Guest Blog: A Crafty T-shirt Adventure

Hi Venturoos! We'd like to introduce our first guest blogger, Trey, or @Treejail4you (on The Twitter). Do you remember the sweet t-shirts we wore in Episode 8 of V3? Well, meet their creator — and then keep scrolling to see his newest (and equally sweet) creations:

Happy Venturing? I guess that’s how this should start. I’ve been asked by the lovely ladies of V3 to play around on the blog from time to time. Maybe we should start off with just a touch on me: I run a custom silk screening shop, and let’s just say I take advantage of this for little pet projects, fun party favors, and other nerdtastic randomness. That being said, I figure it’d be fun to have arts and crafts time!

Being college-aged, I find myself in general, generic party situations. However, a group of my friends try to break the mold by hosting EPIC game nights. These are less of a party and more of a battle for bragging rights. Two-person teams wage war in just about any form possible — short of actually fighting one another. Partners come and go, and each pairing has a different team name. Team names are a very important aspect, as they tie into the very feel of the night. Here’s a short list of teams I’ve been a part of; Rogue Squadron, Team Utility Belt, Team Huorn, Deku Nuts, Team Teamwork, Dumbledore’s Army, Team So Zetta Slow, The Istari, and my most recent team formed…TEAM VENTURE!

Most of my teammates have come to expect a certain amount of flare from me and I try not to let them down. Obviously, as Team Venture, our “go to” move is yelling “Go Team Venture” with the power V venture pose. My partner and I jokingly came up with a shirt idea— one that quickly became reality.

Now, the FUN PART: after designing the shirt, I picked out our color scheme and printed out the artwork. We take the art and burn it on to silk mesh screens coated with photosensitive emulsion. These screens are then put in a light box and bombarded with light, curing the emulsion except for the area with art. After burning, the screen must be washed out. All areas covered by art washes away, giving us our image.

After drying and taping the screen, we then set up our press and start printing. After dabbing your chosen ink color onto the screen, you then pull a squeegee over the image, which forces the ink through the screen onto the shirt.

This design had three different print areas, so it had to be set up three separate times. Between each print it had to be run through the dryer to cure the ink and ensure that the ink sets into the shirt. This was the first run:

This is the final run rolling off the dryer:

 

Team Venture is now a go! GO TEAM VENTURE!