122 Inks - For The 2015 Fade Olympics - More Will Arrive Soon.

[amberleadavis]

FPN member, RECLUSE, created 35 sheets for the 2015 Fade Tests. Disillusion, Vossad01 and Alarickc (who came to Las Vegas and personally delivered his sheets) have also recently sent in sheets for the next test. Which means that I will be doing another test.

 

Other people have sent me letters which I will add to the future tests.

 

BUT FOR NOW, here is the start.

 

OOPS, they are still uploading. Check back tomorrow.

[alarickc]

I'll send you sheets with the rest of my sailor inks to test when I send out two of my co-razys and your bottles of ink later this week.

 

I'm hoping some will put up a better fight than Grenade; that stuff is banished to notebooks after that poor showing. That's sad really, it's such an amazing color. I guess the good ones do die young......

[white_lotus]

Everything except something like carbon black and colors made from earth will fade eventually. Absolute permanence doesn't exist, and is less so in inks which are dyes and do not have a medium such as oil or acrylic to help protect them.

 

From an artist web site on lightfastness and what it means:

 

The American Standard Test Measure (ASTM) gives ratings from I to V. I is excellent, II very good, III fair or non-permanent in artist's paints, IV and V pigments are rated poor and very poor, and not used in artist's quality paints. (For details, read ASTM D4303-03.)

The British system (Blue Wool Standard) gives a rating from one to eight. Ratings of one to three mean a color is fugitive and you can expect it to change within 20 years. Ratings of four or five means a color's lightfastness is fair, and shouldn't change for between 20 and 100 years. A rating of six is very good and a rating of seven or eight is excellent; you'll be unlikely to live long enough to see any change.

Equivalents on the two scales:
ASTM I = Blue Woolscale 7 and 8.
ASTM II = Blue Woolscale 6.
ASTM III = Blue Woolscale 4 and 5.
ASTM IV = Blue Woolscale 2 and 3.
ASTM V = Blue Woolscale 1.

I highly recommend using a blue wool scale to calibrate and identify the rate at which an ink fades. By using the scale, you'll be able to identify that rate. The test shouldn't need to be longer than three months, I don't think. It will take a little more work in the early days to check the blue wool card against the inks. Here is a link with how to perform the test and additional information about what it means.

http://www.drb-mattech.co.uk/uv%20blue%20wool.html

Personally, I think the controls should be placed in the dark and not just covered up, but that's my scientific mind thinking there.

And I'll acquire and send Amber a Blue Wool Scale card if she promises to use it and record the results.

Your results will have a lot more meaning to know that an ink is Blue Wool scale 4-5 vs one that is 6, 7, or 8. And even the lesser lightfastness rating may well be acceptable with an ink as it is expected to be kept inside a notebook, etc and not really exposed to light. And thus most inks I suspect to have only moderate lightfastness.

Edited July 1, 2014 by white_lotus

[disillusion]

EPIC! If you want more written samples of the list of inks I sent you, or if you want to try the inks out, just let me know.

 

 

 

Personally, I think the controls should be placed in the dark and not just covered up, but that's my scientific mind thinking there.

And I'll acquire and send Amber a Blue Wool Scale card if she promises to use it and record the results.

Your results will have a lot more meaning to know that an ink is Blue Wool scale 4-5 vs one that is 6, 7, or 8. And even the lesser lightfastness rating may well be acceptable with an ink as it is expected to be kept inside a notebook, etc and not really exposed to light. And thus most inks I suspect to have only moderate lightfastness.

 

That would be closer to how ink is used in real life, but I think it would make the experiment timescale too long to be practical.

[colrehogan]

It must be time for my yearly update of the ink catalog in Excel!

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_001.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_006.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_011.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_016.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_021.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_026.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_034.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_035.jpg

[amberleadavis]

 

Everything except something like carbon black and colors made from earth will fade eventually. Absolute permanence doesn't exist, and is less so in inks which are dyes and do not have a medium such as oil or acrylic to help protect them.

 

From an artist web site on lightfastness and what it means:

 

The American Standard Test Measure (ASTM) gives ratings from I to V. I is excellent, II very good, III fair or non-permanent in artist's paints, IV and V pigments are rated poor and very poor, and not used in artist's quality paints. (For details, read ASTM D4303-03.)

The British system (Blue Wool Standard) gives a rating from one to eight. Ratings of one to three mean a color is fugitive and you can expect it to change within 20 years. Ratings of four or five means a color's lightfastness is fair, and shouldn't change for between 20 and 100 years. A rating of six is very good and a rating of seven or eight is excellent; you'll be unlikely to live long enough to see any change.

Equivalents on the two scales:

ASTM I = Blue Woolscale 7 and 8.

ASTM II = Blue Woolscale 6.

ASTM III = Blue Woolscale 4 and 5.

ASTM IV = Blue Woolscale 2 and 3.

ASTM V = Blue Woolscale 1.

I highly recommend using a blue wool scale to calibrate and identify the rate at which an ink fades. By using the scale, you'll be able to identify that rate. The test shouldn't need to be longer than three months, I don't think. It will take a little more work in the early days to check the blue wool card against the inks. Here is a link with how to perform the test and additional information about what it means.

http://www.drb-mattech.co.uk/uv%20blue%20wool.html

Personally, I think the controls should be placed in the dark and not just covered up, but that's my scientific mind thinking there.

And I'll acquire and send Amber a Blue Wool Scale card if she promises to use it and record the results.

Your results will have a lot more meaning to know that an ink is Blue Wool scale 4-5 vs one that is 6, 7, or 8. And even the lesser lightfastness rating may well be acceptable with an ink as it is expected to be kept inside a notebook, etc and not really exposed to light. And thus most inks I suspect to have only moderate lightfastness.

 

 

 

The controls are not just "covered up" - they are in a drawer in the dark air conditioned location. I'd use the blue scale if it can be done with a scanner. I don't have the time to photograph all of these and I'm a lousy photographer. I'm happy to allow someone else to do it, though.

[white_lotus]

Actually I wasn't suggesting to scan the blue wool scale itself, which I think would be difficult to do accurately. And not sure it would serve any purpose, since at the end of the test, all the lower scales below 7 will be altered and the last two will not.

 

The key with the blue wool scale is that the wool at each scale fades at known rates (with the rate being the cumulative amount of light received). This is explained in the link. So reference scale 1 may take 3 hours to 3 days to fade. So you'd have to check to see if the reference has changed and then see if any of the inks have changed. Those that have changed are identified with that scale. And they can be ignored for the rest of the test as they will only get worse.

 

Of course this does mean checking the controls with the samples more frequently than just at the end of the test. And that in itself may be too much work. It's your experiment, so run it as you want.

 

But even an ink with "poor lightfastness" when mounted in a frame and displayed will fade (or change) in 2 to 15 years, yet will last for many more years in a notebook where it is not exposed to light hardly at all.

[amberleadavis]

Okay, so let me see if I can recapitulate how this would work - and I'm sorry for being slow because you have had to explain this to me before.

 

In theory, I could take and make a page. Scan it with the blue wool. Put the sunny side and the wool in the window and test again in 3 hours, then once a day each day for a week.

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/2014-Inklings/slides/2014-Ink_684.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_036.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_037.jpg

[amberleadavis]

http://sheismylawyer.com/She_Thinks_In_Ink/Tests/Fade/2015/slides/2015-Fade_038.jpg