Want to make a t-shirt design out of HTV? One-time only, no major monetary investment required? You can! Even words and complex designs with negative shapes. You're limited only by your patience and skill with a craft knife.
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Transcript:
"How to hand-cut lettering from heat transfer vinyl.
So you have this $10 roll of heat transfer vinyl. You know you don't need any fancy machinery; just a simple craft blade to cut it and a home iron to heat set it.
And all you want now is to write some classy and sophisticated words on a t-shirt. But you DON'T want to cut out all those letters as individual pieces and then not be able to line them up quite right.
Well, you don't have to worry about that. The vinyl comes with a clear plastic backing. When you cut out your letters, you're just not going to cut all the way through that backing. Simple, right?
Let's break it down.
1. Print out a reverse copy of the word or words you want on your fabric. You're going to be working on the back of the vinyl, so reversing the image is a must.
2. Fit your craft knife with a SHARP, NEW BLADE. You need it to be sharp so you don't have to press hard; the harder you're pressing, the less control you're going to have over how deeply you cut.
3. Tape your print-out securely to the dull side of the vinyl-- not the shiny side which is the backing.
4. Cut out the interior shapes first; shapes like the holes inside this letter B. If you cut the outside shape first, you're detaching it from your template along with anything printed inside it; you'll no longer have a guide for that inside shape.
::Remember, you are cutting through your paper template and the vinyl layer; check the back to make sure you're not cutting all the way through the backing. If in doubt, do a simple test piece to make sure you're cutting through the paper and vinyl-- but not the backing. If you're having trouble... make sure you're using a sharp, new blade!
5. Once all your letters are cut out, you'll need to "weed" the design; this means removing all the vinyl that's not part of your design. Use something slightly pointy to start peeling it up. If you find parts where you didn't cut all the way through the vinyl, go back over them with your blade.
6. Now you have your design on a clear backing, ready to iron on to your fabric.
The manufacturer of your HTV should have ironing instructions on their website. I've included a link below, also. For myself, I did a test on scrap fabric and figured out the settings that seemed to work best for my iron and the kind of fabric I used.
Three words of advice:
-Make sure your fabric and iron are dry so there's no steam.
-Don't get your iron so hot that it melts the edges of your design.
-Iron over a hard surface that can take the heat... not your cutting mat :(
That's really all there is to it. If you have questions or want to share another method for transfering designs to vinyl, leave a comment. And if you want to see more tutorials, like and subscribe!"
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More about ironing:
*It's a good idea to use a pressing cloth (a cotton pillow case works fine).
*Press (put a little pressure on the iron), moving the iron every 10-15 seconds.
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Everything you ever wanted to know about ironing HTV, you can find on this page:
www.whatchaworkinon.com/workin...