Dry Cleaning the City's Oldest Maps (and architectural drawings as well)

What I’ve posted below is just the beginning of the article; there’s a link below to get to the complete article.

Most reprographers offer scanning/archiving services.  Perfect for preservation of historical maps and architectural drawings.  While a City as large as NYC can afford to have full time people dealing with map and drawing restoration, that’s not the case with smaller cities and counties.

Dry Cleaning the City's Oldest Maps - The New York Times

The tables in the basement of the Municipal Archives are covered with household staples: cotton swabs, tweezers, food strainers, measuring cups, ashtrays and other materials.

None are items that one would expect to find in a professional art conservation laboratory. But they are tools used by a group of government workers who wash and care for some of the oldest existing maps and architectural drawings of New York City. They call themselves “dry cleaners.”

“It’s like being a tailor, but a tailor for paper,” said Pauline Toole, commissioner of the city’s Department of Records and Information Services, which oversees the archives at 31 Chambers Street — what was once the Hall of Records, but is now the Surrogate’s Courthouse.

The building is home to 243,000 cubic feet of records — enough to cover more than four football fields — including maps, photographs, film spools and birth, death and marriage certificates that tell the story of the city’s past. The last four years have seen a push from researchers and archivists to digitize the annals, slowly making them more accessible to the public, but many of the faded, fraying documents are almost too fragile to endure that process, according to the conservators there. Among the endangered records are hundreds of maps of post-colonial New York, created as early as the 1700s, rolled tightly into cardboard wrapping and stored in the city’s proverbial attic.

You can access the complete article and view the photos they posted in the article by clicking on this link:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/10/nyregion/dry-cleaning-the-citys-oldest-maps.html?mcubz=0

Canon has launched a completely new line-up of large format inkjet printers

Canon launches imagePROGRAF TX Series in high-end CAD and entry-level LED plotter markets

Canon has launched a completely new line-up of large format inkjet printers: the imagePROGRAF TX-2000, TX-3000 and TX-4000, available in 24-inch, 36-inch and 44-inch sizes.

The new devices offer productivity, usability and security, alongside beautiful print quality and low running costs, making it ideal for both the high-end CAD inkjet market and the entry-level LED plotter market. The series also includes an MFP solution, imagePROGRAF TX-3000MFP T36 and TX-4000MFP T36, equipped with fast scanning, and newly developed LUCIA TD pigment ink. With updates to all core technologies including the ink system, print head and mechanical platform, the new imagePROGRAF TX series printers are perfect for customers looking for high-production, high-quality printing, in colour and at competitive speeds. 

Superior print quality with every sheet

The newly developed LUCIA TD ink produces fine lines, sharp text and vibrant colours, making it perfect for high-precision CAD drawings and posters alike. Specifically formulated for weather resistance, including water resistance, printed drawings can be viewed at outdoor construction or engineering sites, in long-term storage and on outdoor posters. Thanks to superb colour reproduction even on plain paper, ink performance exceeds the needs for poster quality on both coated and uncoated paper.

Duncan Smith, Canon UK’s , states: “The world of print continues to change and Canon is pioneering in the industry to ensure we’re delivering against the changing needs of our customers. Where previously, CAD drawings were printed in centres using LED plotters, today, many offices or construction sites require their own inkjet printers to produce drawings on demand. In response to this, we’ve designed a high performance, high-speed inkjet that’s ideally suited to replace entry-level LED plotters that comes with a host of other advantages such as colour printing, low TCO as well as unbeatable quality and sharpness.”

Game changing productivity

All models in the imagePROGRAF TX series, including the 36-inch, can be expanded with two rolls. The optional dual-roll system enables high-volume printing from two rolls of the same kind, or hassle-free switching between different media types to meet various printing needs. The imagePROGRAF TX series also accepts rolls up to 170mm in diameter, with the lower unit equipped with a multifunction roll system, enabling users to take advantage of the continuous output and rewinding printouts on rolls. A new high-capacity stacker also offers holding room for 100 A0 sheets, and can be easily folded up to save space when not in use.

The series includes an MFP solution equipped with a 36 inch Colortrac scanner. The scanner features a generous 15.6-inch touchscreen panel, streamlined structure, integrated design and SmartWorks MFP version 5 with customisable menus and buttons. The new copy and archive mode improves productivity and makes it ideal for supporting office workflows, whatever the printing environment. The intuitive UI, straightforward roll loading and direct printing from USB flash drives offer optimum usability.

Powerful and secure printing

With a powerful L-COA PRO high-speed image processor, even data-heavy HP-GL/2 files such as electrical CAD drawings with intricate lines can be processed quickly. In addition, newly added disk encryption, protocol locking and secure data transmission makes the imagePROGRAF TX series devices some of the most robust on the market, with measures such as SNMPv3 and IPSec support to prevent leaks and intrusions.

Hiroaki Shirakawa, LFP Product Management Manager, Canon Europe, concludes: “The newest line-up of products has advanced features to expand into higher-volume print markets, in a compact model, suitable for any office size. The imagePROGRAF TX Series is dedicated to a high balance between print quality, speed and productivity, alongside other enhancements such as more reliable security. Fast printing, high-precision, usability and compatibility with CAD systems are fundamental requirements for both users of high-end inkjets and entry-level LED plotters. We’re looking forward to launching our new product line-up this year. ”

The new imagePROGRAF TX series and their MFPs will be available across EMEA from early December 2017

The information in this blog-post came from:

http://www.largeformatreview.com