How to Stencil a Shirt

Everybody likes a distinctive look and wants to flaunt his or her own style in public. If you are going to look for such an outfit that will make you look different, you will either have to be extremely lucky to find one off the shelf or have to search hard enough till you found one for you. Better still is to not depend on luck alone and instead do a little smart work with some stencil and shirts. Just find out a design that you would want to show off on your t-shirt and with little tidy tricks, you can easily flaunt a designer look and a unique style.

Here is how to stencil a shirt.

In order to stencil a shirt the first things that you will need are shirts or t-shirts, preferably made of 100% cotton, fabric paints, stencil papers, x-acto knife, paint brush, etc.
Choose t-shirts that are either in dark shades or in whites. Cotton t-shirts are the best when used for fabric painting as the material catches the fabric colors easily and they look good when finished. Remember the image or design that you are going to print on to the shirt is going to be based on to a background that will dictate how the design looks. So choose the base color of your shirts carefully while buying the shirts. White and black shirts do not need any explanation or reasoning as base fabrics as they are all time favorites across all ages.
Choose a design that has simple lines that make it easy to compose and does not have chances of getting smeared or smudged by accidental seepage of color or shake of the stencil layout.
Transfer the design from a computer onto a transparency paper with the help of a printer. You may also use different types of transfer papers or freezer papers that have one of the sides waxed to get the printout and cut them accordingly.
Once the printout is done, cut the stencils out of the sheets with the help of a x-acto knife making sure that you do not cut off the bridges that link the inner designs with the outer areas. The islands and bridges are an important part of the stencil design and should be planned in the preliminary stages when you are editing the design on your computer before printing.
Now place the cutout over the t-shirt and restrict its movement by holding it down with some form of adhesive tapes. Certain types of paper that has a sticky side adheres to the cotton fabric and are good for that purpose so that they do not shake or move over the fabric surface.
Make sure that while painting the brush or the colors do not slip under the stencil paper else you will end up with smudged edges of the designs on your t-shirt and it looks bad.
Lastly, with a piece of cloth covering the design, heat press your t-shirt to give it a better finish and a longer stay.