Digital BW, The Print

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "antonisphoto" 
<antonisphoto@y...> wrote:

(snip)
> 
> Digital printing, especially a profiled, "canned" solution like 
piezoBW, 
> promises to allow "print-on-demand". This means you can expect to 
make the 
> identical print a week, a month or a year later. For this to 
happen, however, as 
> we all know too well, the hardware (including heads, inks, CIS 
tubes etc) has 
> to operate identically over time. A lot of us have developed  
voodoo methods 
> for fighting the inconsistencies of the system and often, but not 
always, these 
> work. Even so, unless things get really out of whack, we cannot be 
sure that 
> print-on-demand is a realistic expectation. We tend to count on 
eyeballing and 
> the promise of the accuracy of canned profiles.
> 
Antonis,

Given the current inconsistencies, I don't know that we are any worse 
off than we were silver printing. When I get a good silver print I 
have always made extra copies if I can, knowing that down the road 
with a different batch of paper I will have to refine the print all 
over again. I am starting to do the same thing with inkjet prints.

For true print on demand I think that you would need to do regular, 
as in daily, control checks and then have the software and/or 
hardware adjustments available to keep it on track. This is the way 
good color processing is done but the tools don't seem to be there 
for gray inks. There is a real need for a gray ink printer profiling 
software package that creates true printer profiles and separation 
curves unique to each individual printer/ink/paper combination and 
allows us to constantly up date them as our equipment and materials 
shift. Not likely to be cheap but maybe someday.

Thank you for compiling your data for us. This will give us a base 
line, begin to establish how much variation to expect with these 
systems and put some real numbers to some of the "eyeball" 
information we have observed. 

Martin