Digital BW, The Print

I've done a fair amount of wet darkroom work and am starting my foray
into the digital side.  I was dissapointed with using color inks and
duotoning on my Epson 870(seemed very difficult to get consistant
results).  I am now trying the Full Spectrum Inks from MIS -- trying
but not succeeding!  

I have two images posted at:

http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=188255


One image is as seen on screen and one is the printed image.  The
image was in duotone and converted to to RBG.  I created a transfer
function per the Nevins method described on the MIS website and
applied that before printing on Epson Archival Matte.

I imagine the is a simple thing to fix, but I tried to search the
archive without much luck.  I am anxious to get out of the darkroom,
but it seems I have a lot to learn.

Thanks -- Mark

Mark,
If you have a look at the histogram for your print using the FS inks 
you will see that you have no full blacks, a huge gap and "blown 
out" highlights. 

Instead of converting from duotone, why not use the Paul Roake 
workflow from your original RGB? It is pretty simple. The beauty of 
the FS inks is there ability to show lots of shadow detail, so I 
would definately work on that. I try to get a quite a few full black 
areas on my prints. 

The usual method of converting to greyscale is to use the mixer 
method, have a look around and you should find lots of references to 
doing this. 

Make sure that your printer is firing on all nozzles with a head 
check.

I stuggled for years with a wet darkroom and finally gave up. What I 
can do with PhotoShop and Quad inks I could never have done with the 
wet darkroom. I wonder if Ansel would have stuck with the wet if he 
had photoshop available to him? I would love to get a scan of one of 
his negs to see what kind of print I could get! 

If you would like to email me a copy of your orginal file, I will 
see what I can do if you like.

I hope that I have been of some help.

Barry

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "markjamesfisher" 
<markjamesfisher@y...> wrote:
> I've done a fair amount of wet darkroom work and am starting my 
foray
> into the digital side.  I was dissapointed with using color inks 
and
> duotoning on my Epson 870(seemed very difficult to get consistant
> results).  I am now trying the Full Spectrum Inks from MIS -- 
trying
> but not succeeding!  
> 
> I have two images posted at:
> 
> http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=188255
> 
> 
> One image is as seen on screen and one is the printed image.  The
> image was in duotone and converted to to RBG.  I created a transfer
> function per the Nevins method described on the MIS website and
> applied that before printing on Epson Archival Matte.
> 
> I imagine the is a simple thing to fix, but I tried to search the
> archive without much luck.  I am anxious to get out of the 
darkroom,

> but it seems I have a lot to learn.
> 
> Thanks -- Mark

Thanks Barry -- You are right about this histogram.  This was a very
difficult negetive in the wet darkroom.  The sky was extremely dense
in the negetive (FP4+).  The file shown is a very flat scan (done in
slide mode and inversed to punch through the dense sky) to try to get
all the detail.  I was confused about the origin of this particular
version.  It is the original RGB version scanned from the blanck and
white negetive (sorry about that!).  I actually will mess around with
the curves once I better understand how the MIS inks work.  When I
printed with Epson inks I did adjust it quite a bit to bet a range of
tones. I'll definately look at the Paul Roark work flows.

Thanks -- Mark 



I will take a l --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y...,
"flyfishingusa2002" <tflyfish@c...> wrote:

> Mark,
> If you have a look at the histogram for your print using the FS inks 
> you will see that you have no full blacks, a huge gap and "blown 
> out" highlights. 
> 
> Instead of converting from duotone, why not use the Paul Roake 
> workflow from your original RGB? It is pretty simple. The beauty of 
> the FS inks is there ability to show lots of shadow detail, so I 
> would definately work on that. I try to get a quite a few full black 
> areas on my prints. 
> 
> The usual method of converting to greyscale is to use the mixer 
> method, have a look around and you should find lots of references to 
> doing this. 
> 
> Make sure that your printer is firing on all nozzles with a head 
> check.
> 
> I stuggled for years with a wet darkroom and finally gave up. What I 
> can do with PhotoShop and Quad inks I could never have done with the 
> wet darkroom. I wonder if Ansel would have stuck with the wet if he 
> had photoshop available to him? I would love to get a scan of one of 
> his negs to see what kind of print I could get! 
> 
> If you would like to email me a copy of your orginal file, I will 
> see what I can do if you like.
> 
> I hope that I have been of some help.
> 
> Barry
> 
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "markjamesfisher" 
> <markjamesfisher@y...> wrote:
> > I've done a fair amount of wet darkroom work and am starting my 
> foray
> > into the digital side.  I was dissapointed with using color inks 
> and
> > duotoning on my Epson 870(seemed very difficult to get consistant
> > results).  I am now trying the Full Spectrum Inks from MIS -- 
> trying
> > but not succeeding!  
> > 
> > I have two images posted at:
> > 
> > http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=188255
> > 
> > 
> > One image is as seen on screen and one is the printed image.  The
> > image was in duotone and converted to to RBG.  I created a transfer
> > function per the Nevins method described on the MIS website and
> > applied that before printing on Epson Archival Matte.
> > 
> > I imagine the is a simple thing to fix, but I tried to search the
> > archive without much luck.  I am anxious to get out of the 
> darkroom,
> > but it seems I have a lot to learn.
> > 
> > Thanks -- Mark