Preservation and conservation issues related to digital printing and digital photography

This conference was the third in an international series organised jointly with the University of the Arts London and the Printing, Papermaking and Packaging Group of the Institute of Physics. The lead organiser and editor, Emeritus Professor Robert Thompson, is a member the committee of the Institute of Physics and of the staff of the London College of Communication. The author’s expertise in the areas discussed enabled him to edit the final copy following discussion with the individual authors

The conference was held at The Institute of Physics and included poster displays and an exhibition of trade stands.

As with the previous conferences, the aim was to bring together practitioners of the conservation and preservation sciences, including chemists, physicists, artists; conservators from galleries, museums and libraries as well as suppliers of ink, paper and printing technologies.

The papers presented included recent and comparative studies of research by commercial organisations such as Kodak as well as universities who are working to understand the processes involved and improve the stability of the colorants used for both analogue and the emerging digital technologies. Studies of restoration procedures were presented for movie film stocks as well as conservation and preservation of the whole range of stills photographic media, including restoration techniques for late Victorian newspaper images. Work to improve the longevity of materials is progressing and is concentrating on new media and coatings for photo-quality papers and the stability of ink jet dyes in the presence of atmospheric gases such as ozone and oxides of nitrogen, ultraviolet light and adhesives used in finishing processes. It is evident that there is still room for research and development in all of these areas as well as the effects of relative humidity and moisture.