The importance of paper

This article is dedicated to one of the most needed commodities in everyday life – paper. Understanding how it is made and its characteristics is an important step to more successful printing.

Some history: The term paper comes from papyrus. This is the Greek name for the ancient material on which the Egyptian used to write as early as 3000 BC. Back then it was made from papyrus plants.
Today paper is mostly made by combining natural vegetable fibers. These fibers are composed of cellulose and are further held together by hydrogen bonding. In order to achieve certain physical properties, paper manufacturers incorporate synthetic fibers as well. These fibers are contained in different kinds of trees.
When you want to print a good image on your inkjet printer, the paper needs to have certain characteristics. You may have noticed that standard copier paper gives you an image that is less bright and vivid than an image on inkjet paper. The two main factors that will have significance for your image quality are brightness and absorption.

A smooth paper will have a brighter image than a rough one, because the light is reflected back in the same direction. Most magazines use smooth paper for better quality images. Light projected on rough surface is reflected in several directions. Thus the pictures in newspapers, which are usually printed on more rough paper, look less bright and less clear.
Absorption also plays an important role in image quality. Once the ink strikes the paper, it is supposed to stay on it shaped as a nice dot. It should not be too much absorbed in the paper since this will cause the dot to spread sideways on the paper. This in turn will make the picture look blurry, especially at the edge of every object or character.

It is important whenever you print to adjust the settings in the printer to suit the paper, so that the right amount of ink is sprayed. Usually papers are characterized by their weight and resolution achieved. They can also be of two types – glossy (smooth) or matte (very rough). If you want to print only text, you can usually take a standard general purpose office paper (80 – 100 g/m?) for both inkjet and laser printer. For graphics, however, you should use other coated papers. They have a waxy film, which keeps the ink on the surface and thus allows printers to produce an image at a significantly bigger resolution. A printer that can achieve 720x720 dpi on normal paper can reach 1440x720 dpi when using coated paper.

Thanks to paper properties, inkjet papers can give you a magnificent image with vivid live colors and photographic quality.