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What is Giclée Printing?

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Giclée Printing

Giclée printing is a high-quality, referred to as “Museum Quality”, printing process. It involves capturing an original artwork, (or photograph), in digital format and producing a fine art print. The term “giclée” comes from the French word “gicler”. It means “to spray or squirt”. It was coined by printmaker Jack Duganne in the early 1990s to describe his advanced method of inkjet printing. At the time, inkjet printing was associated with inferior quality prints. Marketing his higher quality inkjets with a fancy name made sense and it stuck!

Over 30 years later, the inkjet process has improved dramatically. So much so that pigment-based inkjet prints are often preferred over any other method due to better longevity and color accuracy. Inkjet is no longer the dirty word in the printing industry that needs to be masked by the fancy French term giclee!

The giclée process typically involves two parts. First, the original artwork is captured digitally using a high-end, high-resolution scanner or camera capture system. For artists, creating a digital copy of their original work before it sells is a no-brainer. It could lead to many additional sales as a print (typically limited edition, but not always).

After obtaining the high-quality digital file of your original artwork, a whole new world of printing options opens up to you, including products like puzzles, t-shirts, mugs, etc. (Dye Sublimation). However, for the purposes of this article, we’ll focus on creating that archival giclee fine art print. If you need a digital image of your artwork you can take your artwork to a professional photographer or attempt to get a photo yourself. These days, most newer cell phones do a great job after some slight editing. Lighting is key. Some people put the artwork on the floor near a window so providing natural light.

Archival

A giclée fine art print must meet certain key components to be considered archival. These include using archival, acid-free paper or canvas, archival pigment inkjet ink. As well, high-end, large format inkjet printer consisting of 8-12 inks.

Archival Acid-Free Paper or Canvas: Most decent photo papers now are going to be buffered and acid-free, but it’s worth checking with your printer to make sure. The paper or canvas should be acid-free to ensure that the print will not yellow or deteriorate over time. At Joe-Lynn Design, we offer satin and gloss acid-free papers and satin canvas. When combined with the UV protection of acrylic or laminates, our giclée prints are expected to last for centuries with no color loss or deterioration.

In terms of permanence and color accuracy, pigment inkjet inks are superior to any other method. Pigment-based inks are more resistant to fading, water, and smudging than dye-based inks, and they produce brighter and more vivid colors. At Joe-Lynn Design, we use only Epson pigment inkjet inks rated to last 200+ years. Also, Epson doesn’t have color “Lot #s”. It has been and always will be the same lot for each color, so your prints will always be the exact same color as the last run, even years ago.

The Inkjet Printer

The Inkjet Printer: Any professional print lab offering large pigment inkjet prints will be using a high-end large format inkjet printer consisting of 8-12 inks. The printer should be able to produce high-quality prints with sharp details, accurate colors, and deep blacks. At Joe-Lynn Design, we’ve been using the Epson series of printers for almost 15 years and feel it’s the best fit for us. We currently use the P9000 Series to produce beautiful giclée quality prints.

The Process, the Proof: All the love that goes into a great print – from optimizing the image (color enhancement, sharpening, denoising, etc.), to making sure everything is color-matched properly, to ensuring the print is trimmed to perfection – requires a great process to achieve great results. At Joe-Lynn Design, we offer a variety of proofing options to ensure the final print is exactly what you want.

In summary, giclée printing produces the finest quality prints available. Please beware of imposters.
The word giclée is tossed around a lot at low quality printing firms just because they have a printer capable of producing giclée prints.
Educate yourself and don’t be afraid to ask questions.

If you’re ready to order our giclée prints, you can Upload Your Image and we’ll get back promptly.

here’s where you can find our Print Pricing.

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We’re also introducing a new line of papers

I have been having a hard time getting my papers and canvas since Covid. I had my supplier search for comparable alternatives and after much discussion we settled on what I plan to replace my fine art, photo paper and poster paper.

