Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Printing: Printers, Papers and Inks => Topic started by: Mike Sellers on January 03, 2015, 11:09:33 am
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How do you mount your inkjet glossy type prints? Do you mount them to foam core with an adhesive? How? I was thinking about using a Pro Seal 44 to mount them to foam core then overlaminate with a film for durability and to eliminate having to use glass when framing.
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Hi
I just use a mounting board that is self adhesive on one side. I get it from my local art shop, it comes in A0 sheets.
Paul
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I have never mounted a print but I am researching options for the future. These guys seem to specialize in a wide range of self-adhesive boards that could be used to easily mount a photo. I have no idea how difficult it is to avoid bubbles.
http://www.foamboardsource.com/
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To avoid bubbles, just peel and expose a couple of inches of adhesive at a time, pat the photograph nicely, and then a couple more inches etc until done. Do not try to peel the entire back in one go. I make the photo slightly bigger than the gator board, and then trim with a rotary blade.
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To avoid bubbles, just peel and expose a couple of inches of adhesive at a time, pat the photograph nicely, and then a couple more inches etc until done. Do not try to peel the entire back in one go. I make the photo slightly bigger than the gator board, and then trim with a rotary blade.
My concern is a very large print and keeping it straight,avoiding any mistakes.
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Use a long wide heavy metal ruler, and wrap it in some soft cloth to not damage the print. slowly move the ruler as you work the print on the adhesive. There are also some squeegies that may work, some soft rubber kind.(?)
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How do you mount your inkjet glossy type prints? Do you mount them to foam core with an adhesive? How? I was thinking about using a Pro Seal 44 to mount them to foam core then overlaminate with a film for durability and to eliminate having to use glass when framing.
One of my favorite ways - prefer to substitute gatorboard 3/4" for say 11" and larger as it does not warp. Overlam adds depth to image and much more protection.
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I like the way this guy does mounting, lamination, etc with a simple roll laminator:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmYSL3j7XXs
He has more videos like that. Inspired me to go a similar route for creating adhesive panels.
The more delicate prints on art papers I mount with a cold vacuum press, I have seen too many issues when third parties did that job for me. With RC papers the risks are lower when the roll laminator is used and they can do the job too.
Sheets of release paper are required though, so never throw them away.
Mounting paper to carton with an acryl medium sprayed on both the print back and the mounting board worked also, vacuum press for flatness and fast bonding time. Does not work with RC papers though as most of the time the RC backs give no bond.
No mounting expert yet but I can find my way.
Met vriendelijke groet, Ernst
http://www.pigment-print.com/spectralplots/spectrumviz_1.htm
December 2014 update, 700+ inkjet media white spectral plots
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I like the way this guy does mounting, lamination, etc with a simple roll laminator:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cmYSL3j7XXs
He has more videos like that. Inspired me to go a similar route for creating adhesive panels.
The more delicate prints on art papers I mount with a cold vacuum press, I have seen too many issues when third parties did that job for me. With RC papers the risks are lower when the roll laminator is used and they can do the job too.
Sheets of release paper are required though, so never throw them away.
Mounting paper to carton with an acryl medium sprayed on both the print back and the mounting board worked also, vacuum press for flatness and fast bonding time. Does not work with RC papers though as most of the time the RC backs give no bond.
No mounting expert yet but I can find my way.
Met vriendelijke groet, Ernst
http://www.pigment-print.com/spectralplots/spectrumviz_1.htm
December 2014 update, 700+ inkjet media white spectral plots
Great link. He shows me yet another way to approach this process - and his look pretty darn good.
Thanks
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My concern is a very large print and keeping it straight,avoiding any mistakes.
The largest that I have done are 36x12 in and 24x16 in. No issues keeping them straight.
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Those videos show the value of having cutting mattes that cover an entire worktable. He's using a premium grade matte, but much cheaper ones work just as well. When you have a table where you can cut anywhere, anytime, rotatrimmers start to look kind of silly. Put your money in a big matte and some good straightedges.
The main downside for clear laminates over the surface is that you inevitably get some hazing. Maybe just a tiny amount, but it's there and if you compare laminated with not-laminated prints you can tell the difference immediately. And in an art installation where your minutely hazy print winds up along a print without lamination or with very clear varnish, you won't get the prize. And let's not even talk about little tiny dust particles and pieces of grit, which bedevil even the most experienced laminators (and also facemounters). As one gets into lamination, one will find oneself Googling "anti-static equipment" and "humidifiers." Just go easy on the humidity.
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Bill T: Would heat lamination where the overlamination material melts onto the surface of the print be better than cold lamination?
