Abstract: A set of color ink compositions for ink-jet printing includes yellow, magenta and cyan ink composition, each of which having water, a water-soluble coloring agent, a wetting agent, a surfactant and an antiseptic and mildewproofing agent, and the yellow ink composition has the lightness index L* of 95.+-.5 and the chromaticness indices a* and b* of respectively -6.+-.5 and 23 .+-.12, the magenta ink composition has the lightness index L* of 75.+-.5 and the chromaticness indices a* and b* of respectively 55.+-.25 and -28.+-.10, and the cyan ink composition has the lightness index L* of 87.+-.5 and the chromaticness indices a* and b* of respectively -35.+-.10 and -19.+-.8.

Abstract: An image recording method for forming an image on a recording material, using a recording liquid which contains a coloring agent and a solvent in which the coloring agent is dispersed or dissolved, includes the steps of applying to a recording material a colorless or light colored image recording acceleration liquid containing a surfactant and a viscosity-increasing compound capable of increasing the viscosity of the recording liquid, and depositing the recording liquid imagewise on the recording material by ejecting the recording liquid in the form of droplets onto the recording material, and an image recording apparatus for carrying out the above image recording method is provided.