When You Wish Upon a Star...
All-Over Screen Printing Capabilities
Types of All-Over Prints
How is All-Over Printing Different from Regular Screen Print?
All-Over Quality Guidelines

WHEN YOU WISH UPON A STAR...

Remember when you were a kid and all you wanted for your birthday was a bike? Maybe it wasn’t a bike, but there was that one thing that you wanted sooooooo badly. You dreamt about it. You drew pictures of it. You pretended what it would be like if you actually had it. That’s how Sharprint felt about the Alpha 8 press.

Up until just a few years ago we rigged up art, pushed registration over the limits, and came up with some pretty crazy solutions in an effort to print bigger and bigger. We also considered dye sublimation. We worked with dip dye specialists. We even looked into the possibility of getting a belt press so we could print bigger. At the very end of the day, any of our truly oversized screen print orders were being sent elsewhere. This made us very sad.

Along came the Alpha 8 and we threw a party! Now we could print all-over designs to our heart’s content, and the Alpha 8 press has double-indexing capabilities. Double-indexing essentially means that we can print twice as much of all the cool stuff we’re already putting up on press. Now, with some years under our belt, we’ve mastered the art of printing all-over and continue to push the limits of the Alpha 8 to see what new techniques we can apply.

ALL-OVER SCREEN PRINTING CAPABILITIES

• Maximum print area of 39”x28” or 28”x39” for more than 1 color designs.
• One color designs can go larger depending on the design.
• Maximum of 6 screens (colors) per design.
• Simulated process can create the illusion of more than 6 colors depending on the design.
• Can print over collars, sleeves, and sides. Can print off top and off bottom.
• 10k shirts printed daily.

TYPES OF ALL-OVER PRINTS

There are a few different approaches we take to accomplishing an all-over print. These 3 standards have been set up to determine what will be the most cost effective route to obtaining the printed look closest to your art and mock up.

ONE-COLOR AOP

Just as it sounds, this print can be executed in 1 screen. We have a specialized press that cranks out 1 color all-over prints all day long. This unique press makes it affordable to set up and print a one color all-over design for as few as 72 shirts!

STANDARD AOP

Up to 6 colors, this is done on our Alpha 8 press. This is our primary press for most all-over jobs, but please note that full all-over coverage may not be possible on sizes large and up. The minimum order is 300 pieces.

AOP PLUS

For the most complex all-over prints or an affordable solution to small runs with all over elements, we utilize multiple imprint strategy to achieve the desired affect. In other words, we print part of the design as a regular AOP and add a standard print right on top!

ONE-COLOR AOP
STANDARD AOP
AOP PLUS
This is an example of a one color all over print plus a standard chest print.	This is an example of a complex 6 color AOP plus a center chest print.

HOW IS ALL-OVER PRINTING DIFFERENT FROM REGULAR SCREEN PRINT?

The main difference between printing standard sizes of designs and all-over printing is in the spray tack application and how the shirts are loaded onto a press.

When screen printing a standard design, a light dusting of spray tack is applied to a pallet on press. The shirt is then opened, pulled over the pallet and smoothed flat. This keeps the shirt from lifting up between colors after ink has been applied.

There is a tendency for the shirt to lift and cause registration problems between colors when printing all-over designs too. Shirts are laid flat on top of tables when we print all over, so the starch mixture is dusted inside the shirt using a separate machine. The shirts are placed on stiff cardboard sheets and smoothed. These cardboard sheets make it much more efficient to load the shirts on and off the over-sized pallets while keeping the shirts smooth and flat.

ALL-OVER PRINTING QUALITY GUIDELINES

There’s no doubt all-over printing is awesome. The ability to print anywhere on the shirt is really a liberating aspect for designers, consumers, and vendors alike. It is important to be aware how the quality of these prints differ from screen prints created with a standard press.

Printing over the collar and shoulder seams is really popular, especially with retail inspired designs. If you lay a shirt down flat, you’ll notice how it is not smooth and flat in these areas. For this reason, when the squeegee passes over collars and seams, the ink is not applied smoothly. In these areas, ink has a tendency to skip or pool. This is completely acceptable and expected.

Since the coverage area on all-over prints is so great, we use soft-hand inks. Primarily, we use chino and fashion soft bases. Water-based and/or discharge inks can be used but there are drawbacks to those inks and they do not work with all designs.

The spoilage rate is greater than with standard screen printing. Expect a spoilage rate of 5%-8%. The process is so variable that many more shirts are considered “misprinted”. Of course, we return any defeats to the customer and they can do with them as they please.