Digital BW, The Print

Hello Yawie,

>I'm almost certain I checked Black Ink Only, but I have no loupe 
>to be for sure. 

If you're getting a color cast there has to be some color ink
involved.  It's pretty hard to get green or magenta from black ink
only.  If you can buy or borrow a loupe you'll be able to check it for
sure.


>I have now changed the Photo Black ink with the Matte one and have
>been printing some graycharts on Epson's Matte Paper. It's a little
>getting used to, but there's definately no colourcast here! 

Sounds good.



>However, in some parts of the chart the printing pattern goes 
>weird.  Can that be due to the change of inks?

What does "goes weird" mean?

 
>You write that Matte Black ink will be less cool in colour prints. 

I didn't mean color prints, I meant the color tone of the ink.  Photo
Black is very warm black in color (actually dark brown).   Matte Black
is less warm, and Eboni is even less warm than that.  In addition,
depending on the paper, the color can vary.  I use Eboni, and on
certain Hawk Mountain papers it is much cooler than on PhotoRag or EEM
(cooler meaning approaching true black instead of brown).


>I do want cool prints, meaning: no hints of blue, green or magenta! 

The terms "cool" and "warm" usually don't refer to color casts (also
called metamerism) or lack of them.  Those are caused by techniques
that mix color inks in with the black.  Cool/Warm refers to the
black/brown-ness, either the tone of the black ink or the overall tone
of the BW print.  

The black inks really aren't black, they are dark brown.  Most prints
with black ink only look warm (brown) to some degree.  Some techniques
mix little bits of cyan and magenta in with the black to cool it down
(make it look more like black).  These other color ink dots can be
seen with a loupe.  The Black Only technique uses just the black ink,
and relies on  the choice of ink and paper to control the coolness or
warmpth of the result.

>Can you also shed some light on an ink/paper combination that 
>would be best for BO prints using semi or glossy papers?  

I have experience only with matte papers.  Maybe someone else can help
with that.

>And can Ebony ink also be used for colour prints?

On my 220 I have tried a few color prints using Eboni and they look
fine to me.  But I'm not a color printer expert, so don't rely on
that.  Ask someone who really know color printing.


Regards,
Clayton


Info on black and white digital printing at    
http://www.cjcom.net/digiprnarts.htm