Make Your Own Squadron Merchandise

[funkedup]

Here is the store I made on Cafepress:  Northolt Wing Store

It's pretty easy to use.  You just upload images and they have a bunch of items you can apply them to.  Then you or your squaddies can order the items.  Prices are pretty reasonable and there are no minimum batch sizes like if you go to a printing shop.

You can open your own store for free, just go here:  Open Store

This way you and your squaddies can look like geeks at cons, airshows, etc.  

[Sancho]

hows the quality of the tee shirts and the silkscreening?

[funkedup]

I'm still waiting on my first samples of the Northolt stuff.  My old WB squadron bought stuff from these guys and it was good quality though.  I'll keep you posted.

[Revvin]

Looks nice!

[funkedup]

I got my test items back and they look great.  The printing resolution was so good that it actually revealed some flaws in my source images.  Very good quality printing.

If you are going to build a store there, be sure to hit their forum for info on images.  For resolution it's good to make your images the same resolution as the printed image.  I.e. if the item says "8'x10' @ 100 DPI" then you should create an 800 x 1000 pixel image.  

Zoom your image so it shows up on your screen at about the printed size (e.g. 8'x10' on your screen) and if it looks crappy on the screen it's going to look crappy on the printed item.  But if it looks good on the screen you will be OK.

Also be aware that portions of the image which are completely white (255,255,255) will be transparent when printed.  This is great for white shirts and cups but maybe not so great for a grey shirt.  I used 8-bit GIF with transparency and had the printing equipment handled the transparency properly.  For my next batch I'm using 24-bit PNG with white backgrounds because I am told that will look a little better.

[Morgoth]

Funkedup:

Thanks for the info, I've just set up a shop for my squad and was wondering how good my source images are. I have to touch them up a bit I guess.

[funkedup]

Hiya Spof, long time no see.  

Gimme a link to your store and I'll have a look!

If you look under "Community" on the Cafepress site there is a nice forum with an area for graphics discussions.  Some really helpful and knowledgable people there.

Also there seems to be a problem with the T-shirt images coming out a little bit dark.  Supposedly there is a fix in the works.  If you get something that's too dark, just send it back and they'll make you a new one.  

[Morgoth]

Funkedup:

Yeah, after WB I lost my taste for flying for a couple of years. Plus being a new Dad may have had something to do with my lack of flight time

900th Bloody Jaguars Store

I haven't ordered any test items yet as I have to do some cleanup on the logos I used. I had to resize them up and I lost a bit of detail.

I'll check the forum you mentioned for pointers as I'm sure as hell not a graphics artist