Erik

What is a gyclee print, and what are its advantages/disadvantages?

Thanks

Welles

Back when fine are prints made on ink jet printers were sneered at by the arts community (early nineties) a clever printer with a marketing understanding (whose name I used to know) made up the term, Gicl?e from French to sound mysterious and expensive. He was using Iris printers and they were expensive so he was trying to describe the cost by coining mysterious artsy sounding name for the prints. You couldn't say, it's an ink jet print and command big bucks.

Most web sites give you a variety of linguistic meanings varying from, it means 'to spurt,' to it is a feminine noun that means a spray or a spurt of liquid. One who claims vast knowledge says "Many websites include a document which says "giclee means to spray". Well, "giclee" doesn't mean "to spray". "Giclee" isn't an infinitive. "Giclee" is the feminine of a past participle." Haw. Gicl?e is at least partly hype.

Legitimate printers who offer the service really do fine prints with 8-12 color inkjet printers of archival quality but anyone can use the term as there are no specific standards associated with it...except if it is a Gicl?e they are going to charge you high prices.

MsOz

Erik, here is the story of how Giclee prints got their name:
http://www.dpandi.com/giclee/giclee.html
It was not so much a marketing ploy regarding expense, as much as it was an attempt to find a generic term for inkjet reproductions that did not have a "technological" connotation. As many of us know, "digital art" still carries somewhat of a stigma when discussed with "real" art...
It now tends to describe high-quality inkjet reproductions.
From www.artlex.com :
Edit: Bad phonetic French lesson:
Like many languages, objects have masculine and femine pronouns, rather than the generic "the." The verb Gicler, pronounced "zhee-klair" means "to spray." La gicle? (zhee-klay) is a feminization of le gicleur, pronounced "zhee-kloor."
Just a Point of Order, I know, but having studied French literature for 5 years in Junior and High school, the pronounciation of words provides meaning to their etymology. It has to do with nouns and verbs, not infinitives.

Now, say "gicleur, gicler, gicle?" 3 times, and you can see how Duganne came up with the term...

Erik

No problem for me, Madeline, as French, together with Flemish is my mother language. But the word "gicl?e" was unknown to me.

But I do have problems when they start talking about water-soluble bio-degradable inks and "archival" quality...
Finally, all "prints" are reproductions. And commrce does play a big role in this.
Remember how offset was often called "lithography" when some artist was responsible for what was printed?

Well, good to know. I do know where iris prints are made, and I know that they are seldom as good as what a good quality printer can print.

Archival? No work on paper should be exposed to direct sunlight or even full-force daylight.

Thanks.

[righton]

MsOz

Glad to be of help, Erik!

The thing is, Iris printers have no trademark on the word gicle?. It became synonymous with Iris back in the day, but no longer. Staples has a "Heritage Gicle?" process that is trademarked, but not the term gicle?, as other printers have been able to produce the same, if not better results.

I've heard good things about the HP pro quality printers being up to the task of other high-ends at a cost of about $10K less (even better savings when compared to an Iris.)...