Digital BW, The Print

my testing resulted in purchasing Blow-Up as well. The ability to add grain and the other controls seem to make it possible to break up that plastic look resulting from many of these tools. Unfortunately I think it may be the priciest. I believe the last GF demo I tested was v5, and it has been updated. I also find I have to do a variety of edge or non-edge sharpening depending on the file, using complex masks. The worst artifacts come from digital files sharpened at processing that someone then wants to make unwise large print sizes from, more USM for the large print tends to bring out the halos in their initial process sharpening to a nasty degree while still not enhancing other image areas enough.
I still find over upresing with Bicubic Smoother, then some USM, then down resing back to the native printer dpi with Bicubic Sharper can work well too.
Bottom line is, when this stuff becomes necessary we're usually considering making the best of a bad situation and picking tools accordingly...
Tyler



--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "john" <deanwork2003@...> wrote:
>
> I used the SI and for years. Everytime I tested Fractals I found it lacking. Found new versions of Photoshop bi cubic smoother to actually work better. The best thing I've found and what I use now is Blow-Up. Much more control there.
> 
> j
> 
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Paul" <roark.paul@> wrote:
> >
> > >... the question is not only what looks sharper, but also what looks 
> > > more natural. ...
> > 
> > I agree, and like any tool we use, any change in the original image can "overcook" the file if not carefully used.
> > 
> > In fact, my experiments with color images and GF have not been encouraging.  It seems to be best with B&W, and then only with a minority of files.
> > 
> > My original interest in GF was really to remove what I see as artificial digital pixelization "artifacts" that I do not think look natural. 
> > 
> > I think most of our digital files can benefit from some careful sharpening.  But, that also usually sharpens the noise in the image, and I'm usually interested in the best signal to noise ratio.  GF appears to sometimes help improve that s/n ratio better than the normal tools in Photoshop.
> > 
> > With respect the edge sharpness difference, it's interesting that some have done work that suggests that we see much higher effective resolutions at edges than, for example, we can separate in lp/mm charts.  There is, for example, a look to some old 8x10 contact prints that we may never be able to replicate with either enlarger or inkjet technology.  In think this sometimes comes from a sharpness that never gets through a second lens or inkjet printer.  Contact prints may be one example of where our mental edge detection algorithms show themselves, and this is with a strictly "photographic" print in one of its purest forms.  So, I'm not sure that a tool that sharpens edges more than the rest of the image is necessarily a negative.
> > 
> > 
> > Time will tell whether I'll actually find the tool worth much in my printing. 
> > 
> > At any rate, it's just another interesting tool to consider.
> > 
> > Paul
> > www.PaulRoark.com
> >
>