Digital BW, The Print

nick90290 wrote:

>
>And then my experience has been, when I called them repeatedly about 
>my problem, is that they say they've practically never had anyone
>call 
>them about their SG inks shifting in tone.
>
Nick, one thing I hate in politics or art is someone who tells only part 
of the story...

1)    Correct me if I am mistaken, but after you  reported these 
problems to Lyson, did they or did they not eventually send you  media 
to help you recoup some of the costs?

2)    Have you sent Lyson any of these "returned & shifted" prints, so 
they can try and figure out what had happened? Did you even send them 
any of the cartridges so they could see if the inks themselves had been 
subjected to some kind of environmental or temperature extremes  by the 
vendor, shipper, or distributor...?

It would seem to me the responsible thing to do would be to have done 
the preceding..  As an example, when we started dealing with EEM/EAM 
differences, I went to my contacts at EPSON and gave them the 
opportunity to address it.. People even sent them samples... That's the 
responsible path..
  

> And yet the briefest of 
>calls around and posting on a couple of forum websites elicited 
>similar experiences to mine. 
>
Let's see, I run the single biggest EPSON printer forum, and yours is 
the ONLY reported case of a color shift in these inks that I am aware 
of  that is NOT directly attributable to metamerism.. You, yourself, I 
believe, noted some of the prints were done on German Etching I 
believe..  But you KNOW that paper's coating will cause enhanced 
metamerism.. That's why Lyson tells people to use the Standard Fine Art 
paper instead to reduce metamerism.... The coating is tweaked to avoid 
that problem..

Then there's the small matter of this list and your report being the 
ONLY documented one of this green shift..  Yes, there have been reports 
of greenish metamerism on certain media.. But if you cannot produce 
these supposed green prints and show it isn't simple metamerism, you are 
just trying to build yourself a soapbox..  I was at the heart of those 
researching the "orange shift" and we caught hell over on the Leben list 
even with strict reporting and reproducibility.  They would have handed 
you your head for this kind of  irresponsible commentary.. (not to 
mention that Lyson admits to the metamerism on certain papers, while for 
a long time EPSON completely denied the existence of an "orange shift.")

Without presenting proof, you sound like McCarthy and his damn "I have 
here a list of Communists at the State Department..."  If you recall, 
all he had was a sheaf of blank papers...  

I can understand you being pissed off at the metamerism, but IMHO it's 
irresponsible for any printer not to check for basic metamerism before 
putting prints up for sale..

>When MIS have got their inks working so well, my opinion is why even 
>bother with Lyson. I would imagine the reason they're moving into 
>pigment inks is because they realise more and more people know that 
>dyes are a liability (something it took me way too long to realize, 
>but then I believed them when they have repeatedly told me that the
>SG 
>inks have 65-75 years longevity.)
>  
>
Funny, I've had NO green shifts other than the metameric issues with 
certain media I noted earlier.. BUT, I checked my prints under Tungsten 
and Daylight BEFORE releasing them..  In those cases, I simply reprinted 
the final prints on a different media..

Dyes and inks are complementary products..  Each has their own strengths 
and weaknesses..

All in all you sound like a pissed off man with an axe to grind..  I 
deal with enough people like that in politics, I expect better of 
 people engaged in "professional" print production..  As far as I am 
personally concerned, you have the same credibility I would have given 
to that OTHER McCarthy, not Eugene, but Charlie McCarthy... That is... 
very little, at the moment..

HOWEVER, I am more than willing to listen to your side of this, should 
you forthrightly and completely answer the questions I posed above.. 
 I'm not taking sides here, but I don't enjoy listening to ranting 
without the audience being given the complete story...
Keith

 

"Just some guy," and caretaker of the Multiverse's largest EPSON printer 
User Community (highly recommended by Vogon Poets and MegaDodo 
Publications), at:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EPSONx7x_Printers/
 
"For the rest of you out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together 
guys"

 




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