Digital BW, The Print

Austin writes:

> I use Delta 3200, XTOL 1:1 and it looks pretty
> damn good!

But then there is the problem of Ilford take-up spools, which I prefer to
avoid.

> Unfortunately, not many of the digicams will be
> B&W...and I'm not a fan of the RGB conversions.

There's a tremendous amount of flexibility in shooting B&W on film.  I fear
much of that may fall by the wayside with the move to digital, and
everything will just be little more than desaturated RGB.

> I wonder how many people would buy such a
> back, if it were priced in the low $k's?

I'd say that it would have to cost no more than the 'Blad body (the least
expensive body), and it would have to be fully autonomous and would have to
be able to work for hours and store hundreds of images.  It will be a while.

And even when it comes, it will be a RGB back, not a B&W back, and I'm sure
there will be no way to get it to work in pure black and white.