What is a Giclée
A Giclée is an individually produced, high-resolution, high-fidelity reproduction printed on a special large format printer. A Limited Edition Giclée is a numbered series of prints, produced from digital images of an original artwork. This is recognized as perhaps the finest method of accurately reproducing art. The Giclée print renders deep saturated colours and has a beautiful painterly quality that retains minute and subtle tints.
Giclée (pronounced zhee-klay) is a french noun that means a spray or squirt of liquid. In it's modern usage it refers to the squirt of ink in the specialised ink jet printers used to produce them.
Giclée printing is a very specialized field and it takes an experienced printmaker to produce high quality work. Every Giclée is a work of art in it's own right. In addition, when each Limited Edition Giclée Print is produced, the artist is there to supervise the colour correction of the image taken from the original artwork. Limited Edition Giclée are so close to the original that it is difficult to tell a Giclée from the original.
How Do Giclées Differ from Lithographic (Offset) Prints
Traditional offset prints are made using lithographic techniques. Lithographic prints are made up of a series of dots of the three primary colours (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow) and black. The size and distribution of the dots creates an illusion that the eye recognises as a fuller range of colours. If you look closely at an offset print you will see the individual dots. The original image used in the process can be either digital or film negative but the process of creating the plates is a detail robbing process much like making a copy of a copy. In addition to inferior image quality, offset prints are susceptable to fading caused by UV light and to moisture.
By contrast, Giclées are printed using a fine spray of pigment based inks. The resolution of the resulting print is so fine that it is virtually continuous tone rather than a series of dots. Consequently Giclées are superior to traditional lithography in nearly every way. The colors are brighter, last longer and because the range, or "gamut" of colors for Giclées is far beyond that of lithography, the details are far crisper.
Displaying and Caring for Limited Edition Giclée
The method of framing will depend on the medium on which the Limited Edition Print is produced.
Canvas based prints should be stretched over a wooden frame in the same way that an original canvas artwork is framed. There is no need to cover the print with glass. The stretched canvas can be hung as is, or can be mounted in a frame.
Limited Edition paper prints should be "Museum Mounted". All paper prints must be mounted behind glass using archival materials.
Technical Details
These original artworks were photographed by Fine Art Imaging Pty Ltd in Sydney, under studio conditions using a large format camera coupled with a very high resolution digital back. The resulting images are processed on a high end Apple Macintosh computer workstation using the latest available image processing software. Computer monitors are routinely calibrated to match viewed colours with printed output. Colour profiles are matched to each different printing surface to provide consitent results.
Limited Edition Giclée prints are printed on a large format ink jet printers using large gamut archival pigment based inks in 12 colours. With the UV protective coating, the life of the print can be in excess of 100 years. They are highly resistant to fading or discoloration.
Regardless of the high tech equipment used it is the expertise of the printmaker and extensive collaboration with the artist that produces the exceptional quality of prints. The results are stunning and no description does justice other than seeing a Giclée print!
Giclée (pronounced zhee-klay) is a french noun that means a spray or squirt of liquid. In it's modern usage it refers to the squirt of ink in the specialised ink jet printers used to produce them.
Giclée printing is a very specialized field and it takes an experienced printmaker to produce high quality work. Every Giclée is a work of art in it's own right. In addition, when each Limited Edition Giclée Print is produced, the artist is there to supervise the colour correction of the image taken from the original artwork. Limited Edition Giclée are so close to the original that it is difficult to tell a Giclée from the original.
How Do Giclées Differ from Lithographic (Offset) Prints
Traditional offset prints are made using lithographic techniques. Lithographic prints are made up of a series of dots of the three primary colours (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow) and black. The size and distribution of the dots creates an illusion that the eye recognises as a fuller range of colours. If you look closely at an offset print you will see the individual dots. The original image used in the process can be either digital or film negative but the process of creating the plates is a detail robbing process much like making a copy of a copy. In addition to inferior image quality, offset prints are susceptable to fading caused by UV light and to moisture.
By contrast, Giclées are printed using a fine spray of pigment based inks. The resolution of the resulting print is so fine that it is virtually continuous tone rather than a series of dots. Consequently Giclées are superior to traditional lithography in nearly every way. The colors are brighter, last longer and because the range, or "gamut" of colors for Giclées is far beyond that of lithography, the details are far crisper.
Displaying and Caring for Limited Edition Giclée
The method of framing will depend on the medium on which the Limited Edition Print is produced.
Canvas based prints should be stretched over a wooden frame in the same way that an original canvas artwork is framed. There is no need to cover the print with glass. The stretched canvas can be hung as is, or can be mounted in a frame.
Limited Edition paper prints should be "Museum Mounted". All paper prints must be mounted behind glass using archival materials.
Technical Details
These original artworks were photographed by Fine Art Imaging Pty Ltd in Sydney, under studio conditions using a large format camera coupled with a very high resolution digital back. The resulting images are processed on a high end Apple Macintosh computer workstation using the latest available image processing software. Computer monitors are routinely calibrated to match viewed colours with printed output. Colour profiles are matched to each different printing surface to provide consitent results.
Limited Edition Giclée prints are printed on a large format ink jet printers using large gamut archival pigment based inks in 12 colours. With the UV protective coating, the life of the print can be in excess of 100 years. They are highly resistant to fading or discoloration.
Regardless of the high tech equipment used it is the expertise of the printmaker and extensive collaboration with the artist that produces the exceptional quality of prints. The results are stunning and no description does justice other than seeing a Giclée print!
