FrancisK7 wrote:
I was wondering why Finao now wrapped their albums. Makes sense.
I'm not sure of their entire process, I haven't talked with them about it in some time, but they do put them though some type of conditioning/drying before they ship them. But even their albums will warp a little once you take them out of the shrink wrap and if you have low humidity going on.
After 15 years of having albums made here's my experience...
Sample Albums that have never warped - Vision Art 10x10/11x11, Queensberry Matted, Pictobooks 10x10/11x11/12x12.
Sample Albums that have warped - Finao both thinner One 10x10s and 14x10 (but not the ones with the black core between sides), Leather Craftsman (horizontal) really badly, Graphi vertical (14x10?), La vie 8x12 ( larger sizes didn't).
I average 24-30 pages per album so large number of sides is not the issue. In recent years I've mostly standardized on VA. For the albums that warped no amount of weight, drying, etc ever seemed to work.
denlex wrote:
And, what did you do with the albums that warped..?
Did you deliver them warped?
If they are severely wrapped (like with waves) when they arrive they go back to the album company right away. If they start wrapping slightly weeks or months after arriving then it is simply a weather/humidity change and they will straighten out on their own. I haven't had to send back an album in years. The last time, was a SoHo book from Renaissance.
Vision Art books are made different than most flush albums and they have their own set of problems. But that is for another discussion.
Other than the LC that arrived warped and was sent back, the other sample albums have developed warps over time sitting on my coffee table for evaluation and display. I haven't had a customer (knock on wood) return one but that's because I mostly use VA and have just tried out the others. I used to use Picto and QB's with no problem.
denlex wrote:
My experience has been the same, once warped, it never gets fixed, no matter what...
Mine too.
This is just peanut gallery, empirical observation so take it for what it's worth. To me it's useful to think about it in terms of grouping the dynamics at play...
There are three categories of this general sort of distortion: 1) folding; 2) gentle, even torquing - as in mildly twisting or rolling a print or paper; and 3) dimensional instability caused by hydrating or dehydrating (or heating or cooling) - read: warping.
Over decades of work with paper, prints, board, wood and metal, what I've seen:
1. Folding is a done deal (no surprise). The fibers or grain structure are toast, never to be the same again;
2. Mild torquing or rolling can be "undone" as the damage to or misalignment of the interwoven structure is fairly uniform and not severe - that is to say, the material's flat "memory" remains largely intact;
3. Warp can sometimes be lessened, but never fully (as in, glass flat) righted. Similar to folding, there's fundamental change or trauma at the fiber or grain level that is the material's "new normal".
Trying to "unwarp" it is the same as purchasing a deliberately warped material from a manufacturer and setting about to make it glass flat. It's a new ballgame. Warped materials have no "flat" memory.
Again, just empirical stuff, but to realign or reorient grain structure in paper or in metal, for examples, requires heat, not just pressure - and in the case of paper, hydration well past the point of anything close to ambient - so much as to at least mildly resemble the initial manufacturing process itself.
Their pages ar a little thicker than most and I've just had an 80 side album (10x14") which is nice and flat.
Importantly the block is nice and square also.
Warping can be a result of transit and may go after being left for a few days at room temp. The advice I was given was not to apply any weights or pressure, and to just let the book settle.
I'm not a fan of Graphi at all, but I think they may have a page type which uses a plastic centre for one of their options... But alas, you are dealing with Graphi, which in my experience has been fraught with issues itself...
Although it's a bit hard to judge from just an image, she thinks it might not be warping as a result of temperature/humidity - the problem seems to appear at the end pages, in particular at the bottom.
It could have something to do with the way the cover is pasted to the book block. Is this genuine leather? This material in particular starts to 'pull' a lot when it's mounted to the cardboard inside. An extra layer of paper with glue can act as a counter measure for this.
evertdoorn wrote:
I've had my wife take a look at the picture.
Although it's a bit hard to judge from just an image, she thinks it might not be warping as a result of temperature/humidity - the problem seems to appear at the end pages, in particular at the bottom.
It could have something to do with the way the cover is pasted to the book block. Is this genuine leather? This material in particular starts to 'pull' a lot when it's mounted to the cardboard inside. An extra layer of paper with glue can act as a counter measure for this....Show more →
I've had many from Zookbinders that were perfect. Then I got one like the op. Zookbinders fixed mine. They improved their design with what your wife is saying - outer book structure, it involved the leather cover and outer filler pages - as I read from their blog. I believe them when they said it was right at there shop when they inspected my one mishap, but board stock develops a memory also and when you pull from different skids where it has set into form ... well, it can wake up when triggered by environment, so you need the books frame structure to hold in place. The manufacturers should be designing the framing of the book as a first line of design to prevent, then controlling the source of the board for the memory,and then holding the final book longer and in different conditions for study before shipping. I can recommend Zookbinders because they fixed my issue - made my 95% satisfied receipt record for me a 100%.
jmraso wrote:
Any personal issue with them u cant forget though u should ?
Please, answer me sweetly.
I dislike the look of their albums, the cheap feel of their albums, and the stories I have heard about their service and of their quality control (colored lines showing up in page creases for example) are enough that I'll never use them.
But to begin with, I haven't seen a single graphi album that I liked. And I've seen plenty of them at WPPI over the years, plus the sample kit they sent me many years ago which was terrible.
We use VA and we've seen pages warp. But it's usually due to heat (e.g. leaving the album out in the car in a hot day). Once it's back to room temperature, it's fine. It happens more with our 12 x 9 album where the pages are long.
Had one issue with an album warping, which was almost a year after production. Contacted our supplier, and they sent a reprint at no charge. They hand inspect all outgoing albums and wrap them in cellophane.
klee.007 wrote:
We use VA and we've seen pages warp. But it's usually due to heat (e.g. leaving the album out in the car in a hot day). Once it's back to room temperature, it's fine. It happens more with our 12 x 9 album where the pages are long.
Keith
That's been our experience as well. They settle down once they are at a consistent temperature and humidity.
