Digital BW, The Print

> Here's the quick and dirty:
>
> 8-bit gives you 256 levels to work with.  Each tweak you make throws away
> levels, so you will end up with less than 256 levels.  If your printer
> requires 256 levels, you may get posterization.
>
> 16-bit gives you thousands of levels.  When you tweak, levels get thrown
> away,

Levels (values) do not get thrown away (in 16 bits), unless the move is
incredibly drastic.  They do get combined (N values in 16 bits become one
value in 8 bits) when converting from 8 bits to 16 bits, but whether you did
level changes or not, that still would happen.

> but when you convert to 8-bit for printing, you will be left with a
> full 256 levels, avoiding posterization.
>
> 16 bit scanning isn't necessarily better image wise, it's just safer.

I do all my tonal adjustments in the scanner software, so for me there is no
advantage to saving as 16 bits since the Piezo driver I am using doesn't do
anything with the extra bits.