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How do you mount your inkjet glossy type prints? Do you mount them to foam core with an adhesive?
I used spray-on adhesive to fix the print to foam core. Usually I get unacceptable bubbles.
Two-sided tape squares (http://clearbags.ca/store/products/mounting-accessories/) give good results, but they are fiddly.
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"The main downside for clear laminates over the surface is that you inevitably get some hazing."
Only tends to be a problem when the materials are cold, if the paper isn't smooth, or a matt laminate is used. And dust only becomes an issue if your workspace isn't spotless. Hot rollers will help the laminate conform to the texture of the paper, but will
Never tried one of those manual laminators - jumped straight to a motorised one, but watching how the guy at Zenith works, he almost certainly has hundreds, if not thousands of hours experience, and so makes things look remarkably easy. Which, just like dentistry, it is, if you know what you are doing.
I'd not go with the wrapped long ruler, for fear of scratching the surface of the print.
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I used spray-on adhesive to fix the print to foam core. Usually I get unacceptable bubbles.
Two-sided tape squares (http://clearbags.ca/store/products/mounting-accessories/) give good results, but they are fiddly.
Ok.... BOTH of these ideas are non starters and are usually strictly amateur attempts coming from not knowing what one is doing.
As the poster stated, the spray didn't work due to unacceptable bubbles not to mention a varying thickness of the spray... spitting... leaving little glue bumps.
The second method is a no-no due to the fact that little tape squares only hold where the tape is and that allows the rest of the print to move from various atmospheric conditions, creating waves in the print.
That is not mounting, that is sticking it onto the refrigerator for Mom to see. ::)
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For the record, it's just about impossible to mount mirror-glossy prints without getting some ripple in the surface. Roll adhesives, spray adhesives, drymount tissue, glue, etc. all have some texture of their own that feeds through to the surface of the prints. And most mounting boards have some ripple. In only takes a miniscule amount of ripple to make visible waves in the surface of reflective prints, it's an optical thing. Nothing looks cheesier than a rippling gloss surface.
The best non-rippling option for glossies may be face mounting on perfectly smooth, high grade plex, where the main reflective surface is very flat. Just like the $6.2M photograph. But you gotta like seeing sharp reflections of the room lights and you own beautiful face floating over your image.
There are some drymount tissues that claim to be suitable for glossies, which I have never tried. You would also need a very smooth mounting surface.
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Lots of good info here, as usual.
I gotta question. foamboardsource.com lists two self adhesive mounting substrates:
3/16ths Gator at $29 or so for a 30X40
http://www.foamboardsource.com/self-adhesive-gatorfoam-psgf080.html
1/4" "Jetmount" at $17 for a 32X40
http://www.foamboardsource.com/jetmount-foamboard-psjm010.html
Anybody have any experience with Jetmount vs Gator? I've none with either.
Is it possible to mount a 30X40 print on these self-adhesive sheets by hand? No roller press?
Thanks!
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That is not mounting, that is sticking it onto the refrigerator for Mom to see. ::)
Well, my old refrigerator would look a lot better with just about anything stuck to it.
What do you do, Framah?
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Peter mentioned: no roller press?
Working by hand with any kind of adhesive mounting gives better results with paper media than with RC media.
If you get bubbles that can't be teased out to the edges, you can puncture the prints with a very fine needle to exhaust the trapped air.
With paper media, there is enough give-and-take stretch available for the bubbled area to then lay flat.
However, RC papers are very rigid along their 2-dimensional surface. Even if you pin-release the bubble air, you may still have an incurable bubble, or you will have an area that initially looks flattened but which will rise again to bubble status after a few hours or days or weeks or months. This I know, ouch. And pin pricks show up on RC much more than on paper.
Best bet is to use a pinch roller to apply RC with adhesives. Smacks down about 98% of the bubbles that bedevil those who work by hand. The super-cheap, hand cranked rollers will do the job, but the rollers on those babies don't stand up to use before developing numerous roller diseases, most especially cracking and splitting.
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Best bet is to use a pinch roller to apply RC with adhesives. The super-cheap, hand cranked rollers will do the job, but the rollers on those babies don't stand up to use before developing numerous roller diseases, most especially cracking and splitting.
Any recommendations on brand, Bill? I'd like to be able to do 30", but I could live with 25"
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They're made by the boatload, each time by a different, lowest bidding factory in China. It's a shot in the dark. If you stumble upon a good one, but two and keep one as a backup.
If you plan to mount a few prints per year, work by hand. You may lose a few prints.
If you plan to mount a few tens of prints per years, buy a cheap press. You'll probably make up the cost of the press in media that is not trashed by bad hand mounting.
