Digital BW, The Print

Louis Dina wrote:

>Tim,
>
>Strangely, on matte papers the 2200 has a larger gamut, and it seems 
>to me, higher quality and smoother gradations.  I have seen this on 
>two different R800's and I have a color management expert friend who 
>has confirmed these findings in his profiles.  You can see it both in 
>the print and when comparing profiles using Chromix ColorThink.
>  
>

In the past there has been a discussion on the Colorsync list how the 
CcMmYK inks create a wider gamut than CMYK printers. You can either 
describe it as better subtractive color mixing of the larger LC and LM 
dots compared to what small C and M dots deliver or less white paper in 
the highlights with a CcMmYK printer so more color. I prefer the first 
description. That's the difference between CMYK and CcMmYK gamut.

The bigger gamut of the R800 on gloss will probably be in other hue 
regions (full red, orange, blue, violet) than the bigger gamut of the 
2200 on matte papers (pastel colors mainly). The gamut shapes will be 
different and the total color (in delta E) number doesn't tell that. Dot 
formation, smaller droplets with more circumference hence different 
bleeding on the edges and into the coating per paper quality influences 
the gamut possible, that's less a problem with diluted colors like LC 
and LM that already did bleed in a sense than with full colors like red 
and blue. So the R800 probably loses its strength in the full colors and 
didn't get something in return. To put it in another perspective the 
better strong red, orange, blue, violet became equal to the MY, MYY, MC, 
MMC mixes of a normal CMYK printer on matte papers.  The 2200 strength 
in the pastels didn't suffer as much.

Comparing rotogravure color mixing with offset color mixing in a sense, 
the first excels on cheap matte papers.

Ernst