Last week we had a wonderful opportunity to provide work experience to a student from one of the local colleges. Despite her young age Rachael demonstrated good knowledge of Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator, great imagination, creativity and made the whole week extra pleasurable and fun. Rachael was working on stripy fabric prints designs and was very happy to share her fabric designing process with us. We are sure this will help many people to understand how fabric design process works and steps required.
Brief
I was given a design brief to come up with 3 different stripe design prints relating to the current trends for women’s wear in summer. I needed to explore stripe designs and its versatility, playing with negative and positive spaces, sizes, mix & match and texture. The design was also going to be inspired by crystal rock colours.
Mood Research
To support the ideas I made two mood boards both displaying two different moods and stories. I used Pintrest as a starting point for developing ideas. I found different summer stripy trends and categorised the images into: bold, thick stripes- conveying a heavier look; and thin, light stripes- conveying a more peaceful look.
Colour research
I also found images of crystals and looked at the many different colours. I really liked the lighter blues and pinks. I found darker crystals that had a different mood to them. The darker colours consisted of dark purples and blues. Once I had found my two different moods I linked the two ideas together: the crystal colours with the stripy designs.
Moodboarding
I made two different mood boards displaying two different unique styles on Photoshop, The bold stripes and dark colours & simple and relaxing.
My first mood board conveyed a peaceful, simple and relaxing mood with small thin stripes, using light and dark pinks. I thought that the light pink colours would work well with detail in the stripes. I went with the whole crystal, spiritual idea and I was really influenced by henna. Henna is traditionally used in Indian weddings, but today henna can be found at most local markets. I thought about combining the two ideas: busy stripes and floral henna style flowers.
My other mood board was going to contain more of a bold strong stripe designs with darker purple colours.
Defining colours
Once I had made my two mood boards I wanted the colours on my Photoshop document to match the final design on fabric. For this I had to go through a Pantone formula guide colour book to find colours that I liked and when I found a colour that matched I would write down the number. In Illustrator I made boxes with the exact colours, with their number. I printed them out and checked to see if they were the correct colours. Depending on the fabric, the colours print slightly differently.
Design experimentation and development
Simple and relaxing
I wanted to make a design that incorporated stripes with a henna style floral. I wanted to have a detailed design with not too over-the-top with colours. I started to draw up some ideas on paper. I really liked having colourful flowers with black and white stripes crossing under them. I made an Illustrator document with the idea. After some fiddling and small changes to my design I thought the background being one colour would be really boring. I wanted to make a colourful, but not too bright background. I thought about something like an army camouflage pattern, just to make it a colourful but not overpowering the stripes and flowers.
The bold stripes and dark colours
I decided to make a print with my second mood board The Bold Stripes and Dark Colours. I thought it might be more interesting and fun to experiment with darker colours on fabric. My design contained a purple and light blue theme but I wanted to add more colour to my design so I added some pinks.
My final three designs looked like this.
We are hope you have gotten inspired by this whole creative process. Stay creative!
Snippets’. Chats with Creatives. Here at Digital Fabrics we love everything print, pattern and colour and we love to know what makes designers tick. This series is all about asking some fun and different questions and learning about the inspirations and ideas behind the artist and their work. We hope to inspire others by sharing snippets of these creative stories. We gave the artists and designers featured a varied list of questions to choose from so we will learn something new from everyone involved, should be fun!
Today on Snippet’s we are talking to Shyanne Clark, the swimwear and textile designer behind ‘Printsea’ a print design brand who love to spread sparkle and magic and inspire others to do the same.
The Snippety Snips:
Tell us a bit about yourself and what your creative practice is, how and when you began:
I’ve been a textile fabric designer for the past 5 years. My style is very mermaidy and I love tropical florals, so my business PRINTSEA has naturally progressed to helping bikini designers find their signature style and launch beautiful labels.
I am such a cheerleader for people doing what they truly love, the things that make them all sparkly inside. I was always that kid that didn’t know what I wanted to be when I grew up, I didn’t fit in one of the boxes. I think it’s because I didn’t know this job existed or how all my talents could come together to be something. I adore what I do so much and its always growing and changing me. I feel so grateful that I listened to my heart and followed its windy path, you learn so much along the way and I would love that for everyone. I get giddy just thinking about it.
At the moment I’m creating a signature range of beautiful hand designed, high vibrational pieces. There is such magic in colour and creativity. My hope is that each piece will add a little extra sparkle to your day and that owning a piece will feel like a precious treasure that brings you many heart swelling, quiet smiles and inspires your soul.
What would your dream creative project look like?
