Question about Matt Laminating in Hotpress

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Bagpuss
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Question about Matt Laminating in Hotpress

Post by Bagpuss »

Does anyone regularly matt laminate photos in your Hotpress ?

The last time I did one was about 7 years ago !!??

I had a 40cmx50cm photo, which a customer brought in, this morning I drymounted the photo onto white display board, looked fine : )
I then went up in the loft to find the roll of Hotpress, Matt laminate I had, found it !

Well I didn't bother looking for instructions on how to laminate, I just laid a sheet of the pre-pierced film over the drymounted photo and treated it exactly the same if I was drymounting a photo i.e. laid on top of the foam sheet and then a sheet of silicon release paper on top.

When it didn't come out as expected, I looked at the instructions on the Hotpress site and saw that the silicon release paper should be UNDER the drymounted photo, then the foam sheet rested OVER THE TOP and the machine runs for 9 mins.

This appears to have done the trick, although I did have to run it through the machine twice ....

I was just wondering, if I was mounting onto foamcore , do I need to laminate onto the photo first, BEFORE drymounting onto the foamcore ?
Thanks in advance, Bagpuss/Adam
My real name is Adam Laver aka "Adam The Picture Framer", just in case you were unsure ; )
Richard Photofusion
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Re: Question about Matt Laminating in Hotpress

Post by Richard Photofusion »

It's been a while*, but, the release paper below is to protect the foam blanket. The foam blanket above is to not cause the glass to gloss the laminate.

As I would laminate prints I had made, I'd laminate the print first, then dry mount to foam board - reduced the chance of dust bits ruining the cost of both the print, and the foam board. It's worth placing strips of foam board adjacent to the material you are mounting to, to prevent the blanket from squeezing the edges.

Depending on the type of mountboard, there is always the option of reducing the glossing, by processing the combined laminated print and board face down on the blanket, if that makes sense...

*Probably 6 years, but used to do it often...
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prospero
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Re: Question about Matt Laminating in Hotpress

Post by prospero »

I haven't done this for more like 27 years. :lol:

There was a craze at the time for 'texturing' photos by overlaying certain things to impart texture on film. Crumbled paper/fabric/whatever.
Using a foam blanket gives a 'fuzzy' matt look. One thing to watch out for is any imperfections in the foam. Holes, tears etc. These will all be
impinged on the film.

I used to get fine linen textured film which gives nice semi-matt surface and you don't have to rely on the foam for texture.


** I've heard reports lately of laminating film 'going off' after a year or two. The glue loosing adhesion in storage resulting in bubbles
when used. I had never considered this before. I have various rolls that date back to the eighties. I must test a bit sometime..... :roll:

*** I used to cook the work for about 20 mins - mounting and laminating at the same time. Still got a few I mounted on hardboard and they
are as good as the day they were done. :D
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Steve N
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Re: Question about Matt Laminating in Hotpress

Post by Steve N »

When i used to do it, I did it in one action, as long as the heatseal/laminate, covered any exposed drymount tissue/film, much the same way we used to do blockmounting on MDF using wet glue
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