The importance of sourcing and preparing cotton fabrics for digital textile printing - FESPA (2023)

FAQs

What are the benefits of fabric printing? ›

The benefits of digital fabric printing services are noticeably obvious and quickly realized. To simplify a complex process, the benefits of on-demand fabric printing would be: more color; 100% accuracy; better feel; and full customization.

The designs are transferred from pre-printed transfer paper onto fabric by contact heat – basically a big oven. The dyes are absorbed by fabric during this heat transfer. Heat Transfer, also known as sublimation printing, is great way to produce high clarity, well defined designs.

Digital printing is one of the most sustainable methods of printing fabrics. It uses less water and energy than traditional methods, and there is no need for harsh chemicals. Digital printed fabrics are also easier to recycle than traditional fabrics.

The four main methods of textile printing are block, roller, screen, and heat transfer printing. In each of these methods, the application of the colour, usually as a thickened paste, is followed by fixation, usually by steaming or heating, and then removal of excess colour by washing.

Designer illustrates the sketches keeping the fabric texture, feel, color, weight etc in their mind. Hence, fabric sourcing plays a vital role in garment development. The process of fabric sourcing is very dynamic, it primarily depends on the fabric type, cost and lead time.

With digital printing, we recommend using 100% cotton. It doesn't matter what colour your t-shirt is, cotton will retain the ink much better giving you a crystal-clear copy of your design.

Digital Textile Printing is a process of printing on textiles and garments using inkjet technology to print colorants onto fabric. This process allows for single pieces, mid to small-run cycle production and even long-runs as an alternative option to screen printed fabric.

DIGITAL PRINTING PRODUCES SIGNIFICANTLY LESS PAPER WASTE THAN OFFSET PRINTING. Offset printing methods consistently produce about 15% paper waste. This amount can be even higher for smaller print runs.

According to DressX, the production of digital clothing emits 97% less CO2 than the production of physical clothing. Digital clothing on average saves 3,300 liters of water per item.

Prevent Waste Through Less Consumption

Digital printing needs no intricate set-up and uses an electric charge to place the ink onto the paper, so hardly any waste is produced. Plus, if you choose to print on recycled paper, it lowers the overall raw material required.

What are the 3 main printing processes? ›

There are three main printing processes: relief, intaglio, and planography, which includes lithography and screenprinting. Each process has a unique mark or characteristic because of the way the matrix is created. The matrix is the block, plate, or surface from which the print is taken.

'Sourcing is defined as the process of determining how and from where manufactured goods or components will be procured. ' The main motivational force to do sourcing of garments/fabrics is to give the highest level of satisfaction, at low production cost.

It depends on fabric quality and sometimes on the end buyer. Some buyers want better quality and are willing to bear extra costs for that. Some buyers especially who are doing big volume business, give very tight costing target and in that case, garment manufacturer has to find out the cheapest source.

Benefits of Digital Printing:

Timeliness: There are fewer steps in the printing process, and as a result, the final product can be delivered quicker. Cost Effective: Because printing plates are not required, there is less investment involved to set up a single job.

Digital printing enables you to easily customize a large number of printing options. Through digital printing, you can print almost anywhere you want if your printer has mobile printing capabilities. Digital printing is cost-effective when you're printing a small volume of documents.

Marketing – Printing is one of the easiest and most effective ways to market the service, promotions or products that you offer. Distribution – Printed materials can be can be easily posted out, displayed around the local area or left in popular areas for people to pick up.

To make sure you are starting with the cleanest possible fibres you should scour your fabric. Most fabrics have some coatings, starches and buildup of oils. Scouring is a strong cleaning to get of these impurities. Cotton should be scoured with a 2 hour simmer in a washing soda (soda ash) solution.

For natural fabrics such as cotton, screen printing, and DTG printing are the methods that will give you the best results.

Cotton is one of the most widely used materials for digital printing because of its comfort, moisture resistance, and popularity within the consumer market. Some of the other typical materials that are good for digital printing are canvas, fabric, polyester, paper, and card stock.

