Graphic Cotton — Printing graphics on cotton: how | graphicotton.com
Three processes, three cost structures: setup, minimum run, colour behaviour, coverage, hand feel, durability and lead time in one comparison.
Screen printing's cost structure is front-loaded. Making the screens costs roughly USD 15-40 per colour per side, paid once before the run starts, and after that the per-piece cost is low. That is why a two-colour screen print commonly becomes the cheapest route somewhere above 50-100 pieces: the setup has been diluted across the run.
DTG inverts that structure. There are no screens and no setup, so the first piece costs the same as the hundredth, and the price scales with ink coverage — under 15% of the print area is light, 15-40% medium, over 40% full. A six-to-eight-colour DTG print can therefore still be the cheaper option below about 25 pieces, where burning six to eight screens would dominate the quote.
On narrow screens, swipe or scroll the plate sideways.
Discharge sits inside the screen family but solves a different problem. Instead of adding ink, a reducing paste removes the garment's existing dye, which makes it the only screen method that can print a true white on dark pre-dyed cotton. It costs 10-30% more per metre, works only on cotton and some cotton-rich blends, and leaves a visible effect on the garment's hand.
Hand feel and durability separate the methods in use. Plastisol sits on the fabric as a film 100-150 microns thick, cured at about 160 °C for 15-60 seconds; DTG lays down 0.01-0.05 mm of water-based ink that soaks in and leaves almost no hand. In the wash, a correctly cured screen print lasts roughly 50-100 cycles before the ink visibly thins, against about 30-50 for DTG.
Lead time is the last differentiator. DTG production is typically quoted at 3-7 days per run, with an A3 head printing roughly 1.5-2.5 square metres an hour at 1200 x 1200 dpi effective resolution; screen printing's time cost is concentrated in setup, before the run. For the fabric side of the decision — GSM, yarn and preshrinking — see /cotton-fabric-specs, and for the sequence of decisions in a real order, /printing-order-checklist.
Further reading