Fading report by Fadeaway, Grandad35 and JV

[Grandad35]

Forum members:

We have finally completed our testing on the fading of inkjet prints, and the reports are available at http://www.nifty-stuff.com/docs/inkjet-fading.php and http://www.nifty-stuff.com/docs/inkjet-fading1.php

Special thanks go to Fotofreek and Manuchau for providing samples for these tests.

It is truly amazing that three people who have never met could successfully complete such an extended, time consuming and complicated project, communicating solely over the Internet.

Please post your comments and analysis after you study this information.

Fadeaway, Grandad35, JV

 

[Manuchau]

Well, I certainly will be carefully going over this carefully in the next few days. I'm sure not everyone will analyze this thoroughly, but I think that a synopsis and/or a list of the longest - lasting ink-paper combos to the shortest -lived combos should be of use and interest to everyone on this Forum.

This way, everyone could see at a glance which ink/paper combination would work best for them and the printers they are using.

I'm happy to have contributed some of the samples, and would be delighted to contibute other samples for any future tests.

Great work, Grandad35!!!! We all benefit from your knowledge, expertise, hard work and dedication.

 

[fotofreek]

Although my help was limited to a producing a few samples for evaluation, I am glad to have been able to be a small part of this project. Thanks to Granddad and others who did the real work to make it happen.

 

[hpnetserver]

Wow! writing something like this is no easier than carrying out the fading test. Thanks for the great work. I will need to read it over a few times to get a complete picture of the faded stuff. Completely surprised that Epson pigment isk is not much fade resisting than expected. If one color fades it doesn't matter if all others do not. My choice of dye based printing using Canon over pigment based printing by Epson seems to be on the money. Thanks guys for the great job done!

 

[Grandad35]

hpnetserver,

I want to make it clear that the Epson pigment ink sample displayed in the report was after 480 hours on test - far longer than any of the other tests. Here is an animation of all of the samples after 96 hours. Note in particular the following samples:
31. Hp ink/paper
32. Epson pigmented ink/paper
36. Canon ink/paper
39. Canon ink/Ilford Classic Pearl (swellable paper)

At 96 hours, you can see slight yellow fading on sample 32, but it still has the best overall color stability of any of these samples. If sample 31 is rated at about 60 years, how would you rate samples 36 and 39?

 

[BlasterQ]

wow! great job guys! we are all grateful!

 

[fish]

Great work, the information is invaluable. Thanks for the effort.

 

[sigpop]

very nice job and much thx for this info.

 

[KnightCrawler]

So for pictures that last I would want Canon OEM and Ilford Classic Pearl.

http://www.pictureline.com/product.php?id=3172


PS: It does not surprise me that Pigment ink is more fade resistant. This is very well known.

 

[websnail]

Dare I ask...

t should be mentioned that Livick did a lot of work in this area, but that he recently pulled his work from his site as explained here. For those who havent read his work, it is still available (thanks to the waybackmachine). What happened to Livick is one of the reasons why it was decided not to post a lot of detailed analysis, but to just present the raw test results.

What did happen to Livick?