With years of expertise in brand design and printing, Ethical Tees has the skills to bring your ideas to life! We can create detailed CAD sheets of your designs, outlining key production elements such as print, embroidery, and labelling specifications. Our team ensures that every detail is not only visually impressive but also practical for real-world factory production. Below is a selection of printed clothing designed and produced by Ethical Tees.
Ensuring Your Artwork is Print-Ready
If you’re unsure whether your artwork is suitable for screen printing, we’re here to help. We can assess potential issues and guide you toward the best solution for achieving a high-quality print. A bright, crisp screen print starts with properly prepared artwork.
Preferred Artwork Formats
We primarily work with PC-based software, receiving files in Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop, but we can also process MAC files.
Accepted File Formats:
✅ CorelDraw (Suite 2024 or earlier) – Convert all fonts to curves and supply in CDR or CMX format.
✅ Adobe Illustrator – Convert all fonts to outlines and save in EPS or AI format.
✅ Adobe Photoshop – Keep all layers intact and supply images with a transparent background. Artwork should be 300 dpi or higher at actual print size.
✅ Adobe Acrobat (PDF) – Save files as ‘for prepress’ to maintain quality.
If your artwork isn’t in one of these formats, don’t worry—just send us the best quality image you have, and we’ll do our best to work with it.
Using Web Images
Web images are often low resolution, which can affect print quality. However, some high-resolution images are available online. The key factor is image size in pixels—the more pixels, the better the quality. If you’re unsure, send us what you have, and we’ll assess it for free. Common web image formats: JPEG, PNG, GIF, SVG—all of which we may be able to work with. If needed, we can also professionally recreate your artwork for optimal print results. If this requires additional time, we’ll provide a quote before proceeding.
Artwork-Only Service
For trade customers using cutter plotters, we offer high-quality vector image production tailored for cutting machines. Unlike automated tracing tools, our hand-crafted vector graphics ensure smoother cutting with minimal nodes—saving time and improving precision.
Print Colours & Pantone Matching
We use the Pantone Solid Colour Matching System to ensure accurate colour reproduction. When we send your proof, we’ll include the closest Pantone colour matches. If you already have specific Pantone colours in mind, let us know for the best results! For any questions about artwork preparation, feel free to reach out—there’s no charge for asking!
Most T-shirt Printers ask for Vectored Artwork.
Supplying vectored artwork isn’t that easy if you're not adverse in producing artwork in Adobe Illustrator or CorelDraw. These are the main programs that are used to produce vectored graphics throughout the UK if not the world.
So What Are Vector Graphics?
Vector are an amazing graphics format. CorelDraw and Adobe Illustrator give you the ability to create graphics that are fully scalable and can be enlarged and reduced to any size without the loss of any quality in the image. Fonts are also fully scalable and will not break up no matter how large you scale up. Ideal when you need your logo or design in various sizes on your printed t-shirts!
How Vectors Work
Vectors work by plotting one point of an image to the next point, whist building up information of the outline or fill colours and styling. Vectors designs are also now used on the Internet where a scalable design is required, very handy for reactive websites where the images are re-scaling to fit different size devices, e.g. desktop PC to mobile phone. A vectored image being used on the Internet is saved as a ‘.SVG’ file format ‘scalable vector graphic’. Most T-shirt printers ask for vectored artwork!
