Digital BW, The Print

Paul Roark wrote:
> Wilhelm's Epson R1800 ratings are posted at
> http://www.wilhelm-research.com/epson/R1800.html .
> 
>  
> 
> I Notice Premium Glossy Photo Paper is up to 300 years of dark storage.
> 
>  
> 
> Note how much lower the "bare bulb" ratings are relative to the 4000 and to
> the glass-covered ratings.

Strange, the Premium glossy results are better behind glass 
for the 1800 and worse in bare bulb.
The Premium Luster result is lower in total but only 
significantly lower in bare bulb exposure.

Just a few papers to compare though. For all the papers 
together the extremes up and low in bare bulb and behind glass 
are quite close and so are the results of exposure through UV 
blocking glass.

The gloss enhancer may help but not on all fading aspects. To 
compare the 1800 sans glop there should be identical matte 
papers in both tests.

Given the changes in the pigment particle construction it will 
be hard to tell what causes the differences. It could well be 
a thinner ink layer as a result of the smaller droplet size 
(pigmentation higher in the ink to compensate for the thinner 
layer). If there were BO test results for both printers on 
matte papers we could get a better idea what the smaller 
droplet means in fading.

A lot of people speculated that the 800-1800 concept could 
deliver a similar wide format printer in the future. The gloss 
enhancer probably will appear in wide formats too, I'm not so 
sure about the 1.5 PL droplet and the RB inks. Speed is an 
issue with wide formats, consistency of the droplet size 
another one, the last in relation to color consistency in 
proof printing where the extra grey added helped too. So far 
the wide formats kept a minimum droplet size about 3x that of 
the same generation desktop models. If RB is included it will 
be as an extra to the CcMmYKk inkset, with the gloss enhancer 
that's 10 heads, a bit over the top in my opinion. The other 
wide format manufacturers returned to the CcMmYK inkset, 
Colorspan and Kodak's Encads are the exceptions in the 
industry now.

Ernst