Printing

MK, MB, PK and MB refer to the photo black ink cartridges in fine art and photographic inkjet printers. Some printer models will allow you to change these manually; on others the type of black ink is linked to the media setting you choose and is therefore set automatically by the printer. 'K' actually stands for key; this comes from the four colour CMYK colour space - Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Key (black). When referring to MK or PK ink, the 'M' stands for Matte Key and the 'P' stands for Photo Key. So PK stands for Photo Black and MK stands for Matte Black. MB and PB are simply alternatives to using MK or PK. 'B' simply stands for Black, therefore: PB stands for Photo Black and MB stands for Matte Black. These abbreviations are most commonly found in file names, such as ICC profiles (where number of characters can be limited). They may also be found within printer descriptions to indicate the colours and number of cartridges of a specific model. The type of black ink needed to print on an inkjet fine art or photographic paper is usually dictated by the surface finish. For example gloss finishes usually require photo black ink whereas matte finishes usually require matte black ink. If you are unsure of what type of black ink is required for printing, you can always contact the paper supplier to confirm.

Giclée comes from the french word meaning literally 'to squirt' referring to the process in which the ink is laid down on the paper.The print heads of a printer spray a pattern of very small dots to make up the final image. Giclée is the name comonly given to an inkjet limited edition reproduction of an artwork, photograph or digitally created artwork. Giclée prints are produced on archival grade artist's quality inkjet coated paper using UV stable pigment inks.

ICC profiles were developed by the International Color Consortium as a way to standardise colour reproduction in digital environments, across multiple devices and operating systems.In print terms an ICC Profile is essentially a set of data that tells the printer what colour the paper is and how much ink to put down for that particular surface texture. It will ensure you get the most accurate colour match on our paper in a large production environment. Remember: As each Innova Art paper is slightly different in base colour and surface texture you will need to download an ICC profile for each paper you plan to use on your printer, generic ICC profiles for selected printer models can be downloaded from this site.

To print your files and maintain their original quality it is advisable to save them to a .tiff format.This format is larger than the commonly used .jpg file format but it will not compress the contents as much and therefore preserves it as intended by the artist. The standard resolution fro a print file is 300dpi. If you are intending to use your work on a website or to email files to selected clients or galleries then it is advisable to save a .jpg copy, this should have a resolution of 72dpi to ensure it is small enough for email servers to send and receive. You can also email and post images on the web in .gif or .png format but this is only advisable for certain image types as these can distort some colours and edges in photographic work. Other common file formats are .psd, .pdf and .ai or .eps, these refer to the program that created the original file (Photoshop, Acrobat or Illustrator). Some professional printers will be able to work with these files but you will need to check that your intended recipient has the software before you send it. It is also worth noting that the older versions of these programs cannot open files created in the newer versions. If the person you are sending you file to has an earlier version of the application, you will need to save a copy of your file in a legacy format (compatible with earlier versions) so they can open it. Adobe Reader can also open .pdf documents and is available for free download, however you will not have access to all the tools available in Adobe Acrobat.  

The type of ink, printer setting and base colour of the paper will all effect the results of the final print. When looking on a screen you are also seeing a backlit colour. The only accurate way to avoid this is to work with colour profiles created specifically for your monitor and printer. A way to minimise this is to work with generic profiles supplied by paper manufacturers, profiles for Innova Art papers on selected printer models are available from this site.