Digital BW, The Print

Last summer I did a series of trial coatings of inkjet prints, Piezo prints, using a variety of varnishes. At the time the one I found the easiest to apply was a water-based, exterior varnish by Varathane. This is a high density polyurethane coating. Initial appearances were very good.

Robert Morrison cautioned me that the polyurethane were the most likely to yellow of all the coatings being tried at the time. I was skeptical but time (and a relatively short time of 8 months) has shown that Robert was right. Not only has the Varathan yellowed strongly but unevenly so that the prints look a bit mottled. The prints coated with the Golden acrylic varnishes show no sign of yellowing. The vinyl coatings are out touring the countryside and I will have to wait until they return to see how they are holding up.

So if you are experimenting with coatings, definitely avoid the polyurethane, unless of course you do want an aged yellow effect.

Martin Wesley


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

As near as I can tell, all of your coating experiments have been done 
with Piezo inks. Have you tried coating the MIS inks, VM set in 
particular? 

Chris Hargens

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "Martin Wesley" 
<mwesley250@e...> wrote:
> Last summer I did a series of trial coatings of inkjet prints, 
Piezo prints, using a variety of varnishes. At the time the one I 
found the easiest to apply was a water-based, exterior varnish by 
Varathane. This is a high density polyurethane coating. Initial 
appearances were very good.
> 
> Robert Morrison cautioned me that the polyurethane were the most 
likely to yellow of all the coatings being tried at the time. I was 
skeptical but time (and a relatively short time of 8 months) has 
shown that Robert was right. Not only has the Varathan yellowed 
strongly but unevenly so that the prints look a bit mottled. The 
prints coated with the Golden acrylic varnishes show no sign of 
yellowing. The vinyl coatings are out touring the countryside and I 
will have to wait until they return to see how they are holding up.
> 
> So if you are experimenting with coatings, definitely avoid the 
polyurethane, unless of course you do want an aged yellow effect.

> 
> Martin Wesley
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Chris,

I'm beginning to sample if you are interested:

My product, Spectraguard Ink Jet coating, works on fine art inkjet papers
for example:

Epson Archival Matte
Hahnemuhle Photo Rag
Legion Photo Matte
Legion Somerset Enhanced
Crane Museo
Brightcube Eclipse Satine
Red River Premium Matte

The coating works on prints made with color and quad BW pigment based inks
that are water-fast after drying.  The coating is applied with a Mayer rod
so there are no brush strokes and the surface of the print preserves the
original texture of the paper.  The coating is non-yellowing and has been
shown in preliminary testing to improve the lightfastness of pigment-based
inks. The final prints have dmax well in excess of 2.0 and are mar
resistant.  The the quad BW prints look like fiber based silver prints.

If you are interested in seeing a sample please send two letter sized prints
meeting the above description to the address below with a self addressed
stamped envelope (you can also use a Fedex letter mailer with an account
number).  The prints should have a minimum of a 2 inch boarder on one
dimension and 1 inch on the remaining dimensions.  You may want to include a
gray step wedge so that you can measure the dmax improvement.  I will return
one of the prints to you coated and keep the other for my records.

Thanks for your interest,

Robert Morrison

Morrison Fine Art & Design
4131 Bledsoe Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90066

On 4/11/02 2:31 PM, "tzinzunzan2000" <ldmr@...> wrote:

> As near as I can tell, all of your coating experiments have been done
> with Piezo inks. Have you tried coating the MIS inks, VM set in
> particular? 
> 
> Chris Hargens
> 
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "Martin Wesley"
> <mwesley250@e...> wrote:
>> Last summer I did a series of trial coatings of inkjet prints,
> Piezo prints, using a variety of varnishes. At the time the one I
> found the easiest to apply was a water-based, exterior varnish by
> Varathane. This is a high density polyurethane coating. Initial
> appearances were very good.
>> 
>> Robert Morrison cautioned me that the polyurethane were the most
> likely to yellow of all the coatings being tried at the time. I was
> skeptical but time (and a relatively short time of 8 months) has
> shown that Robert was right. Not only has the Varathan yellowed
> strongly but unevenly so that the prints look a bit mottled. The
> prints coated with the Golden acrylic varnishes show no sign of
> yellowing. The vinyl coatings are out touring the countryside and I
> will have to wait until they return to see how they are holding up.
>> 
>> So if you are experimenting with coatings, definitely avoid the
> polyurethane, unless of course you do want an aged yellow effect.
>> 
>> Martin Wesley
>> 
>> 
>> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
> 
> 
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