A pigment-based ink set for ink jet printing is described, wherein each ink in the ink set has a normalized differential specular reflectance, N&Dgr;RS(X), of less than 1.25. N&Dgr;RS(X) is defined as the maximum value within a set of N&Dgr;RS(Xn) values in which each N&Dgr;RS(Xn) is the normalized specular reflectance for a density patch of a printed test image. The printed test image consists of a series of at least ten density patches printed such that the ink laydown of the patches increases incrementally, from no ink laydown to a maximum level generating a density of at least about 1.5; and wherein N&Dgr;RS(Xn) for each patch is determined according to: N ⁢   ⁢ Δ ⁢   ⁢ R S ⁡ ( Xn ) = [ R Smax ⁡ ( Xn ) - R Smin ⁡ ( Xn ) ] R Smean ⁡ ( Xn ) where, over the visible spectral region between 390 nm and 720 nm for patch Xn, RSmax(Xn) is the maximum, RSmin(Xn) is the minimum, and RSmean(Xn) is the average specular reflectance.