Digital BW, The Print

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Clayton Jones" 
<cj@...> wrote:
>
> Hello Steve,
> 
> >I have some beautiful winter rural snowcapes I wanted to print, 
but 
> >undecided which paper to use. The snowscapes are somewhat hi-key 
with 
> >not a lot of shadow detail or contrast. I'm open to suggestions on 
> >which brands, textures, tones, etc. to use that will best simulate 
> >the softness, subtle feel of snow. I'm using a 3800 with K3 inks.
> > 
> >Since I'm not an experienced digital printer, I'd appreciate 
hearing 
> >some of your thoughts and suggestions.
> 
> Any good paper will do a good job at that.  Please have a look at
> article #5 at the link below.  It lists characteristics of about 25
> matte papers.  When I was doing research for it I printed two test
> prints on all of those papers.  One of them was a snow scene which 
had
> a large patch of brilliant white snow with subtle detail in the snow
> texture.  In general I found the biggest difference in the papers 
was
> in how they handled shadow detail.  They all handled the snow very 
well. 
> 
> Any differences will most likely come down to how the dark areas are
> handled, and personal preference for the highlights.  For example, 
if
> you visually want the snow to be white, then you might not be happy
> with a creamy warm colored paper.  But that's the sort of thing only
> you can decide for yourself.   Unfortunately the only way to find 
your
> paper is to lay out some bucks and buy some samples.  Only by making
> prints will you find your way there.
> 
> Since you are using 3800/K3 I'd definitely recommend Epson Velvet 
Fine
> Art as a starting point.  K3 is superb on this paper and it will
> certainly set a high standard for others to match.
> 
> 
> Regards,
> Clayton
> 
> 
> Info on black and white digital printing at    
> http://www.cjcom.net/digiprnarts.htm



Thanks, Clayton. Yes, I often refer back to your series on articles 
on Fine Art Digital Printing. It's a valuable resource guide, 
especially for beginners like me.

This evening I made some test prints using VFA and didn't really like 
the results. I found the snow looked too warm on this paper, although 
the texture made the images look quite interesting.

I also tried Moab Entrada BW and found this paper more suitable for 
printing my cold wintery snowscapes. 

I plan to test more papers with a brightness value in the range of W1-
W2.