It’s lightweight, easy to ship, has a wide color gamut with rich colors, and is sharp in image quality.Dye sub printing works only with polyester fabrics.  While you can print on a polyester blend, the best color is realized using 100% polyester fabric.There are two basic types of dye-sub printing:                    

DIRECT TO FABRIC  or  TRANSFER PRINTING

In direct printing, a modified inkjet printer prints direct to the fabric and then the fabric is heat treated to set the ink.

With dye sub transfer printing, the image is printed in reverse on a transfer paper, then run through a heat press sandwiched with the fabric.  The ink is turned from a solid into a gas, and then transferred into the fiber of the fabric.  At the high temperature of 400 degrees, the polyester fiber is nearly melting and it is open to receive the pigment.  When it cools down, it entraps the dye in the fiber.  This is called an entrapment process and is permanent.  It will stand up to many cycles in a washing machine.

The distinct advantage to transfer printing over direct is that with transfer printing you can print on ANY untreated polyester fabric.  This allows you a great selection of different weaves and knits to choose from, as well as the opportunity to select from recycled polyester fabrics; of which there are a number of them on the market.

With direct printing, you can only image on pre-treated polyester fabrics.  This drives up the cost of the substrate and limits your choices to a select few.

Noteworthy is that with transfer printing, the image tends to be sharper!