ABOUT GICLEE PRINTING
What is the difference between a Giclee Print and a Digital Print?
A digital Print: nowadays most people have smartphones to download pictures from the internet and home office printers have given them the ability to print any image. A person can simply print an image from their phone or computer on their home printer. This type of printing is called digital printing. Digital printing is convenient and cheap, unfortunately it is not made to last.
A Giclée Print: If you are looking for a print that will last years and years without fading or losing quality, you’re ready to choose the Giclee Print quality.
The following boxes should be checked whilst buying a Giclee Print from an artist:
The resolution of the image: The original piece of art should designed at at least 300 dpi or higher resolution. What is DPI: This value refers to the number of dots which are printed per inch. It is therefore needless to say, the higher the DPI value, the higher the printed dot density, the higher the resolution (‘less pixelated’).
The ink: The ink must be pigmented (not dye). There also needs to be 8 or more different colored pigmented inks used in the printer.
The paper: The paper must be 100% archival. In this case the archival paper has to made out of cotton also known as rag paper. It contains no acid and is known to last hundreds of years without appreciable fading, discoloration, or deterioration,
The printer: The printer itself must be a wide format ink jet printer. (This is not your everyday household office printer) and will be able to print from A5 to A3 in general.
Because of the many options of materials and tools that are now available for printing, there is an increase of artists creating prints that are not made from archival materials. The artist is probably looking to eather save money, or due to a lack of experience is not aware that a better quality exists.
Some artist have discovered they can save money by substituting out the expensive pigmented inks for cheaper dye inks in their wide formatted printer where as other artist also save money by not printing on cotton paper.
Some artists are outsourcing their printing to companies online that are not specializing in reproducing fine art prints. They’re using print on demand services instead. Some of these companies can even drop ship directly to the customer, which means customers will not get a signed print from the artist.
If you’re looking for Giclee Fine Art Print, you’ve come to the right address. We ONLY print 450DPI illustrations with a professionnel ink jet printer using 9 cartridges of highly pigmented ink. A4 format prints are printed onto ©Canson Etching rag 100% cotton 310g archival paper. A3 format prints are printed onto ©Tecco Fine Art Rag 100% cotton 300g textured archival paper. All the prints will be handsigned on the back by myself.