A3 sublimation paper in the stoke on trent area?

[Customprintwales]

Staples can be expensive but in a push its an option.

I'd pay a little bit more for the paper to get the order or to complete an order, but I suppose it depends on what margins you work at.

[webtrekker]

I use CIE A4 sublimation paper with their inks. Excellent results, and hardly any print left on the paper.

I see their A3 sheets are priced at £18 (incl VAT) for 100 sheets. Add on the £3.72 for 2nd class delivery and that works out at about 22p per sheet. For the small difference in price compared to using matte photo paper I think I would rather stick with the sublimation paper.

[Customprintwales]

THat's what I thought until I found out that most of the sublimation papers sold online is just matt photo paper repackaged and sold at a premium.

I'm not disputing that the major brands have been specially developed for sublimation but a lot of cheaper generic sub paper is just matt photo paper.

[UK Printed Mugs]

Quick Review of Surrey Inkjet Company Matt Paper (as referred by customprintwales).

SIC Matt Photo Paper compared against Truepix A3 paper - WOW!

We have only done metal and cork coasters but the difference is marginal in favour of the matt photo paper.

We used exactly the same ICC profile as quite frankly didn't want the hassle of getting another one done so hoping we could use the same and results at the moment VERY good (see photo below).

What we haven't tried is solid colour backgrounds (especially black) to see how deep we can go or whether we get the same wet black ink problem the Xpres paper had which caused smudges whilst printing.

We do not use this paper or printer for mugs so cannot comment on ceramics I'm afraid and we would stick to the texprint mug paper and SG400 for this.

Below is a cork coaster where the SIC paper was used on the left coaster and TP paper on the right.

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coasters new paper.jpg (97 KiB) Viewed 16 times

We shall keep trialling this for a while but even at 10p cheaper this is promising and would hope for better discount in bulk.

Regards, Olly.

[Customprintwales]

I had problems with sub paper when doing really dark blues and blacks and ink smudges, never had the problem with the matt paper so you should be ok.

I think sub paper by it's nature does not let the ink soak in as quickly or as much because it's about releasing the ink later. but the matt paper seems to take the ink better and releases it pretty well in the heat press.

[carolm1a]

Wow,thats such a difference! going to have a look into this.

[Customprintwales]

yep, I was amazed when I first used this paper instead. The colours just seemed to pop more than with sub paper and provided you print at high quality it carries the definition much more with sharper edges.