I made an (*UPDATE: EVEN MORE) kickass t-shirt for dirt cheap
 

Well, I was looking into starting to screen print t-shirts, and while I was looking into that, stumbled on this idea, which is WAY easier on the wallet, and in my opinion, a cooler effect.

http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c5...r/tpbshirt.jpg

All I did was blow up the logo in illustrator, printed it on an overhead transparency, cut the transparency to use as a stencil (yes it sucked, and took almost 3 hours), spraymounted the transparency to the shirt, and misted two strengths of bleach onto it (30% for the outer darker part, 100% for the inner lighter part). Threw it in the dryer to set it and beat the bleach crystals off it, then touched it up with a fabric dye pen a couple places (the little black 'islands' on the tape, mostly).

If you have an exacto knife, a shirt that is at least half cotton, bleach, 3m spray mount, and overhead transparencies, you're in business!

I can make a more in-depth step-by-step next time I make one, if anyone cares.

Edit: Oh, and for people who don't recognize the design, it's the "The Pirate Bay" torrent site logo.

Wow... you know, that is pretty kickass. Solid idea and the execution is perfect!

What a great idea! I never even thought about bleach.

Nice job, man.

ARRRRRReally good shirt.

That's cool!!! Very creative.

How did you stop the bleach from bleeding through under the stencil?

You're not drenching it, just applying a fine mist. Also, to help get crips edges, the stencil is spray mounted with 3m spray adhesive.

It may be to early to tell but is there enough bleach on there to weaken the material? Great idea, the finished result is cool. I wonder if the same process could be used with dyes.

This is hearsay, as I haven't had them long enough, but I've heard that as long as you use 50/50 cotton/polyester, you'll be ok--the bleach only attacks the cotton. You have to be more careful on 100% cotton, as you can actually burn a hole in it (something I'm going to do on a near-future project).

And yeah, you definitely could use this technique with dyes. However, there are many options available with dyes, and not many with bleach. I plan on mixing bleach and dye on some projects as well...So far our one dye shirt came out kind of sloppy, but it wasn't done by me personally so I'm not sure the reasons.

Wow!!!! What a creative way to make a pirate shirt. Thanks for the idea.

I've played with bleach and shirts for a while. I can safely say that YES the bleach DOES weaken the material. But usually it is not enough to worry about. When the shirt is older and wearing out at the seams, you may notice the bleached parts are thinner or have holes.

The shirt idea is solid. A couple of very minor points -

Over time, the fabric die pen areas will be more obvious.

You can't heat set bleach. You need to wash the bleach out of the shirt with water.

Ok so I get this right ( I will be doing this very soon) after you bleach it, throw it in the dryer...? My question is, when you wash it, will the bleach spread to mess up the design? And should I wash it alone the first time I wash it?

I actually hand-washed one of mine it in the sink (doesn't take as much effort as it sounds) to get the spray adhesive off, and based on clavus's recomendation, I'll be adding that to the tutorial.

Ok, thank you :D I found my first design to be a tribal bat, might put it on a womans tank. Im not sure yet. But I will post a pic afterwards. And thank you for this awesome idea :D

wow. that is dedication. you can do a photo emulsion silk screen in 2.5 hours from beginning to end. and that's with 2 hrs. of waiting time.

this method beats silkscreen for the cool effect of the two different kinds of bleaching around the edges.... those would be a bitch to get just right.

i'm very impressed. i'm excited to see others' forays into this medium.

You should PM me (or post up) some screen printing advice. I'm only doing this until all my screen print stuff is set up, due to low cost of entry...I stumbled on this method while researching silk screening. I am actually looking at buying a double sink, powerwasher, and countertop on craigslist this week to start setting up my storage unit as a screen print shop of sorts, and then I'm going to start doing some pure screen printing stuff, as well as mixing mediums, with bleach as a base coat before the silk.

We're actually going to be pretty capable....In addition to the screen printing and stenciling, my wife does swarovski crystal rhinestone work, is a seamstress (she made a litle black dress in two days to go clubbing in a couple weeks ago!) and my next door neighbor has an embroidery machine, that I have the software loaded for...so we'll pretty much be set to make pretty much anything textile. :thumbsup:

By the way, for people who haven't found it, I did a writeup in Tilted How To:

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthread.php?t=126535

Here's another one I did for a friend of mine, as partial trade for a mountain bike. Here's his car:

http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c5...tor/kaiser.jpg

And here's his shirt:

http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c5...keithshirt.jpg

It's three stencils, one for the car, one for the highlights, and one for the ground plain, and I pulled out all the stops on the technique...multiple strengths of bleach, a hand gradient, a hand-traced stencil. I'm pretty proud of it, and he loves it...I'm making him a hoodie and a shirt for his girlfriend with the same stencil!

Damn, man... you fight crime in your free time, too?

Skills!

that is incredible.
you are not just making t shirts.
you are making some sweet art.

and that car is pretty nice too.

This needs a bump. Have you guys done anymore shirts since these?

I'm doing some this week or next based on this logo, but only the acid burn warning sign part.

http://www.cduniverse.com/images.asp...in+%2D+3750+CD