What is the process of digital printing? ›

The digital printing process involves printing on different media like paper, fabric, acrylic, plastic, etc., directly from a digital image. It is professionally done print work and small jobs from desktop publishing and other digital sources which are printed via inkjet printers of large format or high volume.

Fabric can be printed in three different styles: direct, discharge, & resist styles.

From field to fabric, the process of making cotton transforms the raw fibers into threads, yarn and fabric in three steps: Preparation, Spinning, and Weaving.

Typical preparation treatments include desizing, scouring, and bleaching. Preparation steps can also include processes, such as singeing and mercerizing, designed to chemically or physically alter the fabric.

Why sustainable printing is important. It's obvious why: printers consume paper, toner chemicals, and power. Reduce printing and you directly reduce the impact of all three on your environmental footprint. And yet here we are in 2022 and the paperless office stills seems far off.

Digitization allows fashion companies to develop sustainable and green solutions without sacrificing cultural relevance and consumer relationship. Using digital technology, making better products efficiently while reducing waste is now possible. So, the time is NOW to implement best practices.

In the case of digital fashion, we can see how it's helping at materials level with the selection of materials. There are companies doing excellent renderings of materials, so you don't need to ship those samples anymore. Samples that end up in waste for every single brand or designer that wants to work with them.”

The industry produces an estimated 10% of all greenhouse gas emissions. The production and distribution of the crops, fibers, and garments used in fashion all contribute to differing forms of environmental pollution, including water, air, and soil degradation.

What is the future of digital printing? ›

In 2032 digital print will account for almost a quarter of the global value of all print and printed packaging by value, worth $230.5 billion. Inkjet accounted for 61.4% of digital print value with 62.4% of volume in 2022. This will increase to 74.1% of value and 77.5% of volume in 2032.

Adding a sustainability lens to digital transformation can help us reimagine different outcomes, revitalise our planet, create transformational ecosystems, address inequality, and help us in our journey to a more sustainable and resilient future.

Digital Inkjet Printing

High-speed and professional-grade inkjet printers are capable of producing up to 4,000 words per minute, and the speeds for graphics and images aren't far behind. Along with being much faster, the latest digital printing technology can render designs that are more intricate than other methods.

In general, fabrics are materials that have been through additional processes. A textile refers to the base materials that are made from woven fibers, but as soon as other processes like stitching are applied in order to utilize those materials for making clothing, they are considered fabrics.

Textiles: three stages in the production of woollen cloth, cutting the nap (top), washing [or sizeing ?] (centre), and pressing (bottom).

The most widely used print processes are surface, flexographic (flexo), gravure and screen. It is important to recognize that each process is capable of yielding attractive, stylized and salable products.

Traditional printmaking techniques include woodcut, etching, engraving, and lithography, while modern artists have expanded available techniques to include screenprinting. A matrix is essentially a template, and can be made of wood, metal, or glass.

Print sources include books, newspapers, magazines, journals, and any other hard-copy sources such as official records. Print sources generally include all tangible sources such as video or audio tapes. Print sources are still valuable for research.

What is the importance of fabric painting? ›

Fabric painting can be used to decorate everything from clothing to home furnishings like curtains and tablecloths. It opens all sorts of possibilities for creative expression, allows you to create unique one-of-a-kind works of art, and it isn't hard to do.

As well as the practical and design thinking skills gained when studying Textile Design, you'll learn many vital transferable skills such as team work, project management, communication, marketing and commercial awareness.

Different types of fabrics have different properties that can strongly influence how you treat your clothing. For example, the fiber content in one fabric will influence how to clean the garment completely differently from another fabric's fiber content.

Textile art is art that uses varying materials and fibres to produce decorative, artistic objects. It's one of the oldest forms of art in history and has played a part in practical and decorative man-made objects for hundreds of thousands of years.

Benefits of Digital Printing:

Timeliness: There are fewer steps in the printing process, and as a result, the final product can be delivered quicker. Cost Effective: Because printing plates are not required, there is less investment involved to set up a single job.

The main environmental problems caused by the textile design industry include water pollution, air pollution and solid waste pollution. Water Pollution: The Textile industry uses millions of gallons of water everyday.