So, I've got a source for inkjet paper

[mark]

Would this work as a final base for carbon printing? I know nothing about brand. The person giving it to me found his "dream paper" and has a bunch of odds and ends.

I ran out of an old supply of a few illford MG pieces I started to practice with and I don't want to fix out paper anymore.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

Some inkjet papers work well. All the papers I tried retain a lot of yellow dichromate stain that you will have to soak the print in sodium bisulfite or metabisulfite. I found the look to be similar to Yupo with the papers that I tried. It was also hit and miss. In the end I stuck with sized art papers. Give it a shot!

 

[mark]

Thanks Andrew I'll give it a shot. Do you size your own art paper?

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

Hi Mark, sorry for such a late reply. Just saw your question now. Yes, I size my own papers. I usually use Rising Stonehenge, size with either acrylic matte or gloss medium, or albumen over gelatine. I've been doing the albumen over gelatine for about 6 months now and really liking it.

 

[blindpig]

Andrew,this is a dumb question. Do you use acrylic matte medium only when you are sizing or must it be treated with gelatin as well?
Being new to carbon I thought a hardened gelatin is desirable for sizing.

 

[pschwart]

You can also add some acrylics in small amounts directly to gelatin for sizing. I'm not recommending this, but I know from some limited testing that it can work. If you are new to carbon, it's a good idea to defer sizing your own papers until you have fine tuned your workflow. Fiber photo papers can make beautiful prints -- transfers are simple, and no sizing is required so you can concentrate on fine tuning your workflow.

 

[Andrew O'Neill]

Philip's advice is very sound. There are so many variables and so many things can go wrong, making it difficult to pinpoint the source of problems. When I started out I transfered onto fixed out glossy and matte fibre photo paper. The transfers just glided on nicely. Tonally, very nice. But it's been art papers ever since. I don't feel right fixing out photo papers... that's me, though.
To answer your question, I size only with acrylic medium. No gelatin required. I used to zap the sized paper in my drymount press, but stopped doing so due to weird sheen from the texture of the paper. It was lost in really dark areas, but lighter areas it was clearly visible and very annoying. So now I put a few drops of ammonium dichromate (6%) in the acrylic medium for each coat (4 coats). Then I zap it with UV light for 10 minutes.
I've been using albumen over gelatin more and more these past few months. If I want more sheen, I put a few more coats of albumen on. Transfers are very nice, and this combination seems to hold slightly more detail in the high values.
Some papers are waiting at home for some albumen... stupid staff meeting!!