Digital BW, The Print

> john dean <deanwork2003@...> wrote:
>
> Could someone describe to me what is going on tonally when one
> chooses either 2.2 or
> 1.8 gama setting in a given print driver? I know I should know
> technically what is going on
> here but  sheepishly I admit that I don't.

The gamma simply determines what level of gray is represented by a midscale
value of 127 or 128. For gamma 2.2, it's about a 22% gray, and for gamma
1.8, it's about a 29% gray.

In a color-managed system, the difference will be compensated for, but there
are two good reasons for preferring gamma 2.2. First of all, 22% gray is
closer to what most people think of as "medium" gray, so you're making
better use of the range. Second, Windows web browsers aren't color-managed,
and Windows systems usually have a gamma of 2.2, so 1.8 images will look
wrong on Windows. Mac browsers are color-managed (so I'm told), so they
should properly convert, assuming there's an embedded profile telling them
that the image has a gamma of 2.2.

--

Ciao,               Paul D. DeRocco
Paul                mailto:pderocco@...