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What is a Giclee Print
by J Davis
The easiest way to explain it... A Giclee Print is any photograph or fine art painting reproduced using a multi color inkjet printer.
That is the easy way to explain it, but unlike the lithograph or serigraph printing methods the image is digitally scanned into a computer and then digitally manipulated.
The digital image can be color corrected, imperfections eliminated, resized, and tweaked in many different ways. A color image can be turned into a black and white image, and a black and white image can be colored. Unlike the offset lithograph process the possibilities are almost endless.
It is a fact of life. Giclee printing has forever changed the way art is delivered to the masses. Giclee printing has opened a whole new set of opportunities for the artist - both economic and creative
Do Giclee Prints Last? A major discussion about the permanence of Giclee Prints has been going on since the first Giclee Print was produced. In the beginning the prints faded quickly. Now that problem has all but disappeared. We print our Giclee prints using pigmented inks only. Dye based inks have the widest color range, allowing the closest match to the original, but pigmented inks have the longer life span. Life-span estimates of Giclee prints, printed with pigmented inks, by third-party testing run as long as 100 plus years without noticeable fading. These tests are done with forced aging and are sometimes suspect. We have done real life testing with prints placed in an enclosed environment and exposed to direct sunlight. After 90 days the Giclee Prints showed less fading than the original watercolor painting. This test was a non-scientific test but does, as close as possible, simulate everyday conditions. It is my belief that the current prints are as archival as possible with today's technology.Advantages of Giclee Prints...If you paint with the intention of selling your work you need to make some upfront decisions. Are you going to sell only originals or are you going to offer limited edition images for sale? Here is a very good reason to offer limited edition prints. When a person purchases one of your original paintings they are not only purchasing the image because they like it, but with the idea it may increase in value. The only way it will do this is if you and your work become well known. If you only sell originals this will be hard to do. Very few people will ever see your work.
Now comes the advantage of Giclee reproductions. When you sell an original painting you need to reserve the right to produce limited edition prints. When you produce and sell limited edition prints your work becomes more in demand and your value as an artist increases. As your value increased so does your work. As your work increases in value so does the original prints that were sold to your customers. Everyone wins.
Before the advent of Giclee Prints it was very expensive to reproduce your artwork. First you had to have a good set of color separations made. These separations were normally sized to the size of image you thought would be your best seller. Then the separations were burned onto a metal plate and printed by an offset press. The offset press was either a multi color press or a one-color press. Either way the setup alone was expensive and editions of 500 to a 1000 prints had to be printed to make it economical. If you were selling a large number of prints this was not a problem, but if you only sold 5 prints you now had a lot of costly inventory.
The Giclee Print process offers you a very practical cost advantage. Since your original art has been saved as a digital file you can order prints as they are needed and in the sizes you need. This allows you to publish your artwork without a large up-front expenditure. You can now test market your art before committing to large production runs.
The Giclee technology provides incredible detail and color quality. The resolution (DPI or dots per inch) is actually higher than traditional lithography (1440 dpi inkjet vs. 133 litho.). This allows us to adjust color, contrast, brightness, and color saturation until the final reproduction matches the artist's original. One of the really great things about Giclee prints is that you can print on any material that you can send through the printer. We have printed on Kraft paper, 300lb. watercolor paper, vinyl, silk, and canvas. If it will take ink, and go through the printer, we can print on it.
About the Author
J Arthur Davis: Is a fine art Giclee master printer. His studio is located in Hummelstown, Pa. and can be reached at 717-576-8884. You can get additional information on the Giclee Print process at his website http://www.artreproservices.com or jarthurdavis@visual-artists.com
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