A few thoughts:- Black and white (monochrome) lasts far longer than colour - monochrome is based on silver whereas colour is based on dyes that fade. The longest lasting colour dyes are those used in the Cibachrome/Ilfochrome Classic transparency to print process (P3/P30/P3000). If you want to make long-lasting colour prints from negatives use a good paper such as Fuji Crystal Archive which is rated at 100 year live. By comparison no ink-jet paper will get near 30 years. (Remember those figures are life before one has lost a certain percentage not life before it has all gone.) As a better medium how about printing to plastic - one can get transparancy material for the Ilfochrome Classic and RA-4 (colour printing from negatives) processes and plastic may have a longer life than paper. (see Ilford CLM.1K or Fujiflex Crystal Archive). An alternative is a transparency - even if encapsulated it should be possible to print a copy from it. Once you have an image encapsulate it in hermetically sealed sheets of glass or overall plastic - keep out air, moisture, mites, fungi etc. Write the metadata on the back, who, where, when, what type of paper etc. If the image has faded then proper processes could recover it. Store several different versions! Tom -----Original Message----- From: KJlatsj@aol.com [mailto:KJlatsj@aol.com] Sent: 12 March 2002 07:36 To: VINTAGE-PHOTOS-L@rootsweb.com Subject: [VINTAGE-PHOTOS] Can anyone answer this q? Hello everyone, I don't know where I can ask this question, but thought someone here might be able to help. My FIL wants to seal up a picture of my MIL in the entombment (correct word?) area with her so that if it's ever opened up again people will know what she looked like. He wants the picture to last a very long time and would like to know how to preserve the picture for entombment? I don't think I've run across this topic before. So any help would be much appreciated. Thank you, Kathy