Digital BW, The Print

John,

You wrote:

>Am I correct in assuming that, so far, the most reliable inkset prone
>to the least amount of problems and the least amount of fading and
>warming is the MIS FSN set. I'm speaking of single tone ink sets and
>not VM or The New Epson Inks.

I'll let others answer this question to avoid the appearance of bias -- but
the answer is "yes."  ;-)

Seriously, there are a number of fine inksets out there, but when it comes
to pigmented quads, MIS and Piezo seem to be the main choices.

MIS has a number of inksets (too many in their view) that have been used
successfully for some time.

The new PiezoTone midtones show great promise, although the selenium version
seems to have a problem with at least some 1280 carts.  I don't know if that
problem has been fixed yet.  And, the PiezoTone black is ... well, a mistake
in my view.

> By the way, are the VM and VM Sepia sets
>reliable as well. ...

Both inksets are equally "reliable" in the sense that they are made from
inks that have been used reliably for a long time -- predominantly the MIS
archival and quad pigments, and the MIS VM/FS black.

The standard VM inkset uses traditional pigment mixes that do warm with
light exposure.  After they initially warm they stabilize. Also, the
cooler-curve versions appear to warm less.

The VM-S inkset uses the non-warming FS-N base inks.  As such, it is quite
stable, especially on EAM/EEM, when printed with the "neutral" curve.  When
toner is added to make it sepia, it will warm some, but it starts out warm
in such mode, so it's not a significant problem.

The main problem people have with the vm inksets is if their printer is not
supported by Photoshop adjustment curves that are appropriate or work well.
Some printers are too far off the norm for the pre-made curves to work well.
Additionally, some papers require a different profile, and tweaking the
curves for different paper profiles or for fitting the curves to the
individual printer is left up to the users.

Paul
http://www.PaulRoark.com