This question has come up repeatedly on the About.com Scrapbooking Forum. Many scrapbookers have ink jet printers that they use for printing titles, journaling text, and clip art for their scrapbook pages. Is this ink safe for scrapbooking? The answer is that most ink jet ink is, indeed,
acid-free. The more perplexing question comes when you talk about
the longevity or permanence of photos or clip art printed with ink jet ink. In
general, ink jet ink is not permanent or waterfast. If your images are exposed
to light they will fade eventually (but so will your photos printed by regular
color photo processing methods). Also, if the images come in contact with
liquids damage will occur. These two problems have been enough to cause some scrapbookers
to be concerned about using ink jet printed material in their albums, however
several new advancements and new testing results are making the use of printed
material more and more appealing. Hewlett Packard's web site indicated that black and white images will last for decades. Making the use of black and white clip art, titles, etc. very feasible. When you color them in with acid-free pens or colored pencils, you have a perfectly safe image for your scrapbooks.
PC World Fight Photo Fade Out: This informative article covers several models of ink
jet printer and discusses the length of time that photos can be expected to last
when printed and displayed in different environments. It includes a chart
showing different types of inks and longevity.
Wilhelm
Imaging Research: This company tests the major manufacturers' products to
determine length of time before fading. It has some great articles about the
significant advancements that have been made toward archival printing from home
printers.
Some points to keep in
mind when using your ink jet printer to create graphics or lettering for your
scrapbooks:
1) Keep all images out of
direct light.
2) Keep all images away from water or liquids of any kind.
3) Use page protectors to keep finger prints and accidental spills away from
your prints.
You may notice that this
list is exactly the kind of things that we are trying to protect our albums from
overall. So, when you look at the data provided by the manufacturers and by the
research company above, you can see that using your printer is indeed a viable
option.
