(Warning, very lengthy chapter. 969 words. Including this.)
Ah, so you wanna sell some merch. Merch is really important. It shows off that you like a band. It's basically promoting yourself, and you're getting money and fans at the same time. How wonderful! Merchandise isn't just stuff you wear. It's also music, too. CDS, Records, Tapes, yeah. But since we already learned how to make those, let's learn how to make them clothes.
Shirts:
Shirts are the first thing that comes to mind when you think of merchandise. You can make other clothes with this method, too. But, Let's get straight to it.
You'll need:
-Whatever your printing your logo on.
-a hard surface
-a dark room
-a lamp with a incandescent 150-watt
-something to power the bulb and let it hang
-something to scoop ink (spooooonnnn???)
-a dANK (damp) towel for cleaning ink
-masking tape
-lots of cardboard
-copy shop?
-lots of food, videos games, or something to do while you're waiting.
-a large piece of glass to cover your design
-small fan
-a big sheet of dark paper
-emulsion
-squeegee
-drawing fluid
-emulsion remover
-a screen
-fabric ink
Spoon emulsion on the screen, and spread it out evenly with Squeegee. It doesn't have to cover the whole screen, just your design. Put masking tape on the rest, after your screen is burned. Have a fan blow on it. Put it in a dark room to dry. Lock the door, (wise option) and go to the copy shop with a high contrast (black and no gray) transparency of your design. The screen should or shouldn't be dry when you get home. It's ok, make sure it dries. After it dries, burn the screen. NO, NO NOT LIKE THAT. Keep the screen in your dark room. Place the big sheet of black paper on the ground. This is to catch stray ink. Lay the screen flat-side down. Put the transparency sheet on it, with the piece of glass on top, so it's completely flat.(Earth chan) Taping it works too, if you don't have glass.Hang the light bulb a foot over the screen. Make sure it's a Incandescent 150 watt light bulb. 100 watts work too. Keep it there in that room for an hour. Make sure there are no other light sources in that room, other than the lightbulb.
Go do something. Read a book that's not on your phone, go adventuring, draw, watch Voltron, work on your new song. Go ahead. You do you.
After you're done with that, Take everything off the screen. The design should be faint as hell.Wash the screen with cool water, (and a little elbow grease) until the leftover emulsion is gone. Set it out to dry again. When it's dry, use masking tape to cover the non emulsion edges on the non flat side. If part of your design came off when you were washing, draw it back in with drawing fluid.
Put a piece of cardboard inside what you're trying to print on. Smooth the wrinkles out on what you're trying to print on. Spoon ink on the screen, (nonflat side of screen) in a line around the design. Put screen on what you're printing on, and squeegee ink across screen. Set the merch out to dry. Again. And make sure they don't touch. It takes along time to dry. Turn on the fan or something. It will get everywhere, set it to dry on a flat surface like the floor. If you're switching colors, wash the existing ink off the screen. When everything's dry, and it doesn't come off when you touch it, iron down each piece of merch for thirty seconds on both sides. (With a piece of iron on top so it's not directly touching it.)
Put the merch in a dryer on high heat for an hour. Go do something again. Go on your switch Play some Legend of Zerlda, go on instagram, and laugh at your spicy maymays. Or hang out with that girl that helped you with that Rawr XD thing. Or maybe just
Monika.
The screening method is hard. Let's say you want to get them made professionally. They can be purchased wholesale online. Try to get environment friendly shit, ok? Save Earth Chan. 'Nuther way is to thrift. Find old hoodies, beanies, shirts, at Goodwill or some shit. The kids love hoodies. The same method you used to make clothes in the last chapter can be used to make special sleeves, and posters. You don't have to heat set them, either.
Pins. Or buttons. There's button makers online, or you can make one yourself with a machine. 20 dollars for a hundred buttons is a good deal. If you want a button maker, get one with a circle punch. If you don't, you'll regret everything. Button makers include parts for a thousand buttons. Circle paper that becomes a 1 inch button is actually 1.313 inches. It rolls down the sides, you'll see if you have any buttons. Keep your design simple.if you're making it online, the file should be at 150 or 300 dpi. Print them with a Lazer ptinyer, unless you want low quality bullshit. Maybe if you can, put a message around the lip of the button. The buttons you sell could go for about 50 cents each.
Other merch. Such as guitar picks, pens, keychains, playing cards, vinyl stickers, coasters, patches, vinyl stickers... look, I gave you a whole bunch of ideas. Just search it up online. Find a good deal. Upload your art. There. That wasn't too hard, was it?
Make sure to make a lot of merch for each place you go to. There's gonna be at least 1,000 people there, and the merch will probably be dry clean before your next stop. Sorry, kid.
