Digital BW, The Print

Hi Barbara, 

welcome to the list and the chaos we have to deal with.  Yeah, I see how the 
whole thing looks confusing up front. Take a deep breath as well as good 
notes (!) from all the info you'll gather. 

Also, remember that nothing beats looking at actual prints which means that if 
you are in a city where others are making or exhibiting digital BW prints, you 
may be advised to look at them in person. 

A couple of general issues:

- the matte vs glossy thing is a big issue and really there is no good glossy 
without coating and without possibly sacrificing archival life of the print. If you 
print matte and want stable prints stick to archival matte papers (coated for 
inkjet). they are more expensive, but useful for final prints. Epson Archival 
Matte (EAM) is good for proofs.

- the software ("print driver") issue is also big. Pick an operating system and 
ask away. Your ink choices may very well depend on your software choices.

- if you didn't like Black Only printing with OEM black, I doubt you'll like it with 
anyone else's black ink. Life of print depends on life of ink.

- All MIS and Piezotone inks are pigment based. Do not use dyes unless you 
are doing proofs or short-life portfolios.

- flush carts are a good idea to have around anyway and to use for the initial 
change to gray inks.

- Continuous Iink Systems: you didn't say if you are looking for carts or CIS.  
The latter are good and save $$ but if you leave them idle (for longer than, 
say,  a week) you'll have to burn through some paper to refresh the lines.

- Good  papers for matte prints are made by Hahnemuehle, Legion, Moab, 
Hawk meadow and others. Usually people take into account the maximum 
black you can get on them based on your inks and software - besides other 
aspects of the paper (color, texture etc).

- Toning: some inksets provide for colored inks (sepia, selenium etc) that can 
be mixed in the print by the software. If you are new to all this, try a regular 
grayscale inkset first. Your 1270 has 6 positions - you only need 4 to make a 
great grayscale print.

- Archival issues: depends on your ink and paper. We can only go by 
manufacturers claims and whatever Wilhelm puts out occasionally. Read for 
yourself. I use Hahnemuehle (German Etching, Photo Rag etc) or Moab 
(Entrada FA) papers with Piezotones and feel it's as good as it's going to get 
until we ("they") find out for real 100 years from now (!!).

to some of your questions:...



....

> MIS UT (both 1 & 2) is better than the MIS Quadtone?

I haven't used the UTs myself, but expect UTs to be better than older 
technologies (FS etc) in lightfastness. 




> On the Black Only (BO) printing, is that only done with Eboni ink? 

No (see above).

Who makes
> it? 

Anything with a name other than Epson is aftermarket. Eboni is by MIS. 

>  
> Hypothetically if I were to hang these prints in a gallery....what would be
> my best option (besides chemical darkroom and Cones Piezo.)?


Piezotones would be top on my list, but MIS inks are every bit as good, though 
different in their approach.  Frankly, we now have pretty good ink technologies 
to choose from, so the bigger issue is software. I use Inkjet Control to make 
profiles and Open Printmaker (IJC/OPM) to print from. They have been 
available at bowhaus.com for Mac OS 9 for some time, but there is an OS X 
version about to come out with several enhancements. 
As you are (painfully) aware here, many others have chosen alternates based 
on price, operating system and personal preferences and abilities.  You may 
be better off asking what's best to drive your 1270 (and disclose your OS).

So... take two aspirins and ask us again in the morning.

<BG>

Antonis