I’ve actually got a bit of a fascination with creating a print that would cover a whole aeroplane. Could you imagine a giant bunch of gorgeous flowers flying through the sky. Instant happiness I reckon. I wonder if Richard Branson would let me print wrap a Virgin plane for fun?
In another life what natural talent would you wish for?
I’m pretty much tone deaf, sometimes I’ll sing + scare myself with how out of tune I am. I have always admired people that can make your heart swell with emotion from their singing voice. I’ve secretly wished that I could do this, but in saying that, I wouldn’t want to trade my talent of drawing flowers. Can I have two natural talents?
Which part of the creative process is your favourite and why?
I absolutely love the moment when the inspiration strikes + your imagination goes all bright + sparkly. You can’t wait to birth this creation that’s swirling around inside. It’s just such a rush of ecstatic excitement. I love that part. The finished piece is pretty amazing too, but the journey is the best.
Which other Australian designers, artists or creative people are you enjoying at the moment?
I adore Annie Everingham. Her paintings evoke so much feeling. They are so happy and beautiful. I could stare at their gorgeousness for hours.
Love your Locals:
City/Town/Village where you currently reside:
I live on the beautiful Sunshine Coast, some people say, it’s like what Byron Bay was 20 years ago.
Favourite spot for a bite:
There is a gorgeous cafe at Rosemount called ‘GURU Life.’ The brother sister team roast their own beans + it truly is enlightenment in every cup, they have delicious raw treats and the staff are super friendly.
Secret Inspirational spot:
Well if I told you, it wouldn’t be a secret! … I actually adore the Noosa National Park, it’s a stunning feast for your eyes and soul (and a good workout if you walk all 8kms.) On a great day you’ll see turtles, whales + koalas.
Feeling inspired by Printsea to start a swimwear brand? You can buy her E book here. AND she is currently running a promo where you can purchase 1 print and get one for free with the code: PRINTME until August 17th, then you can print it onto lycra here at Digital Fabrics and start YOUR creative journey.
The Holidays are the perfect moment to go all out when it comes to fashion. But if you truly want to have a unique look for Christmas, designing your fabric, DIY and sewing it the only way!
Design & order your custom made fabric HERE before December 9 to get it before Christmas. And if you’re looking for fashion inspiration for the Holidays, check out these 5 DIY festive dresses tutorials
Shopping for unique gifts is a challenge. You want to make sure the person is happy with what you give but that it also reflects their taste and personality. That’s why personalized gifts are the way to go this Holiday.
It shows them you care (you took the time to design & create the gift!), it’s truly unique (nobody else has it) and it makes gift shopping a fun process!
Custom made cushions are great to gift to people who are passionate about home decor, artists, who just moved into a new house or have a nursery that they want to personalize. Here at Digital Fabrics you can create & design your own print and we make and ship the cushions to you. You can print your art, painting, photographs or messages to personalize the pillows.
If you want to make sure you have a beautiful customized gifts for the Holidays, order before the 2nd December to receive it before Christmas. Create & order your custom made cushionsHERE.
Below you’ll find more colorful, custom made cushions to get you inspired!
Christmas is around the corner and it forms a great opportunity to customize your home & wardrobe. Celebrate the Holiday season in DIY style by creating your own Christmas print fabric, cushions or legging.
Below you’ll find 9 free christmas prints for you to use to print on fabric, cushions or leggings.
If you had to pick just 10 items for your wardrobe, leggings would definitely be part of it. From Spring to Winter, leggings are a wardrobe staple and you can style them many ways. Dress it up for a fancy occasion or wear them during your workout. And to make sure your leggings reflect your personality and style Digital Fabrics is organizing a workshop where you learn how to design your own print for your custom made leggings on December 3rd!
If you need inspiration on how to wear leggings, here are 5 stylish examples for you to rock!
If you’re looking to update your Fall wardrobe, Jocy from Pink Chocolate Break created a DIY Poncho Sweater that you can easily make at home! When it gets colder she loves working with thicker fabrics such as fleece fabric and for this DIY project she used the fabric she designed and printed with Digital Fabrics. You can shop the african print fleece fabric she used here.
What you’ll need:
– 2 yards/meters of fleece fabric
– pins
– fabric scissors
– thread
– sewing machine
We live in a hyper-visual world, where imagery dictates your rating. The increasing need to have a positive impact on sales especially high in a vast and competitive design world.
That is why print design is becoming an increasingly utilised tool in any designer’s tool kit, be it swimwear, stationery, fashion, brand or home wears designer. Print designs, surface design, patterns they called different but carry same purpose, is to capture people’s interests in instant, unifies the design collection and creates point of difference from other brands.
