4 Creative and Effective ways that we like to use fonts in artwork for custom t-shirts.
By now, we are hoping (and also assuming a little) that you have decided on the font style(s) you are going to use for your artwork. If that’s still up in the air, press pause on reading this post and go read our previous blog “Top 5 Fonts for Custom T-Shirts in 2017.” Font styles are a key component to creating a relevant, meaningful design… so make sure you have your font styles well thought out for your artwork!
In the examples below we are using the fonts that we touched on in a previous post… so consider tying those styles for a complete and well-rounded design! The shirt we are using in these examples is our Custom Canvas 3001, Soft Ringspun T-Shirt in Light Blue color with white ink.
One of the easiest ways to improve the text design is to simply re-shape your text. The most common shape we see is a circle, but have also seen triangles and squares as well. Even a slight warp (not a full circle, but more of just an arc) can be super effective. As long as your fonts remain legible at the size your artwork is to be printed, you can really re-shape your text in any way you think looks great and gets your branding message across effectively!
A recent trend we have seen in font-based artwork is having the art be aligned off-center (left or right aligned) on the shirts.
We can also intentionally print text-heavy artwork with certain alignments! This can end up looking really cool if it’s the right design, but there are layouts where we would not recommend this technique… make sure to consult with one of our reps to see if your design is a good candidate for this type of print.
One really fun thing you can do with fonts is to use a clipping mask in Illustrator to make a shape composed of the words or a phrase you want to repeat. This is a little bit more of an advanced skill, so if you’re not sure how to create artwork using this technique, we recommend watching some helpful tutorial videos on Youtube or asking one of our reps about how we can help create your vision for you.
As you’ll see in this graphic, you can mask a shape over text to give it an awesome finished look… and with a little practice it becomes very easy to do!
Last, but certainly not least, you can simply combine multiple font styles. As simple as it sounds, it can be highly effective and really make for a cool design. Combining a Serif font with a Sans Serif font, or a Script/Brush font and a Sans Serif font, or any other contrasting font style combinations is a great way to get your branding/message across without causing a headache for the viewer.
… As you can see in each of these combos, the fonts play off of each other and compliment each other. Also, sometimes it’s better to let the shirt and ink do the heavy lifting, allowing for simple font artwork to pack a punch when the final product is complete…
We love the K.I.S.S. rule (Keep It Simple S_____ … choose your adjective) when it comes to artwork for t-shirts. If you pick the right shirt style and color, and do a great job of pairing the best ink color and print process to match it, your design doesn’t need to be very complicated in order for the final product to be cool… you’ve already accomplished that with the first two things!
Please let us know if you had any questions on using Text and Fonts in your artwork for your next order of Custom T-shirts. Please feel free to give us a phone call (1-877-T-Shirt-1), Contact Message, or Live Chat, because we’d love to help you pick the right font or art style for your next custom t-shirt design.
Still wondering which t-shirt to buy? Maybe consider getting one of our Soft T-Shirt Sample Packs.