Digital BW, The Print

At last, after decades of darkroom printing and years of mental 
preparation (I have been lurking on this list for 6 years), I am now 
starting to produce my first serious digital prints.

I recently bought an Epson 1400, a box of Hot Press Natural, and 
everything needed to make my first Carbon-6 batch (thank you, Paul).

But first, I wanted to fool around a bit with the Claria inks and a few 
boxes of Epson Archival Matte I had bought years ago for proofing the 
Hahnem\ufffdhle. Thus I set up QTR for some BO printing with the Claria black 
ink.

To begin with, I am stunned by the quality and resolution of details 
this printer is capable of reproducing. Some pictures taken with my 
Nikon D700 on a tripod look like what used to be an achievement in the 
old days with medium format or even 4x5".

On the other hand, d-max is less than impressive. I get a value of 1.56 
(datacolor Spyder3) resp. 1.50 (x-rite 810, calibrated, must be a bit 
old...).

Now, as I said, this is not my final ink/paper setup, and maybe I should 
just move on. But still, I see this as an exercise in my learning 
process and I wonder if I did anything wrong?

Here's what I used at 2880dpi:
- Ink limit 60 (it just wouldn't go higher beyond that,
   even dropped a bit at 65)
- No black boost, since I was afraid the value might drop with
   too much ink (see above)
- HighLight 15, Shadow 15, Gamma 2 (this brought me very close
   to linear, linearisation afterwards was minimal)

Maybe this is just a combo to avoid? What experiences do others have?

Louis

>>On the other hand, d-max is less than impressive. I get a value of 1.56 
(datacolor Spyder3) resp. 1.50 (x-rite 810, calibrated, must be a bit 
old...

0.06 difference between very different devices is actually very good...

>>Now, as I said, this is not my final ink/paper setup, and maybe I should 
just move on. But still, I see this as an exercise in my learning 
process and I wonder if I did anything wrong?

Well, matte media are typically in that range; by the time they are under glass, it's fine. 


C. D. Tobie
Global Product Technology Mngr.
Imaging Color Management
Datacolor.com
CDTobie@...

On Jan 16, 2011, at 6:31 PM, Louis de Stoutz <loudest@...> wrote:

> On the other hand, d-max is less than impressive. I get a value of 1.56 
> (datacolor Spyder3) resp. 1.50 (x-rite 810, calibrated, must be a bit 
> old...).
> 
> Now, as I said, this is not my final ink/paper setup, and maybe I should 
> just move on. But still, I see this as an exercise in my learning 
> process and I wonder if I did anything wrong?
> 


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Louis de Stoutz <loudest@...> wrote:
>
> ...
> I recently bought an Epson 1400, a box of Hot Press Natural, and 
> everything needed to make my first Carbon-6 batch ...
> 
> But first, I wanted to fool around a bit with the Claria inks
> and a few boxes of Epson Archival Matte I had bought years ago
> for proofing the Hahnemühle. Thus I set up QTR for some BO 
> printing with the Claria black ink.
> 
> To begin with, I am stunned by the quality and resolution of details 
> this printer is capable of reproducing. ...

The Claria (or Noritsu-Epson in my case) on a glossy paper  at a full 720 dpi image resolution and best printer qualtiy is even more  amazing.  The un-veiled (no bronzing, etc.) image, 2.4 dmax blacks, and sharp edges give the most 3D look I've seen.

 
> On the other hand, d-max is less than impressive. I get a
>  value of 1.56 ...

Try your Hahnemuhle Photo Rag.  I've hit over  2.0 with the dye black -- just amazing for  a matte paper.  It's very paper dependent.  

In general, I  like carbon on cotton for matte fine art display, but the dyes for glossy cards and small prints that will be handled, not under glass,  and not on the wall.  So, I have "eboni-4" in the 1400 (Eb6-Y, LM, M, and K) for the fine art.  I also have the Noritsu-Epson K+13%M in the C and a 30% dilution of that in the LC for quick, dramatic cards and brochures (which, by the way, I print  with the Epson driver and an ICC that has a cyan only straight-line curve  in it).

Paul
www.PaulRoark.com

Thanks for your input, Mr. Tobie. I very much appreciate working with 
your Spyder3Print SR which I consider to be great value for price. I 
don't see how anybody could make somewhat predictable prints without a 
tool like this. The user interface of the software is not perfect, but 
it has already gotten better with the latest updates.

Louis de Stoutz