Abstract: A sublimation thermal transfer recording material including a substrate and one or more ink layers formed on one side of the substrate and including at least a yellow sublimable dye, a magenta sublimable dye and a cyan sublimable dye to form at least a black color image on a receiving material, wherein the magenta and the cyan sublimable dye have better light resistance than the yellow sublimable dye.

Abstract: A sublimation thermal image transfer recording method for thermally forming images on an image receiving sheet prepared by forming a dye-receiving layer on a substrate, includes the steps of superimposing a sublimation thermal image transfer recording sheet which has a substrate and at least one recording layer formed thereon containing a sublimable dye, on the image receiving sheet in such a manner that the recording layer of the recording sheet comes into contact with the dye-receiving layer of the image receiving sheet, recording images on the dye-receiving layer of the image receiving sheet by applying thermal energy Ei imagewise to the recording sheet from the substrate side thereof using a thermal head, and subjecting the image-bearing image receiving sheet to heat treatment by applying thermal energy Eb to the image receiving sheet using the thermal head through a sheet member for heat treatment, the thermal energy Eb being smaller than the thermal energy Ei.

Abstract: A sublimation thermal transfer recording material which includes a substrate and an ink layer formed on the substrate for forming a color image, the ink layer including a plurality of sublimable dye groups each of which has different hue and each of which includes one or more sublimable dyes, wherein, provided that weighted average values of solubility of each dye to toluene in each sublimable dye group are values D1, D2, D3, . . . , and Dn, and a maximum value thereof is Dh, each of the values Dn other than the maximum value Dh is greater than about 0.5.times.Dh, and/or wherein, provided that weighted average values of a product of solubility of each dye to toluene and an extinction coefficient of the dye in each sublimable dye group are values E1, E2, E3, . . . , and En, and a maximum value thereof is Eh, each of the values En other than the maximum value Eh is greater than about 0.5.times.Eh.

Abstract: A sublimation thermal transfer receiving material having an image receiving layer is provided for sublimation thermal transfer recording, wherein the image receiving layer including a resin having activated hydrogen, an isocyanate compound and a catalyst promoting the crosslinking reaction of said resin and said isocyanate compound, and wherein a degree of gelation of the image receiving layer is about 70 to 99% and the isocyanate compound includes one of a xylylene diisocyanate compound and an aliphatic isocyanate compound excepting an adduct of hexamethylene diisocyanate. The receiving material is preferably subjected to a heat treatment after being formed an image thereon.

Abstract: A sublimation type thermosensitive image transfer recording medium is disclosed which is adapted for imagewise transferring an ink from a surface thereof to a recording sheet when heated imagewise with the recording sheet being superimposed thereon. The recording medium includes a support, and a transferable ink layer provided on the support, wherein the surface from which the ink is imagewise transferred to the recording sheet has a waviness of not greater than 2.0 .mu.m in terms of maximum filtered waviness.