Digital BW, The Print

While the heavy weights take a well deserved breather I thought I'd throw in
my two cents.

<Geek mode on>
Dynamic range has a very specific meaning to people involved in signal
processing and designers of optical, audio and many other types of
equipment.  That definition is just as Austin has stated.  Dynamic Range
(DR) = 10log10 (smallest signal/largest signal).  Some of the confusion
comes from the definition of the numerator.  The "smallest signal" is not
the least dense or the least grey, it is the difference in density (or
greyness or whatever you are measuring) between one sample and another which
is the smallest possible amount greyer (or more dense or whatever you are
measuring).

If you accept the definition above, then Dynamic Range does describe the
number of intermediate values.  The number of intermediate values is the
range of values divided by the "smallest signal".

<Geek mode off>

Having said that, it seems to me that a perfectly meaningful and unambiguous
(in any ordinary sense of those words) conversation can be had between two
printers using "dynamic range" and "density range" interchangeably to
describe the range of tones produced by an ink/paper/workflow combination.


Good Printing,



Kevin Gulstene