Digital BW, The Print

hi Doug,
  I haven't had a chance to try the Kirkland yet - sounds like I need to. 
I am curious what is not right with the image on semimatte. This is the
paper that Paul Roark and Bill Atkinson seem to like the best. 
My experience is with Luster (similar to the Ilford pearl) and I agree it
is just too plasticy.
best,
Costa

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Douglas meeuwsen 
<lipshurt@m...> wrote:
> hello, I am on a quest to get my BW prints to be like what I remember 
> our old darkroom prints  looking and feeling like (it's been almost 
> thirty years since!)
> 
> any way, That to me means slightly glossy print that does not feel like 
> plastic. I use paul roarks curves with my 1280 and ut2/glop inks.
> 
> Results with kirkland are great, and not "computery" but only up to 
> letter size. Epson prem semi-gloss is good if I use print sheild spray, 
> but not quite the right surface. Premium glossy is too glossy. Epson 
> premium semi-matte is exactly the right surface, But the image quality 
> is not up to kirkland, and in order to get a good print I have to go to 
> 2880. Then, the dark areas are a little more glossy than the midtones. 
> I Think i can fix that by adjusting the glop curve, no biggie. The 2880 
> setting is Soooooo slow...
> 
> So now I just remembered that i have a whole box of ilford smooth pearl 
> 13x19 sitting here, also have some in letter size. WOW, the image 
> quality is as good as kirkland, and with glop, there is a perfectly 
> bronzing-free finish. Still feels too much like plastic, and the pearl 
> surface can be reflective, but the result is really nice and not 
> "computery"
> 
> "computery" is my new term for prints that make people say "did you do 
> this on computer or something?" I hate it when they do that
> 
> So now my main question:
> I know that ilford smooth papers are not acid buffered like kirkland 
> and epson premium semigloss, but what does that actually mean in terms 
> of years? The Epson papers have a really long rating like 200 
> years.....so would the ilford papers last 50 years?
> 
> I have some work coming up that needs to be 8x10 (Kirkland) and also 
> some bigger prints. I am think of doing them on ilford, instead of 
> semi-matte,  just because of the speed, and slighly better image 
> quality. As long as they will last a reasonable amount of time. As far 
> as I can find, the test sites have not tested this paper with Carbon 
> inks, so you cant tell if they are rating the paper, or the inks.
> 
> Thanks for any info! Doug M