I have some beautiful winter rural snowcapes I wanted to print, but
undecided which paper to use. The snowscapes are somewhat hi-key with
not a lot of shadow detail or contrast. I'm open to suggestions on
which brands, textures, tones, etc. to use that will best simulate the
softness, subtle feel of snow. I'm using a 3800 with K3 inks.

Since I'm not an experienced digital printer, I'd appreciate hearing
some of your thoughts and suggestions.

Thanks in advance

I really like using Epson Velvet Fine Art for snow images. The light texture of VFA often adds to the images. Other fine choices for these sorts of images include Arches Infinity Smooth, Crane Museo Max or Portfolio Rag.

Lightly textured matte papers, either coated or uncoated, work best for me. My particular favorite for my winterscape series is Robert Bateman Fine Art Sketch, which is actually only sold as a spiral-bound book for traditional artists, thankfully 14x17 is just the right size for my portfolio set. I love this paper.

Thanks, Eric, I plan on doing some test prints on scraps of VFA I have lieing around here to see how they come out. I'm trying to get my hands on some Crane MAX and PR but no one around here seems to have them in stock.

I'm going to go against the grain and state my favorite paper is Fuji Pro (I've only seen it in Japan this is not the same as the Fuji papers sometimes stocked in the states) It is very white and very glossy. Both colors and detail are the best I've seen. For soft or low saturation and B&W images I like mattes either Hahnemuhle bright white photo rag or william turner. I prefer photos to look like photos, glossy, white, detailed. When the image is soft or lacks saturation the mattes give it the look of art work.
Marc

Thanks, Eric, I plan on doing some test prints on scraps of VFA I have lieing around here to see how they come out. I'm trying to get my hands on some Crane MAX and PR but no one around here seems to have them in stock.

Thanks, Marc, I've used Hahnemuhle bright white PR for other applications and its a wonderful paper and certainly worth consideration. As far as mattes versus gloss, I'm kind of leaning towards the matte but I'll test both.

Hi Steve,

Are you trying to get the papers locally? Shades of Paper usually has the Crane and Hahnemuehle papers in stock.

Thanks Eric, yes, I'm aware of that, I live north of Toronto, I'm going to take a drive into the city and check out some local suppliers to see what they have in stock. If I fail to find what I'm looking for, I can order online from SofP.

I got excellent results with Somerset velvet for Epson. Others have noted that the slightly different Epson velvet fine art paper gives a better D-max, but for snow scenes that is often irrelevant. I love the apparent detail Somerset velvet's texture gives to areas of snow in large prints. I used the paper extensively with an Epson 7600.

Thanks, Geoff, I'm going to try and get my hands on SV tomorrow if I can find any downtown.