1. Overview

Threadless is a t-shirt contest website where people like you design shirts in Illustrator and submit them to their website. After you submit your t-shirt graphic it is reviewed and given a score from their graphic design experts after one week. If your design was one of the best, you win a thousand dollars. Zazzle is a modern graphic design print shop that prints your t-shirt designs at a low cost. They use a variety of different styles of shirts and brands including American Apparel, which costs less than $20 with your design.You will design a t-shirt, print it with Zazzle, submit it to the Threadless contest, receive a score.Step 1 - Get Ideas

Create a Threadless account with your class email
Look through some of the designs and submit a score on at least five designs
Check out some of the slogans and rate at least five of them

Now think of your own slogan (make sure it is original, random, & creative; people should not have heard the slogan before) and design and sketch it in your CA book after you draw a simple tshirt; the design should be unique and created by you in Illustrator that goes along with the slogan. The emphasis of your shirt should be the graphic that stands out. Remember the design and typography concepts you learned when creating your idea layout. The tshirt will be white and the design must fit in the black box on the guy's shirt. Now draw a second design and slogan.
Show a classmate your two ideas and get feedback along with their opinions and approval. If you are in class, then get my approval before going on to the next step and creating your tshirt design.

Step 2 - Create in Illustrator

Download the t-shirt template in Adobe Illustrator and create your designs in the square guides.
Draw your design in Illustrator and use creative font if needed (e.g. download). All work must be your original work.
It would be nice to be able to make designs all over the front of the shirt (example) but those are really expensive. With the Zazzle printing company, remember all graphic design work must be inside the square box on the shirt template and we will be printing on a basic white tshirt, front only since it is the cheapest.

Step 3 - Saving

In AI go to File > Export > JPG and choose RGB setting in the JPG options. View the tshirt and design and make sure the colors did not change too drastically or make it look bad since you switched to RGB from CMYK.

Then hide your tshirt outline in AI so that you see only your design. Click shift + o to crop down to one artboard the size of your design. Export the artboard as PNG with the following settings: (High 300pi, Background color Transparent)Upload your JPG and PNG files to Posterous and the link to the spreadsheet.
Upload your JPG to MF Picasa.

do not do:

Look at some of the t-shirt designs at Threadless to get inspiration & ideas (but don't copy).
View the various men's and women's t-shirt style and color options and choose one.

Step 3 - Print your T-Shirt

Follow the printing preparation instructions.

When you are finished, submit your design at Threadless. After seven days, they will judge it, score it, and write down comments and they may send it to you. Forward this email to me if you receive it.

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