Digital BW, The Print

Thanks, Paul,

I'm thinking very seriously of joining. As I think I've posted here before, I'm doing some work for architects who are submitting buildings to the National Register of Historic Places and these issues are of course highly important to us.

I'm now using an Epson R1800 with your 3MK with MIS Eboni carbon ink approach and am very pleased with the results, as are my clients. I'm standardizing for now on PremierArt Fine Art Matte 205 (same as Epson PremierArt Scrapbook, right?). I didn't see this particular printer/ink/paper combination listed although I'm convinced it meets archival standards. In an e-mail correspondence with the Register they gave me the nod to submit prints using this combination. However, it would be also helpful to have that specific combination tested at Aardenburg, so I may join with a view toward submitting that to them. Perhaps you've already done so and it's "in their hopper". Oh, and I also spray afterward with Premier Art's Print Shield.

I couldn't find that specific combination listed on Wilhelm's site either but it was a little hard to navigate that site so I may have missed it. How do these two testing agencies compare? Are they mostly in agreement, do  you think?

And speaking of Wilhelm, PremierArt's website state that they have submitted that paper to him and they are awaiting his results.

Thanks for your continued good work for all of us!

Paul W.

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "pr_roark" <paul.roark@...> wrote:
>
> There are some new results on in the Aardenburg Imaging fade tests relating to the materials we use.  
> See http://www.aardenburg-imaging.com/
> 
> To see the latest full results you should pony up the fees so that we can keep this resource going.
> 
> Among other results, the 20 MLux Hours results for the 1800 Eboni 3-MK are there.  Also in the set of test results are Epson ABW, HP, PiezoTone Selenium and Sepia, as well as K6 neutral.
> 
> I must confess I was a little disappointed.  The H. Photo Rag tone shift stopped the 3MK from getting an I* rating of 100 for every patch (no other inkset did either).  However, if the paper white and the next lightest patch are excluded, all the rest got the top rating.  Surprisingly, not all the PhotoRag showed this same tone shift.  Samples of the paper clearly vary (or others were smart enough to lay their paper in the sun for a while before printing it).
> 
> If we look just at the 50% patch, so that we have a fair comparison that would include the HP Z3100 inkset and a PiezoTone selenium (where Portfolio K was used -- not a fair comparison to full pigment), the results are consistent with my view that 100% carbon is a very valid approach.  The Cone carbon Sepia and Eboni 3MK had the lowest delta E's of the group.
> 
> Paul
> www.PaulRoark.com
>