Digital BW, The Print

In a message dated 3/9/06 4:39:26 PM, mark@... writes:


> Robert, not to slam you but....
> It's not like you just read some articles and buy some equipment, it 
> takes years of experience to do what you want to do. You might want 
> to re-think.
> 

The above comment represents one viewpoint about digital black and white, 
that its a journey, an advanced skill that only the initiated can expect to get 
excellent results from. Thats one of the wonderful things about photography, is 
the lifelong journey that it can entail. The Black and White mode in the 
Epson 7800 printer would represent the other viewpoint: that gallery quality B&W 
can be made from a good image on screen, with the push of a button. Pay for 
this machine, get instant, gallery quality, black and white prints.

There is validity to both views, but to tell someone who is researching 
equipment that it will require years of experience to get acceptable results is to 
beg to be left in the dust as irrelevant. Typesetters reassured me, with a 
straight face, and heartfelt emotion, that desktop publishing was inferior, that 
that their skills would be needed indefinately. Pencil-based draftsmen in 
architecturel firms told me the same about CAD. Film-based photographers assured 
me that their markets would never succumb to digital. Does anyone really want 
to tell me that it will require years of experience and experimentation to get 
a system that will take a good B&W image in screen, and make a large, gallery 
quality, archival print from it? 

We can argue the differences between methods, and tinker to our hearts 
content... but that does not mean that an intelligent "outsider" can't buy a system 
that will make salable, durable prints right off the shelf. One does not 
necessarily need to be an inventor/mechnic/tinkerer to print salable black and 
white digital prints anymore; even if that feels like it undercuts the efforts of 
many of us who "rolled our own" systems over the years.

C. David Tobie
Product Technology Manager
ColorVision Business Unit
Datacolor Inc.
CDTobie@colorvision.com
www.colorvision.com


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