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Digital BW, The Print

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LED lighting in art gallery - some issues

2015-07-09 by paulmwhiting@...

For years I settled on darkroom prints using Ilford MG paper and Bainbridge Spanish White mat board. Under gallery lighting they looked great - I must have been showing under tungsten lighting. Then, as I moved to digital printing, I settled on carbon ink, Eboni to be exact, on Premier Art Fine Art paper in the 205 gsm weight. I mounted these prints on a slighter warmer board, Crescent #2299. Displaying these two kinds of prints side by side I could hardly tell the difference.

But a couple of days ago I was doing a small show at our local art museum and they had just switched to LED lighting. The darkroom prints looked fine, but my digital prints were decidedly warmer. Not much I can do about this... I think I'll have to live with this conundrum. Perhaps some of you have run into something similar. Gradually, as I sell my darkroom prints, I'll be reprinting on the digital setup and my shows will have more consistency. But I really am not fond of how they look. Maybe I'll have to move to a different printer inkset and a cooler mat board.

At home, and in clients' homes, this is not a problem for the time being. I suppose as our society gradually switches over to LED lighting I'll be up against this dilemma more and more. I notice LED lamps are hitting my local hardware store.

Any thoughts, advice, feedback would be most welcome... thank you!

Paul


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