Digital BW, The Print

> If Epson, when it adapted the ABW drivers to the new OS-X, did the correct 
> thing it should assume a Gamma 2.2 Greyscale or AdobeRGB Color image at 
> the import side. 
> 
It should assume "Generic Gray Gamma 2.2 Profile" or Adobe RGB, yes, but then who knows what Epson did.  Even if it didn't, so long as it is consistent and doesn't do any transformation then it can be profiled. 

> For targets that means assigning Gamma 2.2 before using 
> the ABW route. For QTR profiled printing afterwards you should then do a 
> P2P conversion in Photoshop to the QTR created profile and then assign 
> Gamma 2.2 to the image before printing it.
> 

Yes, as per previous correspondence here. Just substitute "Generic Gray Gamma 2.2 Profile" in lieu of "Gamma 2.2" in your text to be more precise.


I think there are two things to complain to Apple about here: (1) the inability to print untagged targets and (2) the compulsory conversion of greyscale image files to Generic Gray Gamma 2.2 Profile. I doubt one will ever win (1). (2) though seems much more obscure and more like an error.  Anyway, unless the community pounds Apple Feedback we can moan all we want here and it will do nothing. 

> 
> Something you can skip as it is not a solution for Macs:
> 
> I rather have everything transparent in my workflows next to default 
> choices for everyday use that stay the same in time. People learn from 
> trial and error if the tools are transparent. Making foolproof black 
> boxes does not educate people. Fools remain fools that way. The more if 
> the basics of that black box are fooling the user. The day that the 
> printer does not deliver the same color they have no clue what went 
> wrong and start asking questions. In forums like this one.
> 
> In Qimage when an image is untagged, has no color space profile like a 
> profile creation target has no, Qimage will assign a color space based 
> on some guessing: EXIF file etc. If it does not find anything 
> informative it will assign sRGB as the default if I did not change that 
> to another default setting like AdobeRGB. I can also switch that module 
> off in total. I can even switch off Qimage's LCMS CM totally and that 
> module will then not interfere either, nor will Windows assign a color 
> space instead.
> 
> You can not do that with Lightroom or Photoshop running on recent Apple 
> OSses. It is a black box. So when introduced Eric Chan had to come up 
> with a detour for target printing. With Colorsync becoming more dominant 
> over LR and PS and drivers even that solution did not work anymore. The 
> choice of CM-Off disappeared in PS even for Windows use where the issue 
> did not exist. After months Adobe delivered the Color Utility for target 
> printing, not bug free though. After that it became more difficult to 
> B&W profile ABW workflows at all. And an odd other bug was reported from 
> Adobe on top.
> 
> In Qimage I have three main choices in CM:
> CM-OFF and the image will be stripped of any assigned color space on its 
> way to the driver. The driver should be set to Let application do color 
> management and I can print my untagged targets without getting a color 
> space assigned by application, driver or OS.
> 
> Let Printer Driver do color management and Qimage will not use its CM 
> but send the image + assigned color space to the driver so the driver CM 
> can act accordingly. I have to use driver CM then of course, the choices 
> of supported assigned color spaces are limited to sRGB, AdobeRGB and 
> Colormatch + another one. That is the normal HP "ABW" workflow path too.
> 
> Qimage CM-ON and Qimage will do the color management conversion, I have 
> to set the driver to Let application control CM.
> 
> With all I can use different B&W profiling methods if needed. One that 
> is similar to my suggestion above how to overcome the Mac issues, that I 
> used when Qimage did not work nicely with QTR profiles but Photoshop did.
> 
> The last 5 years nothing essential changed in the CM tools in that 
> system, what has changed were improvements on what already worked 
> perfect. Like allowing different rendering intends or profiles per image 
> of more nested images on one print page. The last nice for comparing. A 
> feature that can be used too when custom B&W printers should deliver 
> different color toned images on one print page.
> 
> -- 
> Met vriendelijke groeten, Ernst
> 
> 



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