Digital BW, The Print

I received two samples from Hawk Mountain papers today. Diana was 
kind enough to send me a few sheets of Hawk Mountain Merlin and a few 
sheets of Hawk Mountain Condor.

I ran a set of test prints. I took one of my favorite images and 
printed it on these two papers, as well as Hahnemuhle Photo Rag 308, 
Museo and Epson Archival Matt for the purpose of comparisons.

Initial (subjective) impressions;

Hawk Mountain Condor is a heavy 300g 20 mil coated sheet. The color 
is pleasing creamy white that is whiter than Hahnemuhle William 
Turner and Museo, but a slight shade warmer than H. Photo Rag. It is 
warmer than EAM. The surface is very smooth much like EAM.

Hawk Mountain Merlin is a heavy 300g 20 mil coated sheet. The color 
is pleasing creamy white that is whiter than Hahnemuhle William 
Turner and Museo, but a slight shade warmer than H. Photo Rag. It is 
warmer than EAM. The surface has a very slight tooth to it much like 
H. Photo Rag 308.

Print Color w/ MIS FS Inks

Hahnemuhle Photo Rag 308     Dead Neutral
Epson Archival Matte         Medium Warm
Hawk Mountain Condor         Neutral
Hawk Mountain Merlin         Neutral
Crane Museo                  Warm Neutral

Black Density (Visual Subjective) Ranked with 5 being the most dense.

Epson Archival matte         5
Hahnemuhle Photo Rag 308     4
Cranes Museo                 3
Hawk Mountain Merlin         3(Tie)
Hawk Mountain Condor         2

Final summary of Impressions

Although the Hawk Mountain papers have a lovely surface texture, the 
final printed images trend toward a flat uninspiring image. In all 
fairness, I would guess that if these papers were profiled with the 
MIS FS inks they would perform better. I printed all images using the 
Cone Orwell profile so obviously the H. Photo Rag might excell as the 
coating is very similar to Orwell.

I also printed the Hawk Mountain Papers with various other profiles 
including Somerset Enhanced and Cone Matte, and a number of Lyson 
paper profiles. None did justice for this paper. In a side by side 
comparison, this paper performs almost identically to Cranes Museo.

Should Antonis wish to run density readings, I would be pleased to 
send him a couple of sheets of each.

Mike

Michael J. Kravit, AIA
Architect/Photgrapher