Tell me about printing on canvas....

[Bruce Watson]

I've been having 4x60 prints mounted on aluminum dibond, and then framed shadow-box style (for these images at least, I prefer this look to overmats).

This is a perfectly viable alternative for display of inkjet prints. I'm assuming that the print is coated since it has some handling challenges both in mounting it to the aluminum plate, and when displayed. There's got to be something between the pigments on the substrate and the sticky little hands of the public. Just sayin'.

What I was referring to was "conventionally framed", but I didn't specify what that means to me. For me, that's the Library of Congress method.

[Bruce Watson]

What is the "best" canvas product? Or your favorite? What coating product do you recommend?

Wish I could help you with this, but it's been more than five years since I had a canvas print made, and I haven't kept up with that market. I have relatively little idea what's available anymore.

[Kirk Gittings]

o me, inkjet on canvas is the only way to make large prints. But then, hardly anyone responding to this thread would ever make a print bigger than 50 x 40 cm. Yes, I'm looking at you Mr. Gittings.

[EDIT: For readers that haven't read Kirk's numerous informative postings on printing and print sizes, as I have for the last decade, he has a well known and well articulated style and a well reasoned desire for enlargements no bigger then around 4-5x. I'm poking a little fun at him, but I mean zero disrespect; he may well be the finest printer on the LF forums, and I'm the first to concede he has already forgotten more about printing, and fine art photography, than I'll ever learn myself. Just sayin'.]

Thanks Bruce (I think ). I rarely do large prints as you say-only when a collector wants one. I rarely exhibit large prints-24x30 being the largest I think and that was once or twice-they sold well. I used to refuse to make large prints period. It ruins the whole reason I shoot LF. "Viewing distance" only works if you can keep people from getting to close-they get too close and it ruins the tactility of LF. Since the recession I have given in on this for a couple of collectors simply because I need the money. I know that is crass but I have pared back my lifestyle as far as I can and a couple of winters the big prints have pulled me through. I work very hard to maintain maximum quality at large sizes always with drum scans from Lenny, but there are compromises. For one client who bought the largest print I have ever made for his ski lodge in Taos, I gave a framed 11x14 of the same print for his house because I wanted him to own one the way I prefer to them to be seen.

When I do make big prints they are treated exactly the same as small prints, matted, window matted, glazed with plexi and framed. The biggest problem at that size is warping so I use thicker mats and backing board and actually dry mount the window mat to the print mat. That is not a window mat that covers the edges of the print but one that allows a generous gap between the print edge and window. these are all inkjet prints. I don't do this myself but work with a local framer.

[paulr]

This is a perfectly viable alternative for display of inkjet prints. I'm assuming that the print is coated since it has some handling challenges both in mounting it to the aluminum plate, and when displayed. There's got to be something between the pigments on the substrate and the sticky little hands of the public. Just sayin'.

What I was referring to was "conventionally framed", but I didn't specify what that means to me. For me, that's the Library of Congress method.

Sorry, I left out the part about the glazing. It's glazed with UV-blocking plexi. We also looked into museum glass (heavy, fragile, expensive) and museum plexi (crazy expensive). Plain old UV plex seemed the most reasonable. The "shadow box" part means that the glazing is held off the print by spacers around the edge, since there's no overmat.

Most of my older work is done the way your library of congress link suggests. For this work, I'm doing it differently, partly for the size (mounting on the rigid substrate prevents warping) and partly because I wanted a more modern presentation. So the reasoning is a little bit practical and a little bit esthetic. I have another body of work that I considered face-mounting, for esthetic reasons, but I rejected the idea because it's so insanely impractical.

[sanking]

Has anyone printed very large prints direct to substrate such as aluminum dibond or other rigid synthetic surfaces? I am curious as to aesthetic of this compared to mounting prints on dibond or other surfaces.

Sandy

[polyglot]

Has anyone printed very large prints direct to substrate such as aluminum dibond or other rigid synthetic surfaces? I am curious as to aesthetic of this compared to mounting prints on dibond or other surfaces.

I haven't done it myself, but I have an inkjet-on-aluminium print mentioned a way up-thread. Looks OK, but there's a lot of metamerism if you have any totally-transparent highlight. It's very delicate and mine (on the loungeroom wall) now has two scrapes on it from clumsy people carrying stuff.