Digital BW, The Print

My 1200 sat idle as I preferred the color output I was getting from my 1160.
I liked the B/W images I was getting from the original MIS Quads, especially
on Legion Photo Matte, (also from an 1160) but I wished for a cooler look,
hopefully using EAM.

So I pulled my 1200 Gen 3 CIS & installed a CFS with the MIS Full Spectrum
Neutral hex set - the version for the native Epson driver. I like the fact
that the Epson 6-color driver already partitions the ink channels (black,
cmy, & light cm). So I only needed to make a simple Curve adjustment to
profile the paper, but I don't possess a spectro or a densitomiter. My
little Epson 1640 scanner would have to do.

I made my own test target in PS7 consisting of a smooth 0-100% gradient next
to a 12-step posterized copy of the gradient. I printed this using the Back
Light Film setting & no color adjustment in the Epson driver, then scanned
it in the 1640, using high-bit grayscale and a gamma of 1.5 with color
adjustment turned off.

Back in PS7 I used Levels to set the white and black points of the scan to 0
and 100 (both original & printed targets need to have the same range of
values- we want a smooth ramp within the ink's tonal space), and then I
proceeded to record the K values for each step of the original and the
scanned targets. I used those values to plot points in an adjustment curve,
using the scan values as input and the original target values as output.

I then repeated the process, this time printing the original target with the
new adjustment curve applied. I then made "best guess" adjustments to the
curve. It took about five iteratioins to dial the numbers in. I couldn't get
the target values to match exactly, but the prints do seem to be a fairly
close match to what I see on the screen (PhotoCal 2.6 & Spyder calibrated
NEC FE950+ on a Win2K system). Interestingly, all of the curve points are
only a 1% change until an input at 97% & output at 94% to compensate for
Epson's blocking up of the shadows in the 1200 driver.

I realize I am relying on a linear response from the little scanner to make
this work. It was helpful that the inkset performs quite well on its own
with the Epson driver (again, Back Light Film & No color adjustment).
Depending on subject matter, some folks may be quite happy printing without
any curves at all.

-BK