Digital BW, The Print

Hello Ben,

As others have said, IMO you can use the photoshop utility and get 
perfectly useable monitor calibration. Could you do better? 
Probably, but only incrementaly and, also in my opinion, not so much 
so that it is worth large expenditures.

As for printer calibration, I think a densitometer can be helpful 
but is more usefull with color than black&white. A scanner can 
substitute in most instances even though not as precise. You can 
also simply use photoshop curves to linearise black&white output.
I do believe calibration/profiling for color is needed for non oem 
papers and inks.

In terms of numbers, I believe they are indeed relevant. If you send 
a 128,128,128 dot to the printer, it will be printed the same every 
time.( or else you need to change printers ) It is the consistancy 
that truly matters. You can compensate balance and/or tones so long 
as a given #set prints the same each time. This is particularly true 
if you are not trying to match up to someone else's gear but merely 
printing your own stuff. Color spaces and color management merely 
distort the 0-255 or % no's onscreen in different ways for different 
purposes and are themselves an artificial construct. Yes they are 
usefull albeit with much mumbo jumbo attached. IMO the primary 
benefits are #1--convenience (worth as much as you choose) and #2--
standardisation (pretty much a necessity if you are expecting to 
ship files off to be printed economically elsewhere).

After all, it is you that is likely going to manipulate the 
tonal/color relationships to suit whatever you envisioned to begin 
with regardless of where they might have started out.

Regards
Duane


--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Ben Rosengart 
<yahoo.com@n...> wrote:
> Dear all,
>   I'd like to get some more rigor in my printing process, and I 
just
> don't know where to start.
> 
> Which is more important -- to calibrate the monitor, or profile the
> printer?  Or are both necessary?
> 
> Is it possible/useful to go to a "color-managed" (really
> luminance-managed, I suppose) workflow without a densitometer
> or monitor calibrating device?
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> -- 
>  Ben Rosengart                                          ben@n...
>        "Young people should be seen and not heard, because they're
>         good-looking but not too bright.  We're pretty bright now,
>         but we're ugly." -- Grace Slick on the '60s youth movement