Digital BW, The Print

Steve,

I've been using MIS PKN and UT7 LK with a two ink QTR profile in my 
4000.  I recently noted a shift in hue of the UT7 LK towards warm 
(yellow) and I'm not certain yet why.  Could  just have been a bad 
batch of UT7 LK the last time I loaded a cart or instability of the 
ink.  I had to resort to adding some LM and LC in the profile to get 
back to neutral with this batch of ink.  Most of this printing has been 
with Epson premium semimatte.  I'd also like to see MIS offer a matched 
set of neutral MK, PK, and LK inks for the UC printers.  Adding the 
light inks (particularly LM and LC) to the mix tends to exacerbate 
bronzing on the semimatte.

Carl

On Apr 28, 2005, at 6:42 PM, Steven Karafyllakis wrote:

> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Steve Kale
> <stevekale@b...> wrote:
>> Diane
>>
>> Unless I am missing something, the QTR curves for the standard
> Epson inks
>> have always been "2K".  That is to say, they have always used a
> greyscale
>> compiled from K and LK with the tone of the latter controlled
> using LC, LM
>> and Y.
>
> Steve;
>
> I suppose you can call the above a "2k" printing method, but to me
> it seems a bit contradictory, since (except for the 'warm' carbon-
> only curves) you're laying down at least two more inks to balance
> those warm Epson blacks. At any rate, lets call what I'm playing
> with 2KO (2 black ONLY) to differentiate, yes?
>
> My current interest is to find a simple arrangement that strikes a
> better balance between the dottiness of BO and the more filled-in,
> veiled look too much ink on the paper can produce. 2KO provides a
> smoother print than BO,  with better dmax and better mid-to-
> highlight luminosity than I was getting with UT-1. That says nothing
> about anyone else's favorite combination, they may all do better
> than UT-1, but I think this is well worth exploring.
>
> Of course until MIS gives us a true neutral LK that matches Eboni
> (the UT-7 LK doesn't come close)  there is the added nuisance of
> having to mix your own LK ink. Not all bad, since you get to
> customize to your own taste. The other downside is the fact that you
> have upset the proverbial applecart where the other pre-packaged
> curves and resulting tonalities are concerned. I'm having to tweak
> the sepia curves to give me a couple steps further in that
> direction. But that's turning out to be easy enough, and I'm quite
> happy with the results.
>
> None of which addresses the banding problem that started this
> thread, and considering I use a 7600 not a 2200, I'm not sure I can
> help if the previous poter's printer is set to 1440-super
> and 'better' printing. I did notice however that when I went into
> the driver to set the above as defaults, the(super) box was
> unchecked. When I checked it virtually all of the remaining banding
> I had with QTR went away. Could that be a bug in QTR?
>
> Hope this helps-someone.
>
> Steve Karafyllakis
>
> http://www.stevekphoto.com
>