Digital BW, The Print

In order to verify for my self that replacing the PiezoTone black ink in the Selenium PiezoTone ink set with MIS-Full Spectrum Neutral black was the proper response to the rapid warm/fade shift of PiezoTone black ink shown by Paul Roark in his comparative fade testing of both PiezoTone inks sets to MIS-Full inks and as reported on prints by several other people, I did the following.

I printed a 21-step wedge with Selenium PiezoTone ink, including the PiezoTone black ink on Photo Rag 188 using the Piezo plug-in with the Photo Rag 188 profile and quality set to "Better". On the same sheet of paper I printed a second wedge in the same manner only for this wedge MIS-Full Spectrum Neutral black ink was substituted for the PiezoTone black ink.

I allowed the wedges to "settle" for 4 days and then measured C,M, Y and Visual densities of each step in the wedge and the 95-100 steps as well.

The Sel-PT with PT-K measured 1.83, 1.88, 1.78 and 1.84 with a "Warmth" (C-Y) of 0.04.
The Sel-PT with MIS-FSN-K measured 1.69, 1.70, 1.67 and 1.66 with a "Warmth" of 0.02.

The sheet with the two wedges was then hung in a west facing window where it received indirect or direct sunlight all day. After 14 days I removed the sheet and measured the wedges again and got the following readings:

The Sel-PT with PT-K measured 1.51, 1.63, 1.69 and 1.58 with a "Warmth" (C-Y) of -0.18.
The Sel-PT with MIS-FSN-K measured 1.60, 1.63, 1.65 and 1.61 with a "Warmth" of -0.04.

Basically the wedge printed with the PT black faded 0.26 density units and warmed 0.22 units while the wedge printed with the MIS-FSN black faded 0.07 density units and warmed 0.07 units. The shift in the PT black was 3 to 4 time the shift in the FSN black. The effects can be seen on the wedge as a slight reddish discoloration in the 90 to 100% steps.

All of the spectrophotometer readings can be found in the files section of the group homepage in folder:

Files > Ink Sets > PiezoTones > Recent tests on PT black fade

Based on this additional information,  I continue to recommend that to avoid premature fading and warming in the dark tones, 85 to 100%, with either of the PiezoTone ink sets and the Piezo plug in or other driver, that you replace the PT black with the FSN black until a more fade resistant black is available from InkJetMall.

Martin Wesley




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

Martin,

Thank you for clarifying this issue.  I wonder why folks at 
Piezography have not caught on to this. Did you cc: Cone, or post 
this on Piezography3000 group?

Shilesh

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "Martin Wesley" 
<mwesley250@e...> wrote:
> In order to verify for my self that replacing the PiezoTone black 
ink in the Selenium PiezoTone ink set with MIS-Full Spectrum Neutral 
black was the proper response to the rapid warm/fade shift of 
PiezoTone black ink shown by Paul Roark in his comparative fade 
testing of both PiezoTone inks sets to MIS-Full inks and as reported 
on prints by several other people, I did the following.
> 
> I printed a 21-step wedge with Selenium PiezoTone ink, including 
the PiezoTone black ink on Photo Rag 188 using the Piezo plug-in with 
the Photo Rag 188 profile and quality set to "Better". On the same 
sheet of paper I printed a second wedge in the same manner only for 
this wedge MIS-Full Spectrum Neutral black ink was substituted for 
the PiezoTone black ink.
> 
> I allowed the wedges to "settle" for 4 days and then measured C,M, 
Y and Visual densities of each step in the wedge and the 95-100 steps 
as well.
> 
> The Sel-PT with PT-K measured 1.83, 1.88, 1.78 and 1.84 with 
a "Warmth" (C-Y) of 0.04.
> The Sel-PT with MIS-FSN-K measured 1.69, 1.70, 1.67 and 1.66 with 
a "Warmth" of 0.02.
> 
> The sheet with the two wedges was then hung in a west facing window 
where it received indirect or direct sunlight all day. After 14 days 
I removed the sheet and measured the wedges again and got the 
following readings:
> 
> The Sel-PT with PT-K measured 1.51, 1.63, 1.69 and 1.58 with 
a "Warmth" (C-Y) of -0.18.
> The Sel-PT with MIS-FSN-K measured 1.60, 1.63, 1.65 and 1.61 with 
a "Warmth" of -0.04.
> 
> Basically the wedge printed with the PT black faded 0.26 density 
units and warmed 0.22 units while the wedge printed with the MIS-FSN 
black faded 0.07 density units and warmed 0.07 units. The shift in 
the PT black was 3 to 4 time the shift in the FSN black. The effects 
can be seen on the wedge as a slight reddish discoloration in the 90 
to 100% steps.
> 
> All of the spectrophotometer readings can be found in the files 
section of the group homepage in folder:
> 
> Files > Ink Sets > PiezoTones > Recent tests on PT black fade
> 
> Based on this additional information,  I continue to recommend that 
to avoid premature fading and warming in the dark tones, 85 to 100%, 
with either of the PiezoTone ink sets and the Piezo plug in or other 
driver, that you replace the PT black with the FSN black until a more 
fade resistant black is available from InkJetMall.

