InkAid Coatings

In my Alternative Printmaking Report #1, I talked about using InkAid coatings on various papers, but found that once the coating is allowed to dry the paper loses its ‘flatness.’ It becomes wavy, and this resulted in print-head strikes with my Canon printer. This might or might not occur with Epson printers because of differences in how the two printers are engineered ( this is not meant as a negative comment towards Canon printers, as I really far prefer my Canon to my prior Epson, after all, printers are not manufactured with this type of usage in mind). Needless to say, print-head strikes are not at all a good thing for your printer to do.

But I decided not to totally give up, and tried two more things. The first was to take the thick fine art paper I had been using (though not as thick as some of the made for inkjet papers I have successfully used in the printer) and put it under some heavy books for two days to see if it would flatten out. The second was to try coating a thinner paper, specifically some Japanese rice paper that I was able to purchase from my nearby art store (and for good measure after coating put that under books as well).

After emerging from the ‘book press,’ the thick paper looked much flatter, but looking at it from the side you could see there was still a bit of a waviness to it, which I tried to remove by pulling it over the edge of a table. I gave printing a whirl…..but, unfortunately , I still got immediate head strikes. Thick papers were definitely out!

What about the thin, translucent rice paper? Success! The paper went through the printer like a champ. No problem at all. I was able to print on it with very good results (see images below). So it definitely can be done using more lightweight papers, even on a Canon printer. The problem is that I am personally a fan of heavier and textured fine art papers, which is what I actually had in mind when initiating the coating project. I don’t enjoy the thinner lightweight papers as much and so will be abandoning the use of the coating for printing. I will be continuing to use the thicker fine art ‘made for inkjet’ papers from Hahnemuhle and Canson that I had been using (and which I like quite a bit).

But what about the image transfers which I had started to write about in my Alternative Printmaking Report #2? I wanted to first take the time to write this update to the coating saga which I had started talking about in my first alternative printmaking report. Part 2 of Image Transfers will be the subject of my next report!

Alternative Printmaking Report #3

InkAid Coatings

Get new posts by email: