What causes paint cracking on cels?

Sugarflower · Post by **Sugarflower** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 1:54 pm

I have a few cels I just received and noticed the cel paint is showing minor cracking in it. What causes this? Rough handling? Age? I'm curious to know and also what can I do to prevent this or help to stop this from happening to my poor cels.

sailorsv13 · Post by **sailorsv13** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 1:57 pm

Well I do know that if cels are stored improperly (ie. not flat) the bending can cause a paint cracking.

~ Bri ~

rallihir · Post by **rallihir** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 11:26 am

In addtion to bending being a culprit in paint cracking and flaking, I suspect that age is the next big issue. As latex or acrylic based paints dry, they lose the plasticizer/solvent that keeps them soft. That is the "paint" smell that you notice when you open a sealed cel bag. As for how to conserve a cel to prevent this, I'm not sure. So careful handling of cels is a must.

Sugarflower · Post by **Sugarflower** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 5:02 pm

When I received the cels they were in a 3 inch stack so the pressure from all those cels may have damaged a few. I'm not sure if they were stored this way by the seller or its possible it was due to age. The series was made in the early 90's.

Thanks for the info everyone!!

kizu · Post by **kizu** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 5:12 pm

I wonder if the weather is also a problem. Here where I live there's just drastic changes in weather... *sigh* One time I noticed the cel bag I had had a slight bit of "crumple" I realize it might've been a little to hot in my place so quickly I examined the cel, thankfully nothing bad happened but now I take note of the temperature...

klet · Post by **klet** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 5:34 pm

kizu wrote:One time I noticed the cel bag I had had a slight bit of "crumple" I realize it might've been a little to hot in my place so quickly I examined the cel, thankfully nothing bad happened but now I take note of the temperature...

That actually has nothing to do with the weather. When cels are kept in cel bags for a long time, the cel bags tend to crinkle right next to the paint. It probably has something to do with the chemical release that rahiller was talking about.

Though, I imagine that weather does have an effect on cels. Like, if they're kept in an extremely dry environment, the paint might dry out faster. But we're talking really, really dry. Most normal artwork is best preserved in a dry environment.

bulma_gt · Post by **bulma_gt** » Fri Nov 03, 2006 4:59 am

Sugarflower wrote:The series was made in the early 90's.

Mmh I have some really old cels in my gallery (mid-end of the 70's) and they have no suffered of this cracking, I guess it all had to do with the way they were handled before. And besides you're asking for a series made in the early 90's, so compared to some of the stuff I have that can be considered like new

vapalla · Post by **vapalla** » Fri Nov 03, 2006 8:02 am

There is another possiblity. Paints are made up of lots of different chemicals and there is a chance that the problem could be caused by the chemicals in the paint combined with exposure to heat, cold etc... It might alse be happening even without external factors. IF it is paint, it would most likely tend to happen in certain colors only, though, not with any and all of the colors.