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

on 10/14/02 9:39 AM, Shilesh Jani wrote:
 
> Thank you for clarifying this issue.  I wonder why folks at
> Piezography have not caught on to this. Did you cc: Cone, or post
> this on Piezography3000 group?

Jon's position appears to be that they knew how fast the black ink fades,
but they thought no one would notice because the Piezo driver uses so little
black.

Todd

On 10/14/02 1:42 PM, "Todd Flashner" <tflash@...> wrote:

> 
> Jon's position appears to be that they knew how fast the black ink fades,
> but they thought no one would notice because the Piezo driver uses so little
> black.
> 
> Todd


That¹s the impression I got as well.  Seems a bit dodgy to me.

Lawrence
----------------------------------
Lawrence W. Smith Photography
http://www.lwsphoto.com
lsmith@...
----------------------------------

> A - If we deliver you a black with the same performance as the PiezoTone
> grays but with a OD that starts slightly less than current competing black
> inks, but does not fade and therefore ends higher than them. Would you use
> that black exclusively even though at the onset it was paler than current
> blacks?
> 
> B - If you knew that even another black was available which was slightly
> darker at the onset and yet faded to the lower OD of A, but not as
> dramatically as PIezoTone black because the starting OD was less, would you
> rather use that because after all it is what everyone has been used to?
> 
> C - If you choose B, to what degree are you willing to sacrifice non-fade in
> order to have better aesthetics at the onset?
> 
> Jon Cone


My Vote is for "A" easily!

John V.

on 10/15/02 5:28 AM, DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com at
DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com wrote:

> Jon,
> 
> I just want to add that my own window fade test confirmed the fade
> resistance of the Selenium PiezoTone gray inks with values from 0 to 85 dot%
> showing only 0 % to 2% fade which is at the limit of the accuracy of my
> Spectrocam spectrophotometer. There are a couple of odd readings in the data
> which indicate that my instrument is not really up to measuring changes this
> small. For all practical purposes there was no fade in the grays in my test.
> 
> Likewise my test showed the amount of warming in the grays was extreme low
> with the change in C-Y averaging 0.01 unit.
> 
> They are continuing to give me the best prints yet.
> 
> Martin Wesley

Martin,

Honest opinion time. Okay???

A - If we deliver you a black with the same performance as the PiezoTone
grays but with a OD that starts slightly less than current competing black
inks, but does not fade and therefore ends higher than them. Would you use
that black exclusively even though at the onset it was paler than current
blacks?

B - If you knew that even another black was available which was slightly
darker at the onset and yet faded to the lower OD of A, but not as
dramatically as PIezoTone black because the starting OD was less, would you
rather use that because after all it is what everyone has been used to?

C - If you choose B, to what degree are you willing to sacrifice non-fade in
order to have better aesthetics at the onset?


D - Would this not be a great poll?


--------------------------------
may your highlights be dotless
and your tonal scale smooth,


Jon Cone
jon@...
Piezography(tm) brand software and inks
http://www.piezography.com
--------------------------------

On Tue, Oct 15, 2002 at 09:42:57AM -0400, Jon Cone wrote:
> on 10/15/02 5:28 AM, DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com at
> DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com wrote:
> 
> Honest opinion time. Okay???
> 
> A - If we deliver you a black with the same performance as the PiezoTone
> grays but with a OD that starts slightly less than current competing black
> inks, but does not fade and therefore ends higher than them. Would you use
> that black exclusively even though at the onset it was paler than current
> blacks?
> 
> B - If you knew that even another black was available which was slightly
> darker at the onset and yet faded to the lower OD of A, but not as
> dramatically as PIezoTone black because the starting OD was less, would you
> rather use that because after all it is what everyone has been used to?
> 
> C - If you choose B, to what degree are you willing to sacrifice non-fade in
> order to have better aesthetics at the onset?
> 
> 
> D - Would this not be a great poll?
> 

A

The problem with B is that it is not wysiwyg, and many of us don't care to
print while having to imagine what it will look like some time down the
road.

I suspect that many of the A answers will be by those using alternative
workflows to the piezo driver. It would be nice if the poll could take
printing workflow into account (maybe a separate poll to see what percentage
of people printing with your inks are using the piezo driver?) I think it
is important that you understand who your target market is when you come to
design any new inks (unless you care to cater for them all with different
products).

-- 
Tony Terlecki
ajt@...