How to Make a Tee Shirt for Graduation
Designing your own T-shirt to wear for your upcoming graduation can be a fun project. You might want to create a T-shirt design for your entire graduation class or customized specifically for you or for your group of friends. The process of creating your graduation design doesn't have to be difficult, but it will take a bit of time and organization.
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Instructions
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Brainstorm ideas for your graduation T-shirt on paper. Use a sketchbook and colored pencils to formulate the ideas and make them more concrete for when you develop your design in a graphics program.
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Decide on the text and images you want to use. For example, you may want to use "The Class of..." and then add a phrase that fits your class or yourself underneath. You may also want to select a photo or photos to use in your design, such as a montage of photos of your classmates throughout their educational careers.
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Select a graphics program to create your graduation T-shirt design. Photoshop is a good program, but if you don't have access to this particular program, consider using other software such as the freeware program GIMP. The instructions here are for Photoshop, but the functions in GIMP are quite similar, even though the exact tools may have a different name or be in a different position.
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Pick "File" in the upper left hand corner of your screen then scroll down and click on "New." Choose the background you want. For a T-shirt design, this could be any of the options available: white, black or transparent, depending on the type of design you will be creating. Select the size of image you want for your T-shirt. If you are uploading your design to a site like CafePress or Zazzle, keep in mind that you will need to choose from their preset dimensions. Add the resolution into the dialog box, choosing at least 200 (this is also the resolution requirement for CafePress) in order to print a quality image.
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Open any photos, clip art or other graphics you want to include in your design. Each image you open will be placed on a layer in the layers panel. When you develop new text or images in the program, it will be to your advantage to create new layers for each element in order to make editing an easier process.
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Scroll through the font styles available to choose a font that fits your design aesthetic best. Use the "Text" tool to add any text sections. Position your text (or photos or other graphics) by utilizing the "Move" tool. There are a variety of filters and image adjustment variations you can apply to graphics (or text) to create the design you have in mind. The "FX" functions allow you to apply a number of different types of effect to your text and images including "Bevel and Emboss," so its a good idea to experiment with all the tools available in the program to create the perfect design for your graduation T-shirt.
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Save your final design as a high resolution JPEG. Print your design through a screen printing shop or upload it to an online printing service (CafePress, Zazzle) from which you can then order as many as you like.
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