Digital BW, The Print

(urk, resend with right From)

Hi,

On Tue, Jul 07, 2009 at 03:23:16PM -0000, Roger wrote:
> Amadou Diallo's book on B&W printing is still current and gives you a
> useful conceptual framework to understand the issues- it's worth a
> read.

I've glanced through it in the past; looks like I should order a copy.
http://cjcom.net/articles/digiprn2.htm was also helpful (although the
last update seems to be about a year ago).

> I think what you want to do depends on a few things- your tolerance to
> learn specialized software (QTR),

I will if I must, but I'd prefer not to.

> desire to tone B&W inks,

I prefer neutral (or slightly toned) prints. As I understand it, some
ink and paper combinations have significant tones, which require toning
to counteract (potentially at the cost of lightfastness).

> desire to print on both gloss-type and matte papers,

I'm not particularly interested in high-gloss RC type papers; I like
Ilford FB glossy's surface, and so at the moment I'm most interested in
Harman FB AL. But I'm not wedded to it, and initially I'd like the
flexibility to experiment with different papers.

I expect eventually to settle on one or the other, so I'm ok with a
setup where switching from glossy to matte is clumsy or somewhat
expensive, as in the long term I don't expect to do it much.

I would like to avoid a setup where I have to run a print through
multiple times (e.g. to add a layer of gloss optimizer) or where I have
to spray the prints after printing.

> maximum print size,

From Epson's printer pricing, 13" wide seems reasonable.

> size of willingness to blend your own inks, and willingness to
> manually refill ink cartridges and maintain your printer.

I've never blended inks or refilled ink cartridges; blending sounds
finicky and messy, so as a novice I'd prefer to avoid that. Refilling
cartridges sounds like it's worth the effort.

It's likely that I'll be printing sporadically, and I'm willing to give
my printer reasonable care and feeding.

> Give us your answers to the above and we can maybe guide you to an
> appropriate solution.  
> 
> Personally I'm happy with an R220 with MIS UT-R2 refillable carts (the
> modern equivalent would be the basic MIS Epson 1400 inkset).  I can
> print on glossy or matte, don't have to use QTR, can do basic toning
> with the Epson driver, can print 8x12 and it's cheap to run.

Indeed, after my first round of reading it seemed like an R1400 seemed
the way to go. The I started reading Paul's PDFs and it all started
seeming potentially very involved....

-- 
  | Mike Acar |                                | mike at waspfactory dot org |