch for the quality myself but they have a far bigger range than cafepress: Link (http://www.printedclothing.com)

UK based too so P&P should be cheap.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: vyper on November 22, 2005, 09:11:48 am
Cafepress printing is fine in my experience. Never had anything very detailed on mine though.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: pyro-manic on November 22, 2005, 09:27:55 am
Can anyone confim that? I'd love to own a t-shirts like that but not if it's a tricky thing.

As an aside... I don't suppose anyone knows a place that prints onto patches or black shirts? (the idea behind the patches being that they could be sewn onto an existing black shirt). I think that'd look rather smart personally...

There are t-shirt printing shops all over the place, and I imagine you could ask them to print onto a piece of fabric rather than a shirt if you asked 'em...
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Martinus on November 22, 2005, 10:46:22 am
The reason most people seemed to be unhappy was that CP used transfer printing instead of screen printing which looks better and is longer lasting.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: kasperl on November 22, 2005, 10:47:31 am
The black they printed on the cap is more grayish, but the rest is ok. I've got it lying next to me as I type this.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Galemp on November 22, 2005, 02:52:39 pm
Woo, thanks Eddie. I'll put that up right away.
EDIT: Any chance you could make it with transparency? We don't want an ugly square border around the edges.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Setekh on November 22, 2005, 04:59:06 pm
Woo, thanks Eddie. I'll put that up right away.
EDIT: Any chance you could make it with transparency? We don't want an ugly square border around the edges.

Yep. It's the third one down:

http://www.hard-light.net/staff/setekh/shirt/
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Ghost on November 22, 2005, 05:18:53 pm
How high-res do you need it to be to make a decent shirt out of it?

Edit: put a few variants up at www.hard-light.net/staff/setekh/shirt. Go check it out.

If I was gonna get any of them, I'd get the no text version.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Galemp on November 22, 2005, 06:20:22 pm
Here we go. For legibility I'd recommend getting rid of the white vertical stripe, though.

I can produce 3 varieties, so if Steak wants to grill up a few more transparent varieties I can do them too. How about a greenish one with the SCP splash logo on it? Or a green-and-gold GTVA one? I know a few people will probably want an SOC shirt too...

Anyway, it's still in the Design phase right now, they're not for sale yet. I'll let you know as soon as they are.

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Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Ransom on November 22, 2005, 08:07:02 pm
If I was gonna get any of them, I'd get the no text version.
This goes for me too, the text versions all look a bit cluttered to me.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: an0n on November 22, 2005, 08:37:13 pm
Hmmm.

I did look into cheap screen-printing back when WS-GW was setting up myscrotum.com. It's pretty cheap if you're getting a decent run printed.

/me fires up PS to play with some designs.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: an0n on November 22, 2005, 08:55:34 pm
Based on my card logo:
(http://www.penguinbomb.com/images/hlpshirt1.jpg)

And for the traditionalists:
(http://www.penguinbomb.com/images/hlpshirt2.jpg)
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Galemp on November 22, 2005, 09:22:49 pm
It's a bit limited, Anon... and by limited I mean 10"x10" on the chest. We won't be seeing hockey jerseys like that from Cafepress.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: an0n on November 22, 2005, 09:38:53 pm
Not from CafePress, no.....
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Setekh on November 22, 2005, 10:48:36 pm
a decent run printed.

How many?
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: an0n on November 22, 2005, 11:17:26 pm
You could probably knock simple t-shirts out at an affordable retail price doing runs of maybe 50-100.

Mine, for example - on a 100 run with IndigoClothing (http://www.indigoclothing.com) - would use 3 colours (red, yellow, orange - I think) across 5 placements and 4 designs. So I'd probably need 12 screens (at £20 a screen) - meaning a £240 one-time setup. Add in £180 labour, £175 for cheap shirt, a few bucks for postage and tax and ****.....

So around £700 for 100 shirts. Meaning £7 piece? Damn. That's pretty cheap. I thought it'd be more than that. And the setup is a one-time thing. So repeat orders just use the old screens. And your designs would only need like 4 screens, meaning £80 setup. So they'd be more like £5 each.

This might actually be worth doing, y'know....

You could even get small stuff embroidered for not much. If you were aiming for a retail of say £10 per shirt, you could do some kickass stuff.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: an0n on November 22, 2005, 11:27:32 pm
Actually, you can probably get them dirt-cheap if you conscript a HLP 3rd-worlder to check around in their locality. But I dunno if the quasi-slave industry types would be interested in such a short run.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: Galemp on November 22, 2005, 11:44:30 pm
I'd rather not invest in that sort of thing if I can help it. It's bad enough involuntarily supporting them here at home. :blah:

As for IndigoClothing, the main thing is that we'd need some cash-up-front to pay for it. Maybe the admins could set up a PayPal account and anyone who donates $10 gets a shirt once the run is done. If it's less than that, I guess you could choose to donate it to the server/webhosting or getting it back.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: FireCrack on November 22, 2005, 11:45:32 pm
Those ones an0n posted look snazzy...
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: an0n on November 22, 2005, 11:55:33 pm
I've submitted my 'traditional' one to Indigo for a rough quote (screen-printing only).


The way to do this would be to take orders (and cash) from forumites and place the order with Indigo (or whoever) once we hit 70% of the printing costs. Then use AdSense revenue to cover the other 30%.

That gives a balance between speed and loss-risk for the admins.
Title: Re: Cafepress now prints black T-Shirts.
Post by: an0n on November 23, 2005, 12:21:05 am
Oh and I'll be getting around £115 in like a week.

Assuming my uncle doesn't screw me, I can probably dump that into the fund, subject to a few provisos regarding how I'm reimbursed and on the condition that I get to gouge people to turn a profit.