Digital BW, The Print

I received my copy of ImagePrint 5 last week. The installation 
instructions were concise and easy to follow. It is important to 
follow them exactly as there is one process in Windows that must be 
stopped in order to remove the ImagePrint sub-directory.  Once the 
ImagePrint 4 software has been removed, installation of the 
ImagePrint 5 software is a snap. No problems installing as with the 
earlier IP4 versions, at least not on a W2000 box. I have not 
installed IP5 on my Mac G4 at home as of this date.

Of recent, I have been making digital negatives on my Epson 1280 and 
Epson 10000 for contact printing on 100% Palladium hand coated Arches 
Platine 100% cotton, fine art paper.  Unfortunately although the 
Imageprint 4 negatives were lovely with most images, smooth graduated 
skies posed the bigged problems. The dither of the old IP4 RIP would 
result in banding when contact printed in palladium.

So far, I am very pleased with the ImagePrint 5 RIP. Absolutely no 
dither, no banding, no dots, no grain, no digital artifacts. Just as 
the company claims. My negatives are smooth as silk.

Please keep in mind that I am NOT printing with monochrome quads, but 
rather Epson Durabrite Dyes on Pictorico OHP. Obviously a Pictorico 
OHP profile is not provided, so I sent a calibration target on the 
OHP to Colorbyte and look forward to it's return.

I am making my negatives with Dan Burkholders Color Table - Color 
Density method. This method results in a negative that is 
brown/orange in color. The color table values for the cmyk are 
0,55,55,0. I also have tired using all 6 colors to make a black/white 
negative with excellent results. The reason for the orange color 
negative is that this color acts to inhibit the passage of UV light, 
thus a thin negative in reality exhibits a significantly higher 
density range.

If the ImagePrint 5 RIP prints quads as well as it is my 
monochromatic orange negatives, I think folks are going to jump off 
of their seats. The total lack of dither and grain is amazing.

The interface seems very similar to the IP4 RIP. I have not had time 
to explore all of the subtle changes. I will say that now being able 
to print files created in the Photoshop .psd format is a welcome 
convenience.

Regards
Mike