Thermal dye transfer printing with chelate compounds

With its excellent color and tone reproduction, thermal dye transfer printi ng produces continuous-tone color images that rival silver halide photograp hy. However, conventional thermal dye transfer images fade easily when subj ected to light or heat. To solve this problem, we have studied a chelate co mpound system and have found that certain sets of azo dyes and transition m etal cation-providing compounds produce dye-metal complexes, or "chelate co mpounds", that provide exceptionally high image stability.