Thank you all for taking the time to help out. Much appreciated.
If you do a lot of this I would buy an hplv sprayer. Even one from Home Depot is a lot better than trying to roll on. If have to roll it on you might consider spraying first with Premiere Art uv solvent spray. That works as an under spray.
Yes, spraying the varnish will solve a lot of problems and using Premiere Art or any other archival varnish spray to seal the ink is a great idea. I used to have a spraybooth set up (first hvlp and then a proper setup), but I don’t have the space and think it is a lot of hasstle. I get great results with rolling (apart from the recent smudge issue) so want to stick with rolling for now.
Sounds like you've got too much ink on your canvas. Even after drying three days if you can rub your finger across the canvas and the ink comes off then you have too much ink and need to decease it.
Is it all colors or just black? Epson software has an option to decrease ink density.
This did cross my mind and I think it’s a great tip. I still think it is strange how the problem didn’t occur with Hahnemühle’s varnish, but I do want to make this work with the Timeless since I like the finish and feel better. There is an option in the printer settings called Color Density that allows you to decrease or increase the amount of ink laid down by the printhead by 50%. I did some tests and it turns out I can go -30% without losing any richness of the black. It does however change the color grey (in ABW) which now doesn’t match with I see on my screen. So additional testing is done to match the colors to what I am seeing on my screen. I will do some varnish tests and let you know the results.
Since I don’t work with photographs but vector based works and can change individual colors, changing the color density setting is a viable option. But in any other situation any setting that changes the output colors will ‘mess up’ your print (I assume colors will change too) and soft proofing is out of the window. So additional color management (either in the program you are editing in, or in the printer settings if the printer determines colors) is necessary. And hard proofing is needed to test if the end result is what you expected.
Before applying matte varnish, use a thin layer of gloss vanish on your canvas. That will seal the surface, and make your matte top varnish process easier. (Sure you should wait the first gloss varnish dry then apply second matte varnish.)
This is what used to be recommended by Breathing Color too. But it does alter the finish of the print. Even 2 coats of matte Timeless increases the gloss finish to a level I don’t like. So, unfortunately this won’t be a solution for me.
