As someone that does a lot of printmaking choosing the right paper is extremely important, especially when you are printing at home or in your studio. You can have the best, most expensive printer in the world, but if you are printing to subpar substrate and don’t have your printer settings dialed in the results will almost always not be what you want or expect.
Over the years I have use a number of Canon, and Epson printers to print closed edition runs on sizes up to 13×19 inches and have tried every kind of paper from tissue to heavy card stock with mixed results. Usually because the paper was either not compatible with my printer, or because I didn’t have the correct printer profiles loaded. Profiles that were specifically designed to match the paper to the printer itself.
A few years ago a friend recommended trying Red River Paper because not only do they have an excellent selection of paper stocks to choose from, but because they have done extensive research and development is creating printer profiles that match paper to printer. Plus they provide instructions on how to get the best results from the hardware and software you are using.
At first I was a bit skeptical, having been down this path before, but I was willing to give it a try and popped over to their website to see what all the fuss was about. I was pleasantly surprised not only by the variety of papers to choose from, but by the instructional videos, and as I mentioned earlier the profiles for my specific printer and every paper that they have marked as compatible with my hardware. That last part is important, because I was able to filter for the Epson EcoTank 8550 printer and eliminate all the substrates they offer that are not a good choice for my gear.
I ordered a sample pack and after it arrived tried a number of different papers in various weights, textures, and tonalities, finally settling in on Polar Matte 230. It has a finely tuned coating and premium base with a soft white surface that is perfect for my closed edition fine art print runs. It’s available in a heavier weight, but that requires printing single sheets at a time on the 8550 which isn’t very convenient for me when I’m doing a run of 30 to 40 prints of the same work. With that said for single images I have bumped up to the 330 which offers the same print quality on an eighty eight pound stock that is perfect for floating inside of a frame above a solid matte.