Digital BW, The Print

Hello Bruce,

** (My earlier post was sent accidentally before it was done, sorry)

>prints using this curve lacked realism though they successfully 
>displayed all the tones in the photograph. 
>A compromise needs to be made that only the skilled eye of a
>printmaker can shape for most pleasing results.

I think you have put your finger on the thing that I was intuitively
feeling but couldn't articulate. I have also been following this
discussion with a lot of interest, but while the theories make sense I
still couldn't quite see the practical application and have had an
uneasy sense about it. I have never really understood the
technicalities of what we're doing (the gamma-this and log-that just
makes my eyes glaze over), so my own pathfinding has been a mostly
intuitive process based on years of darkroom experience.

>The monitor can be changed to match the print, but not the other
>way around.

This is exactly what I eventually arrived at (but from a non-technical
approach), hence my workflow practice of setting the printer profile
to "Same As Source" and choosing a document space profile to get best
WYSIWYG.

I'm not saying the theories aren't correct, but I think there is a
whole lot more happening and a pure technical approach will fall short
somehow.

Regards,
Clayton


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