Digital BW, The Print

Hello Colin,

>I am not sure this going to get anywhere in consensus terms, but I 
>feel I owe you my further thoughts.  I am in the process of starting 
>from zero knowledge base to build a website and explaining that I
>use pigments, as against dyes.  I work in colour and black and 
>white, BO, UT2 including 'toned' (for want of a better word} prints, 
>MIS FS and, maybe soon, Roy's QTR.  For me 'Pigment Print' fits all.
 
>'Carbon Ink Print' is, I understand, only strictly applicable to BO 
>printing  Cone's piezotones, and maybe Sundance but not, for
>example, UT2 or Roy's QTR, or Image Print RIP.  I am prepared to 
>stand corrected on this because I am not fully conversant with the 
>technologies.

These are excellent points.  The term "Carbon" (whether used with
Pigment or Ink) implies Black and White and of course can't be used
for color prints (the color pigments aren't carbon based according to
Bob at MIS).  I don't know what to suggest for color prints.  Even
since pre-inkjet days color photographs have had their own
nomenclature (Cibachrome, "C" Print, etc).  I suspect the same will
apply here.

BW of course is the focus of this forum and all of my remarks as
well.  Again according to Bob Ziess, there are not enough color
pigments in the UT toners to change their carbon status.  The only
question remaining is whether RIP prints with visible C/M dots keep
that status.  There is still an unanswered question of whether these
prints will color shift at some point.  However, I have a full ink
2200/UC print (a grayscale image printed full ink with Matte Black -
it's mostly K+LtK with tiny amounts of C/M) 11 months now on my window
sill torture test with no signs of fading.  So if it will color shift
it probably will be years down the road.  If I recall correctly, the
Wilhelm results for UC colors is 73 years or something like that,
while the blacks are 100+.  

I don't know how picky people want to be on that one. It will have to
sort itself out over time I guess, but I suspect that RIP prints will
ultimately be included.  "Carbon" implies longevity and the inks keep
getting better and better, so probably it will quietly over time
become a non-issue.  In the meantime, my main concern is that fine art
archival BW inkjet printing needs a unified identifying term that,
preferably, meets the requirements listed in the other message.  I
think it's important and is necessary to get the medium out of second
class status.

They way I see it now is that we are past the stage where inkjet
prints (IJP) are openly despised by sliver/platinum (S/P) folks.  They
have been overwhelmed by sheer numbers and many respected
photographers going the IJP route.  The hot emotional debates are
largely over and it is now politically incorrect to blatently put down
IJP, but of course it still happens in subtler ways (B&W and LensWork
mags for example - "There's nothing like a silver print").  Clearly
IJP is making headway, but subtle discrimination is still there and my
concern is that if gallery owners and/or others who silently favor S/P
decide what the final indentifying term is, that term will carry a
subtle connotation of inferiority and we'll be stuck with it.  That's
why I emphasized the "link with the past" and other attributes of
"Carbon Ink print" in the article.  The whole point is to carve a
niche that a generation of people down the road who didn't go through
"the wars" will percieve as equal.


>In my view it is not necessary to say how the pigment gets to the 
>paper.  While in painting the terms oil painting and watercolour are 
>everyday parlance, a silver print is a silver print without the need 
>to refer to the developer or fixer, although 'selenium toned' is
used 
>to indicate hue and 'archival' properties.

Yes, I agree.   Paintings generally aren't categorized by what kind of
brush was used, but whether they are watercolor, oil or acrylic is
certainly important to collectors.  Whatever term finally becomes
dominant for us, I think there will be no doubt in the mass mind that
it is associated with inkjet printers.

Regards,
Clayton


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