If you're in production, buy a good, heat assisted press in the $4K+ range. Make sure there is a good stock of replacement parts warehoused in your home country.
Get a press that is wider than your media by at least 3 or 4 inches. It's kinda dicey to get a 24" by 72" pano through the ubiquitous 25 presses on ebay. But it can be done, I'm just too lazy to build the kind of straight edge guide that should be sticking out the front.
I ruined my 39" press buy running a piece Dibond with a rather minor but sharp burr on the edge. The tiny cut grew rapidly in a very big one. One must treat roller presses with care.
My 25" press that has been sitting idle for about a year has started to develop longitudinal cracks in both rollers. Must be the humidity, or maybe the use of cheap-as-dirt materials in manufacturing. The rollers are the Achilles heals of these things.
I used a large, high quality press a few years ago. I have to say a real, professional grade, motor operated press is miles ahead of any of the cheap, manually cranked press I have ever seen or used. And a footswitch makes it a one-man operation. If I bought one again, it would have a heated top roller and at least one tensioned laminate feed roller
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If you plan to mount a few prints per year, work by hand. You may lose a few prints.
That'd be me. I'd have to lose at least ten prints to pay the cost of a roller.
If you're in production, buy a good, heat assisted press in the $4K+ range.
I noticed in one of the videos that you need at least 25C room temperatures for those pre-glued media.
The heated rollers you mention make sense now.
As usual, Bill, superb. Thanks.
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Have another look a the Zenith Video - they're not selling a cheap option, but it is far from production level (IMHO).
If you want a super gloss, or no surface texture then you need an absolutely flat substrate = Aluminium / DiBond / cast acrylic / glass. Needs a polyester (facemount) adhesive, and a print media with a polyester base. Perfectly possible to mount mirror-glossy prints without getting any ripples or defects in the surface.
I have no doubt that some of the auction site laminators are of questionable quality. As with tripods, sooner or later you buy one which lasts for the rest of your life... etc... I wouldn't buy a cheap BNW car - would you?
Ten prints, plus cost of substrates, plus time. OK, for a few prints a year, I might accept being hit and miss in my work.
For £400, I'd buy a Drytac Jet mount, or Zenith handCrank, and not need to feel bad about about the majority of my prints looking second rate. Factor in a few dozen rolls of film cost (plus processing) for the learning curve of how the process is actually done.
Then be happy and proud.
Before I knew better (and before people paid me to), I tried and made a reasonable job of doing things without machines. Now I've seen the difference, I'd never go back.
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The lamination press in the video appears to have the same metal and plastic parts and the same mechanical design that I see on my super cheap versions. However, the rollers are much larger in diameter and appear to be of a different material. I believe larger and perhaps softer rollers have some advantage and this may be an up-market version of the cheaper machines. Most of the professional machines I have seen have rollers somewhere around 4 to 5 inches, 100 to 125mm. IIRC my cheap rollers are more like 60mm. There are exceptions, the low end Drytac Jetmounter machines have relatively small diameter rollers.
There are probably numerous versions and knock-offs of knock-off out there in the world of laminating presses. There's one company in Germany that offers a modified version with a roll capability added that would be very useful, but the price is pretty high.
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Well, my old refrigerator would look a lot better with just about anything stuck to it.
What do you do, Framah?
Well.. Kooltack is a product that is dibond with an adhesive coating. Personally, i have never had to mount a glossy ink jet print as no one has ever brought me one, but that is what i'd use if it did come in. It requires a heat press but the time and temp is lower than other mounting adhesives.
The last glossy prints I ever did were Ilfachromes and because they are a polyester base, they can be static mounted to plexi and the mat holds it down at the edges.
I think you are on to something with your refrigerator!! Just cover the whole thing with your images and make a really "Cool" collage!! ;D
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What framah is talking about with "static mounting" is that you frame the piece with the print hinge mounted, cover it with plex, and then rub your cat up against the front of the plexi whenever the print starts to ripple.
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Oh, Bill!!! you so funny!! ;D
EVERYONE knows that you need more than one cat...preferably declawed.
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EVERYONE knows that you need more than one cat...preferably declawed.
Never! Responsible vets refuse to declaw cats nowadays. It's unspeakably cruel. How would you like to have your fingers amputated?
You do, however need more than one cat
(https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7536/15603590853_a97b58f2ab.jpg)
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I was imagining him being shredded from trying to rub cats on... anything! ;D
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Ah. Declawed so they won't scratch the plexi. Ok, then. :) Sorry if I overreacted.
I did manage to squeak a cat pix on to the forum, though. :)