Digital BW, The Print

The new Piezotones give far superior prints to my eye and spectrophotometer
than the MIS inks.  The MIS inks flutter around a very critical area of the
dmax range (1.5 to 1.65).  When you go with the piezotones you get out of
this range with all of the major papers...(1.65- 1.85).  This makes a huge
difference to my eye.  A 1.55 dmax print is unacceptable while a 1.65 dmax
is ok to me.  That said I have a much broader range of papers...some much
cheaper than Hahnemuhle that give great prints.  This difference more than
compensates for the price difference in inks given that paper is really the
big cost in all of this...not inks. Believe me, if you can get a good print
on a paper that is 50 cent's per sheet cheaper that makes whatever
difference in ink cost there is amount to nothing. If I want to change from
one inkset to another (which I don't do too offen) I just swap carts and run
a flush image. For desktop printers I keep my main ink in a CIS and then use
hand filled carts for special jobs with other inks.  With my 7000 I just
keep multiple sets of carts.   When the Piezotone Sepia and Neutral-Cool
inks come out later this summer you will have as broad a range of tones as
VM and WM-sepia offer and without the hassle of an RGB workflow.  I'm using
Imageprint instead of the epson or piezo drivers.  It is available for both
windows and the mac.  The output is simply excellent and final profiles for
the piezotones on a broad range of papers will be out within the next couple
of weeks...I'm testing beta's now and they are outstanding.

Robert

On 8/7/02 8:36 PM, "Alan Zinn" <AZinn@...> wrote:

> At 05:58 PM 8/7/2002 -0400, you wrote:
>> I am ready to get a printer. I was waiting to see what happened with the
>> 2200, to make the decision. It seems that the 2200 is not a good printer
>> for someone who is primarly interested in B&W.  So it's the 1280. Now I
>> need to select the inking system. It's boiled down to the MIS hextone
>> Variable Mix inks or the Piezo driver and Piezo inks. I do like the
>> flexibility of being able to select print coolness based on the subjec,
>> what I am trying to say and where it will be displayed. This seems to
>> argue for the MIS solution.
>> 
>> One the other hand I have heard that the Piezo driver produces a
>> smoother tonal range. All my images will be scanned 6x7 or 4x5 so the
>> tonal range will be there to capture. Is this ture about the Piezo dirver?
>> 
>> So instead of talking about the merits of imbedded assembly code in a C
>> program could someone give me a little help here:-).
>> 
>> Truman
>> 
> 
> Truman,
> 
> It's a tough call.  I have friends who use the MIS or Generations inks and
> curve adjustments that are making superb prints on older Epson machines
> (1160, 1200). I use the Piezo system with MIS and Gen black inks in
> home-filled carts and have had few problems. My ramp has been behaving
> consistently for some time now and the 980 printer is a sweetheart. If I
> were starting from scratch and didn't have time to learn to do the curves
> adjustments I'd go for the Piezo. Also if I were expecting to use a variety
> of papers I'd for sure want the Piezo. I'd worry most about how either
> system is going to evolve with the new printers. Seems to me OEM inks and
> drivers should be just about ready for salon-quality b/w output.
> 
> AZ
> 
> Maker of Lookaround panoramic camera.
> http://www.panoramacamera.us
>        or
> keyword.com lookaround
> 
> 
> 
> 
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