hmmm, now where did I put that microscope?
I have found the d-roller to be quite effective - didn't think that it might mess up the print.
Wayne et al, I have a D-roller en route because I'm tired of doing it the "cheap" way. I have used various rolling and weighting techniques, some of which cause their own problems. If one has time, one can weight the print in a very slightly concave "basin", but if you're needing to mat and deliver a print within 48 hours (after out-gassing) then this method doesn't work on heavy papers.
With the mention of the damage caused by the D-roller I will inspect my prints carefully (and with a Leica stereo zoom MZ-12 microscope and fiber optic light ), but this is the first I had heard of it. I wonder if this is more common with certain paper types (such as gloss, Baryta or semi-gloss, etc.).
One technique that I found to work for some prints was to mimic the D-roller process by rolling a print in a roll of wrapping paper. That seemed to work until I did it to a "high key" type of image with lots of negative white space. When viewed obliquely (after matted and framed) I could see where the paper slightly dented itself because the wrapping paper didn't protect the print from the end of the 308 gsm paper "shelf". Just a heads-up if one wants to do the D-roller on the cheap -> Don't use light-weight wrapping paper as your tool, and roll it carefully when it passes over the end of the print.
I agree that the D-roller is over-priced, but my time and results are worth more to me. Now I hope that I don't find myself "cracking" my prints.
