Digital BW, The Print

Today must be a one for rants; here's my humble contribution.

All forms of inkjet printing have their advantages and disadvantages, all of them. It is the the user's prerogative and duty to balance and make choices based on needs and aesthetics.

No matter how much the 3K + color systems get knocked around, they are the MOST versatile solution in the marketplace today: (1) they can be used with virtually all papers, both matte and glossy, (2) can be tailored to create the widest range of hues, and all sorts of split-tones, (3) they are fairly light-stable (but not the best, when significant color is used), and (4) they are much better than "good enough". With all due respect, you do not offer all of these attributes in a single inkset - period. When vesatility is most important, K3 +color are actually the BEST solution, not just good enough. And when image intergrity (what is the definition of this fuzzy jargon anyway?) is considered, it is downright disingeneous to say that this technology fails. I know it does not. I have printed with all sorts inks, ranging from black only (BO), to full color, to K2 (alone and +color), K3 (alone and +color), custom mixed K6 (no color). I found that every refinement produced some improvements, and some drawbacks.

These prints you mention seeing at SPE; well whoever did the printing was not skilled at using the tools at their disposal. They did not make the right choice between paper, inks, and ABW RIP control. That is NOT how you judge a technology. There is no guarantee that if she was to print, say using MPS Selenium, that magically her prints would improve. If fact, if she had wanted the prints to by on a glossy baryta stock (her prerogative), with a particular hue (her prerogative), most likely using MPS Selenium would make the prints worse! The inks would still be sitting on the surface and she would have lost all control of hue.

That brings to mind a recent experience where limitation is marketed as a positive attribute. Apparently they don't make mattresses like they used to. When shopping for a new one, I was told that that the new ones are "no flip." I thought "huh?" Obviously the makers are saving money in manufacture by makeing only one surface sleepable. Perhaps they pass the savings along to the buyer, but I doubt that. So they market it as "they don't need to be flipped", rather than the truth that "they CANNOT be flipped." In the same vein, the K6/7 Neutral are marketed that you can control print hue through selection of paper. Well the truth is that the "neutral" look of K6/7 inks is LIMITED to a very narrow range of papers. If you want the same look with another set of papers (very valid need), you have no choice but to go around the limitation of this inkset. Where do you turn? One very viable and better than "good enough" option is Epson OEM K3 inkset with ABW or QTR. So there is so much BS about limitations and attributes in marketing.

Speaking of aesthetics: Black only BO prints (single or multi-channel) have an aesthetic that absolutely cannot be duplicated by any other system. This look is not for everybody, or for every image. But I can attest that certain images absolutely sing with this method. In comparison, the same image with my fully linear, ultimately smooth custom K6 inks are opaque and blah. I still (ocassionally) turn to this archaic method even when I have so many other newer options avilable to me. Tyler wrote that if his current preferences were not available he would turn to Platinum printing with digital negatives. Well, how much more archaic and backward can you get? If subject to 10X or more magification, his revertion to this technology would be objectively, measurably inferior to say a contact print on silver gelatin paper. But so what? If he likes the look, that is all that matters. So why the derision of BO prints? By your punditry, you guys are doing a disservice to the potential of a perfectly viable option.

When someone explores inkjet b/w printing for the first time, tries ABW, and is dissatisfied with results, they often turn here for answers. It is rare that they receive the advice to look at their current workflow, refine their images, learn to use ABW or color driver properly. Guess what, if they cannot get good results with ABW, they do not have enough slills to go to more complex (and expensive, finicky, frustrating) solutions yet. Because ABW is capable of producing outstanding results in the right hands. Outside of making a buck, you guys are the gurus, teachers of printmaking, and so it is your duty to fairly deliniate both pros and cons of your prefered technologies. So, please let us not stoop to the "no flip" matteress saleman pitch.