For example Tigerlily always been known for they boho and travel inspired prints and easily recognised in Australian fashion market.
Say, We Are Handsome and beautiful swimwear with stunning photographic print design are evoked.
But what if to take print and fabric a bit further? Doesn’t this collaboration open more door? There are so many ideas and product that can be created with using fabric as a base medium. Don’t think of a fabric as a cloth on a roll.
Would be a wedding invention a luxurious idea to make your invitees fill extra special and setting the tone of your weeding?
Fabric packing is very unique concept too, wrap your product, or even how about envelops or business cards?
To archive all the above ideas is a breeze now days. We live in the new era of digital printing technologies. Fast, cost efficient, ecofriendly they opens doors to the craziest creative projects!
That is why we are in love with digital fabric printing!
Garment making and production can be daunting and a complicated process especially placement or engineered printing. A lot of time and effort goes into research and understanding where to start. We have put together tutorials on how to design, work with and prepare legging pattern for digital placement fabric printing. For this tutorial you need to be proficient in Illustrator or at least have basic knowlage. Our tutorial is based on industry standards. This technic can be applied to printing other products such as bikinis, t-shirts, singlets , dresses etc.
How to prepare a layout/mark up legging pattern for fabric printing in Photoshop
Once you’ve completed the steps in the tutorial ‘How to use legging pattern in Photoshop’ You may want to print more than 1 design or more than 1 size, the most economic way to do this is to create a mark up/placement layout to have printed.
The following are instructions on how to set up in Photoshop, but could easily be done in Illustrator.
Start off by renaming the pattern layers to insure that you always have a pair of leggings.
If you are only wanting the same size with different designs you can just Duplicate the leg layers. If you’d like to bring in different sizes you will need to repeat the steps in ‘How to use legging pattern in Photoshop’
In this tutorial we will be using the same size 10 but printing in new designs.
On the same artboard move files to the left hand side. you will notice that you can only comfortable fit 1 pair within the 147cm width with the current orientation; however there is a lot of wastage as illustrator below.
Like a Jigsaw puzzle you will now need to start moving the patterns, you will need to make sure that you keep in mind that your grain line is parallel to the selvage. To do this, select the leg you’d like to rotate (select both layers) press Ctrl+t to open up the transform tool and while holding down shift rotate the image 360′ and make sure to move the pattern piece as close as possible to other leg (zoom in to make sure it is not overlapping)
You can now start bringing in the other size 10 designs and play around with the layout. It’s best that you make the art board slightly longer than needed and once you’ve set up all the designs crop the excess.
Make sure you zoom in and double check that you haven’t overlapped any areas, when you are happy with the layout save as a JPG, TIFF or PDF.
You’re now on your way to have custom printed fabric which you will be able to make into comfy leggings.
Garment making and production can be daunting and a complicated process especially placement or engineered printing. A lot of time and effort goes into research and understanding where to start. We have put together tutorials on how to design, work with and prepare legging pattern for digital placement fabric printing. For this tutorial you need to be proficient in Photoshop and Illustrator or at least have basic knowlage. Our tutorial is based on industry standards. This technic can be applied to printing other products such as bikinis, t-shirts, singlets , dresses etc.
How to prepare legging pattern for fabric printing in Photoshop
Open the PDF file in Illustrator. You can purchase our digital leggings pattern on our website or use your own.
Copy and paste the size you would like to use within the same file, we have selected size 10.
Delete all details and notches within the pattern piece and select the pattern shape and fill in black.
while legging is selected copy and take note on the sizing.
Open Photoshop and select a new artboard, keep the pixels and resolution the same, just make sure you’ve selected RGB color mode. Click OK and Paste pattern piece as a smart object, click enter to place.
Double check that the sizing is correct by selecting Image>image size, in this case it is only a few points off which will be fine.
Next you’ll need to increase your artboard size to fit the other leg, change the width of your artboard to the width of the fabric you’d like to use and select the anchor points to extend from corner.
Copy Layer and while selected transform (Ctrl+t), while still selected right click on top of the layer and select Flip Horizontally, you know have a pair.
With both layers selected you will need to select transform again (ctrl+t) and while select cover over to rotate, when rotating make sure you hold down shift to make sure it rotates correctly.
Copy and paste the design you would like on your leggings and place layer on top of the one of the pattern legs.
Right click on the design layer and in the drop down menu select create clipping mask.
Repeat for other leg
Group all layers and centre.
Your file is now ready to print!
Soon you’ll have your printed fabric which you’ll be able to whip up into these comfy leggings
Design experimentation and development
