Digital BW, The Print

Update on scanning issue: I've tried experimenting with all the suggestions given in the previous posts and have settled on a solution - unless I hear from folks here that this is a bad or marginal approach. Granted, I don't have a lot of experience scanning B&W film so I'm still on the lower slope of the learning curve. Here's the Epson Scan settings for what I've settled upon: all scans were 16 bit & 1200 dpi and the 4x5" B&W negatives were very flat (overcast winter scenes with extremely soft shadows, metered with incident meter and given extended development). I selected, in the configuration settings, "No Color Correction" which turned off all other options; thus, no histogram available, no unsharp mask, no grain reduction, and so on. A "flat scan."

These settings have given the most consistent scans over the half dozen negatives I've been testing; there's no pure whites or blacks. I then take them into PS and open a histogram adjustment layer; I click "Auto" to bring the black/white points to the point of clipping. I then save for later adjustments. Of the various methods tried, e.g., B&W Neg. Film, Positive Film, Color Neg. Film, and different histogram settings before scanning, the flat scan with the Auto adjust in PS produced the most normal appearing image from which to base further work. Am I missing anything with this approach? I'd like to get it right the first time so as to avoid redoing later on. Thanks.