Rant over. Respectfully,

Shilesh

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "piezobw" <jon@...> wrote:
>
> Tyler,
> 
> I'll rant with you!  lol  You are of course right.  The two issues are really convenience and "good enough".  I have never been shy to be shot down in flames on this users list. Although I admit I gave up on this list somewhere back a few years ago - and probably as a result of that, it is reverting backwards to printing with black ink only again. I should have been more thick skinned I suppose...lol. o'well
> 
> So, at SPE I reviewed a portfolio by a photographer that was marvelous. She shoots people who are shooting with cell phone cameras. The photography was incredible. Really unique. I loved it perhaps even the more because I happen to like shooting with cell phone cameras. I believe they are culturally important in a visual context. Anyway - she printed it with ABW on a baryta paper and the difference between ink and paper was distracting. It stopped me because it looked like ink sitting on paper, and it interfered with my ability to see the work. And it reminded me of a stern lecture I received in college from my lithography teacher who said my first prints looked like I had shi**ed the ink onto the paper. He said lithography should be the marriage of ink to paper and that statement has always been a strong influence on my development work in ink making as well as printmaking. I've printed editions since the 1970s for artists that I believe are marriages of ink to paper. Beauty first!
> 
> In terms of longevity - I should be touting my Carbon PiezoTones and Sepia K6/K7 inks all over my websites and marketing - but I also agree that longevity is not everything - and therefore neither is carbon everything. And I don't really mention the Carbon inks as anything other than an aesthetic choice.
> 
> Anselm Keifer, DeKooning, Rauschenberg, Cindy Sherman just to name a few - along with Leonardo DiVinci have all used extremely fugitive materials in their art making that has not seemed to curb their careers nor influence.
> 
> My belief, and I may be shot down as a result of saying it, is that digital printmakers feel inferior still to traditional printmakers - and therefore jump on longevity as if its some way in which to attain the same level. That type of thinking is wrong in my opinion. If you set your sights on some level, you will never exceed it, and you will always be a slave to trying to attain the same level of something that you feel inferior to. This has plagued digital fine art printmaking for as long as I have been involved with it - which is 27 years. But, it is not something I have ever allowed myself to be swept up into.
> 
> I watched in the mid-1990s as some group tried to set "standards" for fine art digital printmakers - these same standards prejudiced against the most important and influential artists of the day - like Hockney who was doing some early digital work - and certainly against many of the editions I had been producing since the mid-1980s. It fell apart under its own weight. I affectionately referred to it as the International Association of Digital Fine Art Police.  They called themselves the International Association of Digital Fine Art Printmakers. I was asked to run for President.  icccckkkkkk!   I ran away from this group as fast as I could because it seemed like the anti-christ of fine art.
> 
> You can not put "fine art" into a set of parenthesis - ever. It only backfires on your intentions of promoting it. Fine art can be fugitive. Hockney said it best when he said something like what is the use of art that will last forever if it doesn't look particularly good.  or to that effect. You echoed it yourself. It really is a universal thought uttered by artists since they began working with material other than stone.
> 
> Is Cindy Sherman irrelevant because she likes C-Print? She gets $100,000 a photo that has a short chemical life. C-Print has a very certain look that some photographers prefer over more archival or/and fade-resistant alternatives. If art is important enough to preserve, someone will. But I would hate to see all of my customers only using my Carbon Sepia or my Sepia inks. It would be a terrible waste of creativity. I'm not opposed to making prints that will outlast the papers they are printed on as a practice - but I also do not want to see artists and photographers having to fit into a pre-determined set of aesthetics, or feel that they are not in some "club".  Digital printmakers do this to themselves over and over again. It's like we never learn - yet the day of digital is not tomorrow coming - its yesterday already. It's more than arrived.
> 
> We here are for all practical purposes the last vestige of material photography. Even inkjet one day, will be cast aside because of the pollution paper making causes. It will all end up one day on the big screens. B&W will eventually be a subset of color. Epson will be Kodak. They protect their LCD technology to such a point that they have been fined multi-millions by our own Gov't for market interference. Photography is temporal at this point. It should be made beautiful and it should be made to last without eating itself up in chemical deterioration. This is longevity vs archivability.  Roarke is correct in wanting to use papers that do not have inkjet coatings if his concern is to print on papers that will last as long as possible. But as one carbon supplier to a carbon promoter, if you print images of significant importance - history will preserve the work. It does it for you, so you need to concentrate on what it is you have to communicate. Even the Mona Lisa is fragile. DeKoonings often burst in sunlight because of his tendency to favor Joy dishwashing liquid as a paint medium. Art is imperfect. That is what makes it so ideal in a world which is often not.
> 
> My rant for today is if you can't make it as beautiful as possible, why make it?
> 
> Jon Cone
> Piezography
> 
> 
> 
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "tboleyyh" <tyler@> wrote:
> >
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "piezobw" <jon@> wrote:
> > ..
> > > However, if longevity is not so critical - and image fidelity is not the most important factor - than why not just print in color and use Epson ABW?
> > 
> > well because it sucks. I can get away with that, perhaps the backlash for you would be too great if you don't maintain a more civilized voice and stance, so thanks for helping to promote generous discourse in this community. 
> > But I'm sorry, I don't want fine B&W printing to go backwards. I've argued and illustrated the superiority of the multi black systems I have access to, and compared the silver contact print, many times over the years to ABW. But that's just the technical stuff, I have to add that criteria for masterful photography has always had a technical element, it can't be helped, the process includes science. Add to that the visual impact differences. Now many don't see it, or if they do- don't care. Interestingly, often the people who are sensitive to it are those with a strong background in pre-digital fine print. Often people who don't care are new enthusiasts dslr, for whom good B&W was not even possible before ABW, so it is a revelation. We all welcome new photographers, but should they be who set the standards? Are we only trying to supply reasonable solutions to them?
> > The variety of criteria, and expectations, are huge, why must any of us comply with another's? Why because one person argues to me ABW is outstanding I'm supposed to accept that? I don't expect them to use my setup. In fact, I'm somewhat jealous they have a readily available out of the box solution that makes them happy.
> > I have old 3000 quad tone prints here I'd take over ABW, in a heartbeat. If it managed to force all other alternatives from the market, I'd make digital negs for platinum or head back to the darkroom. Oh wait, those solutions were crowded out of the marketplace as well. Guess what? ABW and many other "solutions" provided us now are not even as good as the old darkroom by some standards.
> > Longevity has always been extremely important in photography, and historically one of the greatest scientific challenges. But what's the point of prints that last forever, that fall behind artistically?
> > Thanks to everyone here working hard to develop systems that result in beautiful print, and/or promote longevity, hopefully we'll get it all, and make prints exceeding the photographic masterful quality of systems 100 years old.
> > End of incoherent rant...
> > ... and by the way, where the heck is spring?
> > Tyler
> > http://www.custom-digital.com/
> >
>