FAQS
Design Faqs
Do you print white?
We only print the color white on non-white garments. We actually print a white under base and then print the color on top. On white garments we DO NOT print white, it is stripped and the white comes from the white shirt showing.
What is Underbase?
Underbase is a layer of white ink that is printed onto the garment before your design is printed. Just as an artist begins with a white canvas, your artwork also needs a blank white underbase to show the colors of your design in true, vibrant hues. Without it, the color of the shirt effects the hue and vibrancy of the ink as it is laid on the shirt directly.
All non-white garments print a white underbase before the color artwork layer by default. Black shirts, or any very dark shirt MUST have an underbase in order for the artwork to appear on the shirt.
Attempting to print on colored shirts without an underbase only works to achieve a vintage or faded look on lighter colored shirts, such as light blues, yellows, tans, light greys, pinks, etc. We cannot guarantee the results when you choose “no underbase” on colored shirts, and you may find it necessary to order tests of your design, or color swatches printed on various colors of shirts. The pictures below are a comparison of the vibrancy of the colors when using/not using an underbase
Print Locations
We offer front and back printing on most t-shirts in standard print locations. We currently do not offer sleeve printing or printing across seams. On v-neck designs we currently only print below the V even on the back of the t-shirt to ensure a flat surface for printing. For hoodies, we print on the front above the pocket and on the back above the front pocket.
How big should my design be?
Try our design tool get a rough idea of how big your image will be.Well, good question…as big as you want it under 12″ x 16″ but here is a handy tip we use here to get a visual idea of how big a t-shirt design should be. If you lay down your favorite t-shirt and then take a regular 8.5″ x 11″ piece of paper and lay it down on the shirt. You can even rotate it to get an idea of how big 8.5″ or 11″. Many t-shirt designs are somewhere between that 8″ and 11″ width depending whether your design is text or some other graphic.
Design Contrast
Make sure your design has enough contrast between colors. Dark colors next to colors don’t look the same as they may on your backlit computer screen. In the example below, the colors in contrast to the black outlines are quite viewable but as you can see the darker purple just doesn’t pop like the other colors. A better solution would be a lighter purple to make sure the color would pop.
Artwork Services
We expect our clients to provide print ready images formatted to be printed. We currently do not offer graphics services for sizing, cleaning, or altering our clients art. We are not responsible for low quality or incorrectly sized submitted art.
Transparency
Underbase can cause problems for designs with standard transparency. The underbase is only printed underneath your design, and it is not transparent. For example, if part of your artwork is 50% transparent, the white underbase will still print at 100% opacity under it, making any transparent parts appear solid white. Using transparent artwork often leads to very unexpected results, depending on the amount and degree of transparency used in the design.
How do you avoid this issue?
There are a couple of options to avoid the transparency problem:
- Only print designs with transparencies on light garments and choose NO underbase. (But keep in mind the other non-transparent parts of the design will have a slightly faded or vintage look without the underbase)
- Only use fully opacity in your designs. You can try to achieve a similar look to transparency by painting your artwork with a solid color base and then use shading or gradient techniques to achieve the look you want.
- Another option for fading your design into the shirt is to feather the edge of the design using a layer mask.
- Use a dissolve photoshop effect on your drop shadows
- Another option is to put a background layer underneath and/or around your artwork that can be any color, or combination of colors.. This will in essence try to cover the underbase with the shirt color, so that it won’t show through. Adding a background solves the issue because the transparency is printed onto the background, not the white underbase
Shipping Rates and Info
T-Shirts & Garments
Items that are on a separate line are shipped in separate packages due to the nature of the how the products are packaged and shipped. The exception are sweatshirts which can ship with t-shirts, bags, phone cases, and beanies but the base price will be the sweatshirt 1st item price and then any items from the other group of products will be charged the additional item charge for that group.
US Shipping:
USPS 1st Class w/tracking (5-7 business days)
USPS Priority w/tracking (2-3 business days)
Canada Shipping:
USPS International 1st Class (5-12+ business days)
Tracking is only available when the package is in the United States. Print Aura is not responsible for delays due to customs which may be a few days to a few weeks.
International Shipping:
We will ship USPS First Class to just about anywhere your customer is located. Tracking is only available when the package is in the United States. We are not responsible for lost packages or delays due to customs which may be a few days to a few weeks.
Tracking:
Tracking is provided on ALL orders. However, tracking is only valid when in the US. Once the package leaves the US for international orders it will not update.
Shipping Packaging:
Most packages are shipped in basic white poly bags.
T-Shirt Printing
Direct to Garment (DTG) Printing
We uses Avalanche printers by Kornit. We print our t-shirts using Direct to Garment technology. Our machines print full color on dark or light garments. DTG provides an excellent image quality, durability, and is soft, breathable and a great eco-friendly solution with the water based inks. Direct to Garment is fantastic for full color prints with no color limitations. No more trying to come up with a design that is just one or two colors, you can have up to 16 million colors in your design. Our printers use water-based inks that are environmentally friendly.
Turnaround Time
Order Processing
- Standard Processing: 3-5 business days
- Rush Processing: 2-3 business days (only available for garments, cost is $2 per item)
- Cutoff Times: Daily cutoff to start processing the same business day is: 12:30PM ET / 9:30AM PT
- Business Days: Monday – Friday
Order Edits/Cancellations
You are only able to edit or cancel your order when the status is still displays “New” or “On Hold”. Once the order goes into processing you can no longer edit or cancel the order. If the order is processing and you need to make a change please contact us about your changes. We do our best to meet your request but once it starts processing we can’t guarantee that it can be edited or canceled.
Stock Issues
99.44% of our orders are completed without any stock issues. However, due to our dynamic and fast moving inventory, we do experience stock issues from time to time.
So what happens if an item isn’t in stock?
Notification
We will notify you via email that an item in one of your orders is out of stock.
Substitution
There are usually comparable substitute items for most of our products. At this point you can look through our product offerings and choose a similar item, or contact your customer to see what they would prefer. If you do decide to substitute the item, we can print out your design onto the new item and ship it out, no problem!
If there is not a suitable replacement item, or if you just don’t want to substitute, we can cancel the order the order for you. Unfortunately we do not do back orders.
Product Care Instructions
T-Shirt & Garment Care
A few tips to take care of the t-shirts that we print using direct to garment print methods. Follow the tips and your shirt will last a long time with the same bright looking design.
Washing: Wash inside out with cold water with similar colors using a gentle cycle
Ironing: If ironing is necessary, iron inside-out on the lowest setting
Drying: Tumble dry low or hang-dry
No-Nos: Avoid using bleach and do not dry clean.