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What spray to preserve the finish on Canson Platine Fibre Rag?

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Bob_B:
I recently bought a box of Canson Platine Fibre Rag, and love the paper's finish and resulting prints. I currently use Premier Print Shield for coating my glossy prints, and it works well on that surface. I want to coat the Platine Fibre Rag, and would appreciate your comments about using the Premier spray on this semi-gloss, textured surface. If Premier isn't recommended, your recommendations are greatly appreciated. Thank you.

Bob

MHMG:
If you don't want to significantly alter the surface of the media, then low viscosity sprays like Premier Print Shield are the way to go. Print Shield works well on the Canson Platine, although in my own personal tests, it's a little less forgiving to user application technique than say, HN photo Rag Pearl, but with practice, you should do well and get the results you want. Print Shield is definitely compatible with Platine, provide you are using pigments not dyes. Print Shield is also rebadged under different brand names by numerous companies, so expect similar results from other low viscosity (likely Print Shield by another name) sprays such as Moab Desert Varnish, Hahnemuhle Protective Spray, etc.

Another low viscosity spray that should work well is Lascaux Fixative. It contains paraloid B72 acrylic polymer which has a long and successful history of use in art conservation. That said, a 300ml can of Lascaux fixative is even more expensive than a can of Print Shield, so be prepared for sticker shock as you track down where to buy the stuff :)

cheers,
Mark
http://www.aardenburg-imaging.com

bill t.:
Have never met a gloss or semi-gloss or luster paper that didn't coat beautifully with Premier.

I have recently coated a lot of Fine Art Baryta, which has a Platine-like surface although with a little more texture and a little more gloss.  When coated with Premier it's invariably gorgeous with only a tiny increase in gloss beyond the complete elimination of the already insignificant amount of bronzing and shadow hazing present in FAB.  I have no qualms about exhibiting three times Premier coated coated FAB open face, it's at least as rugged as coated canvas and so utterly gorgeous.  And all you need is light coats.  Coated Silver Rag is another sweety.  Who needs stupid facemounting when Premier can give you organic looking surfaces that are just as rich and colorful, and quite a bit more resilient, and even trivially repairable?

Premier has a quality of solvent paints known as "burn in" which is a tendency for the paint to permeate into the painted surface, and for subsequent coats to slightly rewet and merge into the previous coats.  That's what gives solvent sprays their wonderful clarity.  There's something about the chemistry of glossy inkjet surfaces that really works well with those sprays.

FWIW, I recently tested all three fine art sprays recommended in a recent missive from a famous media manufacturer, and they all stink, both literally and practically.  Just sayin'.  The Montana spray showed promise, but there's something weird about the way it turns matte over Lucia inkset yellows.  Premier Art Print Shield, and the Hahnemuhle spray, look no further.

Bob_B:
I have a confession to make: I have been using Premier to coat my Canon dye-based (Pro-100 printer) inks. I'm new to this, but so far on Red River Arctic Polar Gloss paper, with these inks, I noticed no ill effect when lightly coating three times with Premier. No smearing or running of the ink, and no change in coloration. Again, I'm new to this so... I mention this, as I note that Mark specifically mentioned using Premier on pigment, but not dye-based, inks. Comments?

MHMG:

--- Quote from: Bob_B on March 17, 2015, 02:09:22 pm ---I mention this, as I note that Mark specifically mentioned using Premier on pigment, but not dye-based, inks. Comments?

--- End quote ---

I'm just advising caution with dye-based inkjet prints. The solvent chemistry of the spray can cause further dye migration that tends to affect some media along with different colors and tones worse than others. It probably doesn't affect longevity, and indeed the finished print may well be more stable, but initial colors and tones can nonetheless be changed undesirably.

I haven't published my findings yet, but I specifically tested Print Shield and other low viscosity solvent type sprays on both RC and "traditional fiber base" type gloss/luster media printed with both Epson Claria dyes and Canon Pro-100 Chromalife 100+ dyes. What I found is that the solvents are causing some migration of the dyes. The result is unwanted color and tone changes, not always severe, but definitely reducing color gamut and visual contrast. Dark colors and tones in particular tend to lighten and desaturate a little. With pigmented inks on the same media, the sprays either leave the final image unchanged, or with very slight increase in gloss and dmax levels which most would agree is a change for the better. No so with dye prints. The changes I've noted are always in the direction of reduced Dmax plus hue changes and/or loss of chroma in various colors to varying degrees.

My findings for dye-base compatiiblity of Print Shield and other similar sprays surprised me as the sprays I've been testing are not water-based sprays. The effect is more pronounced on some media compared to others, but it's been there on every sample I've tried to one degree or another. The amount visual change may be acceptable to you, but it's definitely not in the direction of enhancing colors and contrast. A good way to check for this compatibility issue  is to create an image target with an elongated bar pattern of colors and tone, for example, the colors of the Macbeth color checker target. Use photoshop to elongate the color patches into longer bars, cover one half of the printed pattern, spray, let dry, then examine the sprayed versus unsprayed line of demarcation. You will likely see some colors and tones are just noticeably changed, while others are more changed, perhaps some changed very little at all, but over the whole array of colors, especially areas of higher ink load, you will more than likely see some reduced color gamut and loss of contrast. Again, the amount of change is not necessarily extreme for many observers, and may be acceptable to you, and you could even create a custom ICC profile that somewhat adjusts for the shift, but it's there nonetheless.

cheers,
Mark

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