There are three typical ways of creating the art for screen printing. It can be hand drawn, computer generated or art that has replicated from paintings or photographs. Hand drawn art can be done different ways. It can be drawn and then scanned into the computer or it can be drawn and then photographed and put on the computer. With the proper software, this image can then be changed or added to in the software. It is possible to directly draw the image on to the screen but it is difficult to do this unless it is a simple one color design.

Computer generated images are created in commonly used software programs like Adobe Photoshop. They are drawn and separated right in the program.

Replications, like hand drawing, are best accomplished by scanning the image or taking a photograph of it and then putting it on the computer. However it is done, once the image has been created it must be separated into films that allow the UV lights to pass through to specific areas.