Seal Drymount Tissue

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Anyone know if Seal MT5 drymount tissue for fiber paper is as good as their Archival Drymount Tissue for Fiber Paper (ie, archival)? B&H only has 11x14 "archival" paper in 100 sheet boxes, which is more than I need, while the MT5 is available in packages of 25. On a side note, does anyone know if Kodak still manufactures drymount tissue? Under almost every listing of the Kodak stuff on B&H, they have the following: "Note! This item is temporarily not available. We have no estimated arrival date at this time."

-- Erik Asgeirsson (erik@erikcellist.com), April 20, 2002

Answers

My experiance is with seal archival tissue, it's very thin, and if you need to, you can remove it with heat. You might try contacting a picture frame shop in your area and ask if they'll sell you the amount you need.

-- Vince Pulvirenti (zone7@massnet1.net), April 20, 2002.

Erik,

I don't know the answer regarding MT5. I have always used Seal Color Mount tissue to mount my fiber based prints. This was suggested in an article I read in Photo Techniques Magazine. Subsequently, I took a John Sexton printing workshop, and found that he uses Color Mount for his photographs. This might give you another alternative.

-- Dave Karp (davekarp@ix.netcom.com), April 20, 2002.


I also use Seal Colormount for B+W mounting as well as injet and color prints. Archival Drymount I believe is demountable with heat while color mount and MT5 is not. Thats why achivists like it better.

Dave

-- David Walker (david.walker@snet.net), April 21, 2002.


Another option is to use Seal Fusion 4000 which has no paper in it at all and is a pure archival PVA type glue in tissue form. It comes in rolls and sheets and works perfectly in the dry mount press. I use the kind already cut in sheets, but most of my friends use the roll and cut to the size needed for the job. Not a direct answer to your question, but I thought I would mention this because very few know about this nice purely archival product . .

Scott

-- Scott Jones (scottsdesk@attbi.com), April 21, 2002.


Erik, I have purchased dry mount tissue from Freestyle Sales in L.A. in the past, and found it to be very reasonably priced and good quality. You may want to give them a try.

-- Eugene (TIAGEM@aol.com), April 21, 2002.


Erik,

The frame supply store I use sells Techmount 3 (equivalent to Seal Fusion 4000) in 36 inch by 30 yard rolls for around $45 per roll.

I do a lot of mounting and a roll typically lasts me several months to nearly a year.

This tissue, like the Seal product, is acid-free and can be removed by re-applying heat (although I'll have to admit I've never tried it). A side benefit is that using release paper you can eliminate the need for a tacking iron.

Instead of tacking the "sandwich" of print-tissue-mount which can result in some unplanned misalignments, what I do is put the print and tissue in the press for 20-30 seconds between two sheets of release paper, with the tissue hanging out about an inch all around.

After a 30 second cooldown, the tissue and print are bonded and it also takes any residual "curl" out of a print (such as single-wt Azo). Then it's a simple matter to trim neatly around with sissors and position on the mounting board. The tissue will be a little "gummy" so it's almost impossi ble to get it out of position whenn putting back into the press for the final mounting.

I've been using this system for about 10 years now and never had a problem with a print mounted in this manner.

Hope this helps.

-- David Haynes (studioblsp@mindspring.com), April 23, 2002.


Erik,

Try to obtain a copy of Henry Wilhelm's book, "The Permanence and Care of Color Photographs," Preservation Publishing Co., Grinnell, Iowa, 1993. He has an extensive discussion of the different Seal products, much too long to quote here. The upshot: significant differences in age yellowing among them. Seal ArchivalMount Plus much worse in this regard than ColorMount, MT5 Plus, or Fusion 4000 Plus. Although none of these materials apparently pass the strict archival standards in ANSI IT9.2-1988, there has been little evidence that they actually harm the print. Still, a thin yellow line framing your print has little aesthetic appeal. I do not know if these materials have undergone changes by the manufacturer since the time of the tests in 1991.

There is still, of course, the thorny issue of whether or not to dry mount fine photographic prints at all. This issue is also extensively discussed by Wilhelm. This is an expensive book, but well worth the price for its 744 pages.

-- Martin Miller (loonchaser@comcast.net), April 27, 2002.


Have any of you or do any of you use canvas mount? I am interested in canvas transfer and can not find much info on it.

-- Shannon (shannon76@angelfire.com), April 27, 2002.

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