mounting photos

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By "mount" I assume you mean Dry Mount as opposed to Hinge Mount, Overlay Mount, or some other techinique?

The answer is, no I don't dry mount every photo. Only when it's appropriate.
In fact, I'd say my predominate mounting technique for photos is to hinge.
 
Hinging is always the best option because it is reversible. However, I usually find that anything over 8 x 10 usually looks better mounted down and my preferred method is cold lamination onto Kapafix.

Often, by the time the photos have been mauled around by careless and unskilled hands mounting is the only way of making them look presentable.
 
Depending on the desire of the photographer, pros' like dry mounting. For snapshots and valuable art photographs that are not reproducible I prefer photo corners/corner pockets.
 
We've learned hard lessons both ways on this subject.

I prefer dry mounting replacable photos over 8x10 also, but we always double-check heat tolerance with customer or photographer first. Rare or valuable pieces are almost always held with mounting strips or other conservative methods.

But every order needs to be judged on it's own merits, and the customer's preferences.
 
I would ask the customer if they have a the image stored on file before permanently mounting.
Also explain the trade-off of visual appeal, ie flatness vs. conservation.
 
Thanks for the input. I had felt that 8x10 was the threshhold where mounting - and I did mean dry mount or PS - should be done for appearance sake. However I have framed some 5x7's that I thought might have looked better had they been dry or PS mounted - depends on the photo paper I guess.
 
Something that will make me stop from drymounting a photo is the texture on the finish. When we drymount photos, the texture typically gets smoothed out a bit. A couple times it didn't look so good, so I'm always nervous to do this. But lately, it hasn't been too bad. Bigger problems came from dirt on the print as it went into the press.

That's for the RC/professionally printed photos. Home inkjets and laser prints cause us to change the kind of release paper we use to prevent transfer. And I should charge double whenever anyone brings in a photocopy to mount!

Finally, apparently (and another grumbler might be able to clarify this) another store in our area supposedly has a policy of "mount everything". :shrug: Not my place, that's for sure.
 
IMO., I suppose it depends on the value of the print as has already been said. If the photograph is 'fine art', especially limited editions, has cost a significant amount, and is likely to have any future value; then if it's ever sold on in the future, the seller/collector would naturally want to advertise it as in 'mint condition'. He certainly couldn't do that if the print was mounted in any other way than something that's completely reversible.
 
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