Digital BW, The Print

Louis Dina wrote:

>Both IJC/OPM and QTR deliver excellent B&W and toned monochrome prints 
>using the standard UC inkset.  Great Dmax, smooth gradations, linear 
>output, excellent neutrality, etc.  They are both inexpensive 
>solutions, and if you are happy with the B&W prints you get from your 
>4000, you will be able to leave the standard inkset in your printer for 
>color work.  
>
>I do this with my 2200.  I use IJC/OPM for all my monochrome printing, 
>and the Epson driver with custom profiles for color work.  Works on 
>either a PC or Mac platform.  
>
>Lou
>
>  
>
This isn't to argue about the quality of the B&W possible with the RIPs 
and the Ultrachrome inkset but I'm interested whether the two blacks are 
both used in the 4000 for matte printing with mentioned RIPs.

I may have missed something since the introduction of the 4000 and my 
questions then whether QTR could address the 3 black/grey ink channels 
at the same time. The answer then was (AFAIR) that one couldn't use 
Photo Black + Matte Black at the same time. I have no 4000 here so I 
never checked what QTR actually does with the 4000. If IJC/OPM can drive 
the 3 channels at the same time then there's no firmware or hardware 
limitation and QTR should be able to do it in theory.

Is IJC/OPM useing the 3 black/greys at the same time ?  And what does 
QTR with the 4000 ?

I'm using QTR now with the MIS inks: Eboni + PK + two lighter greys in a 
9000 for matte papers. Though the PK is quite dark for a set like that I 
like to keep it that way for reasons that have more to do with 
consistency of the printer for both matte and gloss printing.

In general the 3 black/greys of the Ultrachrome sets are all quite dark 
compared to other quad sets, the finer minimum droplet size and the 
variable droplet size take care of that. Changing the black/grey inks to 
a more quad compatible set will change the color printing basics too and 
influence the gloss Dmax.

Ernst