My supplier and myself have a fair amount of papers on hand so this will gently ease into the change. I have always been a huge fan of Sihl papers and canvas so I plan to be selling all Sihl products after using up my present supply. Sihl, Epson and Frederic’s are the 3 top producers in the world and I have found Sihl to be a lot more what I would look for in papers. In my personal opinion I have never tried Frederic’s but I far prefer the Sihl Canvas over Epson.

I’m replacing the Verona HD250 HD with Sihl Creative Smooth. The Verona is 250gsm and 15mil The Sihl is 320gsm and 19mil. So a heavier paper. The Verona is HD. I have looked at both under a loupe and I truly found the Sihl a little crisper. I am very happy with it and I know my customers will be as well.

I’m replacing my Siena 200L Luster Poster Paper and Epson Premium Luster Photo Paper with Sihl photo papers. The Siena 200gsm 8mil will be replaced with Sihl Supersorb 230gsm 9mil Satin photo paper. The Epson Premium Luster 260gsm 10 mil will be replaced by 3 types of paper. PosterBright™ Matte 200gsm 10mil, Rocket Photo Gloss 190gsm 10mil and Rocket Photo Satin 250gsm 10mil.

The Sihl 350 Satin Canvas won’t change.

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The World of Dye Sublimation

A Few of our Available New Products

We have upgraded some equipment and offering a lot more these days than just fine art and canvas prints.

These are just a few of the new products we offer now. We’re always adding and you can contact us if you’d like us to bring in something that we don’t already offer. Our new site will be an ongoing project and we’ll try to keep updating as products come in.

All of these products are produced through dye sublimation. It enables us to print images onto a special paper, then use a combination of heat, time and pressure to transfer the image onto hundreds of products. Polyester TShirts, Puzzles, Coffee Mugs, Flip Flops, Jewelry just to name a few.

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Creating a Puzzle Using Dye Sublimation

This is just a quick video about our process of creating a puzzle using dye sublimation.

Our process is shown below. Our method needs the puzzle to be turned upside down where usually the heat is applied directly to the print. In the world of dye sublimation many people use different methods as not always the same methods work well.

Order your own puzzle HERE

Find other products available for dye sublimation HERE

Follow our Facebook Page about dye sublimation here – Joe-Lynn’s Garage

Creating a Puzzle Using Dye Sublimation
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A Few of Our Available Products – Dye Sublimation

Here’s a quick video of some of our new products.

If you see anything you’d like to have your logo, photo, artwork, etc. on Contact Us and we will have it ready for you in no time! Most times within a few days.

We’ll post more in detail later but you can find these products HERE

See more at our Facebook Page Joe-Lynn’s Garage

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Welcome to Joe-Lynn Design – Our First Post

I’d like to use this blog to introduce our new line up of products. We don’t only offer fine art and canvas prints anymore. We have a wide range of new products you can purchase with your images, artwork, etc.

In early August 2020 we bought a new printer and started producing products through dye sublimation onto polyester fabrics and treated products. I’ll get into that in future posts.

In early December we brought in another new printer. We didn’t set it up until early January and spent most of our free time researching and learning how to use it. Its a DTG (Direct to Garment) printer and it prints directly onto cotton fabric. We have only used it doing TShirts and Hoodies but in time we will start experimenting and possibly offering new cotton printed products.

I’m building a new website on my spare time to showcase all of these new products. Anything we post and all items in the online storefront are available for you to have your own images printed on. They are great for your own use and also make great gift ideas!

We do offer quantity discounts so you can pick up a few items for promoting your own business or to sell with your own artwork.

Follow our Facebook Pages to keep up with what we’re up to.

Joe-Lynn Design Fine Art and Canvas PrintsFinest Giclée Prints Available

Joe-Lynn Design – Direct To GarmentDTG – Direct to Garment Printing (Cotton Fabric, TShirts, etc.)

Joe-Lynn’s GarageDye Sublimation (polyester fabric, TShirts, Mugs, Puzzles, Jewelry, Metal Prints, Flip Flops, etc.)