Digital BW, The Print

Bruce,

I also have come to similar conclusions - I'm on Macs so don't use 
Qimage or Shortcut Photozoomm but have Genuine Fractals (haven't used 
it for years) but use Photokit Sharpener all the time.

I do follow the recommended workflow, do the Pre sharpening, the 
Creative sharpening (after I've done all the other corrections I deem 
necessary) and then after upsizing in Photoshop as the last step I use 
the Output sharpener. For those of you not familiar with Photokit 
Sharpener - the Output sharpener is applied as the last step before 
printing and it applies sharpening depending on what kind of printer 
you output to, matte or glossy paper and what resolution the file is 
at.

I can't recommend this program enough - it is great - I've had, like 
Scott Jones described in another post,  photographers and collectors 
standing in front of my prints, begging me to tell them which ones of 
the prints were film or digital - or if they were either... They simply 
couldn't tell...

Christer


			Christer, AKA Christer Rosewell
			  http://www.ChristerArt.com
		  	   3.7 million visitors to date..


On Aug 21, 2005, at 1:19 AM, 
DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com wrote:

>    From: "btvarner" <bthomasv@...>
> Subject: Re: Genuine Fractals
>
> I have been following this thread with great interest & decided to do
> a little test myself.  I must say that the results seem to be the
> opposite of what most here seem to have found.
>
> I down loaded & installed the latest demo versions for both Qimage &
> Shortcut Photozoom Pro then did a comparison of prints from the same
> image.  Unless someone can tell me what I might have done wrong, my
> results indicate that neither product produces a better image what I
> am already doing.  Follow and see:
>
> Test images produced by all three products (Qimage, Photozoom,
> Photoshop) were printed in color (I did not want to introduce another
> variable into the mix, aka QTR) using my Epson 2200 and OEM inks.
> Also note that the Raw image I picked was from a Canon 10D & 12x18 is
> about the absolute maximum size from this camera on my Epson 2200.
>
> My current workflow in Photoshop CS2:
> Canon Raw to Tiff,
> Applied initial Capture sharpening using Photokit Sharpener Pro Plug-
> in,
> Crop as desired,
> Create adjustment layers or layer masks as required,
> Adjustments to Levels, Curves, Hue/Saturation, Color Balance, etc�
> [At this point I saved the image to four files, one for each products
> print]
> Re-sampled 1st image to 12x18 at a resolution of 360 in Photoshop
> using bicubic,
> Applied creative sharpening using Photokit Sharpener Pro,
> Printed using "SP220 EnhancedMatt 2880PK.icc" printer profile,
> All print driver corrections turned off
>
> Qimage workflow:
> Opened 2nd image from above in Qimage,
> Re-sampled image to 12x18 apparently at 720 resolution using Pyramid,
> Saved to another file & closed Qimage,
> Opened this Pyramid re-sampled image in Photoshop,
> Applied Creative Sharpening using Photokit Sharpener Pro,
> Saved file & again opened in Qimage,
> Selected this image & printed,
> took nearly 1 hour for Qimage to do its thing & for the data to
> spool!!!!!!
> Sharpening in Qimage appeared to be off,
> This print was wayyyyyy over sharpened, so��.
> Picked the 3rd image in Qimage and just resized as above & printed.
>
> Photozoom workflow:
> Opened 4th image from above I Photozoom,
> Re-sampled image to 12x18 apparently at 720 resolution using S-spine,
> Left Photozoom Unsharp Mask on as re-sampled image appeared to be way
> to blurry,
> Printed.
>
> Results of the four 12x18 prints:
> Photoshop print � Best by far.  Sharp & clear.  Admittedly could
> be sharper in some areas of the image but normally I can go back into
> Photoshop and re-apply Creative Sharpening using Photokit Sharpener
> Pro to just that area & improve image.
>
> Qimage print � 1st Qimage print looked absolutely phony because
> of over sharpening.  Apparently you cannot apply your own sharpening
> in another tool and then go back & print in Qimage and obtain the
> correct sharpening.  2nd Qimage print.  Sharper in certain areas of
> the image, but still over sharp in others.  Enough that the image did
> not look real.
>
> Photozoom � Image was not nearly as sharp as either of the other
> two.  I attempted to sharpen based on the products previews of my
> image but no mater how sharp I attempted to make the image on screen,
> it did not look sharp.  I settled on about half way up for the
> sharpening settings in Photozoom.
>
> So, am I way off base here?  Just not using Qimage & Photozoom
> correctly?  I know I am new to both products but I do not see even a
> savings in time from using these tools.
>
> Puzzled,
> Bruce Varner
> http://brucevarner.com/

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