Digital BW, The Print

After lurking here and on the Piezo list, I have decided (I think) to go the
MIS VM route- because of the flexibility of "toned" prints, and the initial
investment.  So here are my questions (and I would love to hear from others
in addition to Jerry and Paul!)

First, I'm on MacG4/1160, currently using Gen3, and making toned prints on
EAM.

1. Learning curve- yes, one may save several hundred dollars by going MIS
instead of Piezo, but Piezo is basically plug-and-play, no?  How many hours
of tweaking, testing, reprinting, re-doing curves, downloading new curves,
trying Nevins/Woolf/Brandin transfer functions, etc. are required with MIS
VM to get acceptable prints?

My experience has me leaning towards going with tried-and-true systems.  I
can't tell you how many dozens of hours I have wasted trying to profile Gen3
inks (with Profiler RGB) on my 1160, even on old faithful EAM.  With
hindsight, it would have been WAY cheaper to pay for custom profiles, even
at $150 a pop, considering how I value my time.

So I don't want to be penny wise, pound foolish again.  If I have to spend
hours and hours tweaking, testing, etc, I'd rather spend a few hundred more
on Piezo, as aware as I am about clogging, microbanding, and "brown" inks.

2.  Variable Toning-
How variable are they?  Sounds like there's cold, neutral and warm.  (I've
seen Lyson SG and love what they can do, but I understand there's dot and
metamerism problems.)  So it sounds like with VM, if you want a "warm" tone,
you print with only three inks.  Can you truly get different tones "between"
cold, neutral and warm, like with SG?  And how, by using the Epson sliders?
If I don't care about cold tones, which I don't, should I just go with Full
Spectrum?  

3.  Profiles in Courage-
It sounds as if you can only use VM with Paul's curves, and the curves have
been written for EAM only for the 1160 (is this true?).  What do you do if
you want to use other papers?  I'm through with scanner-based profiling, no
more!  I don't want to write my own curves.  I want plug-and-play.  (Well,
at least plug, spend a couplahours, and then play.)

4.  CFS-
I have been using nomocarts CIS for over a year, with no problems.  Anyone
use MIS' CFS?  Reasons not to?

This is a great list.  TIA,

David Corwin

I use the MIS VM process, and I'm pretty happy with it after some experience
now. But based upon your lack of desire for cool or neutral tones, and your
ardent desire to quickly get up and running, without a hitch, and with tech
support, I'd say pay your bucks and go Piezo straight up. I've never used
Piezo myself, because I wanted the flexibility of a variable tone system,
and I'm pretty stinking cheap, but I also new I could handle a little
messing around (of which there has been some but not TOO much, YMMV). The
thing is just that Piezo is the most "mature" system (using the term in a
marketing perspective), at the moment. But be forewarned, I've lurked these
lists long enough to know, NO inkjet system is without it's own particular
trials, and travails.

Good luck whichever you choose, their all worth some fuss. :-)

Todd

> After lurking here and on the Piezo list, I have decided (I think) to go the
> MIS VM route- because of the flexibility of "toned" prints, and the initial
> investment.  So here are my questions (and I would love to hear from others
> in addition to Jerry and Paul!)
> 
> First, I'm on MacG4/1160, currently using Gen3, and making toned prints on
> EAM.
> 
> 1. Learning curve- yes, one may save several hundred dollars by going MIS
> instead of Piezo, but Piezo is basically plug-and-play, no?  How many hours
> of tweaking, testing, reprinting, re-doing curves, downloading new curves,
> trying Nevins/Woolf/Brandin transfer functions, etc. are required with MIS
> VM to get acceptable prints?
> 
> My experience has me leaning towards going with tried-and-true systems.  I
> can't tell you how many dozens of hours I have wasted trying to profile Gen3
> inks (with Profiler RGB) on my 1160, even on old faithful EAM.  With
> hindsight, it would have been WAY cheaper to pay for custom profiles, even
> at $150 a pop, considering how I value my time.
> 
> So I don't want to be penny wise, pound foolish again.  If I have to spend
> hours and hours tweaking, testing, etc, I'd rather spend a few hundred more
> on Piezo, as aware as I am about clogging, microbanding, and "brown" inks.
> 
> 2.  Variable Toning-
> How variable are they?  Sounds like there's cold, neutral and warm.  (I've
> seen Lyson SG and love what they can do, but I understand there's dot and
> metamerism problems.)  So it sounds like with VM, if you want a "warm" tone,
> you print with only three inks.  Can you truly get different tones "between"
> cold, neutral and warm, like with SG?  And how, by using the Epson sliders?
> If I don't care about cold tones, which I don't, should I just go with Full
> Spectrum?  
> 
> 3.  Profiles in Courage-
> It sounds as if you can only use VM with Paul's curves, and the curves have
> been written for EAM only for the 1160 (is this true?).  What do you do if
> you want to use other papers?  I'm through with scanner-based profiling, no
> more!  I don't want to write my own curves.  I want plug-and-play.  (Well,
> at least plug, spend a couplahours, and then play.)
> 
> 4.  CFS-
> I have been using nomocarts CIS for over a year, with no problems.  Anyone
> use MIS' CFS?  Reasons not to?
> 
> This is a great list.  TIA,
> 
> David Corwin

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., David Corwin 
<davidcorwin@h...> wrote:
> After lurking here and on the Piezo list, I have decided (I think) 
to go the
> MIS VM route- because of the flexibility of "toned" prints, and the 
initial
> investment.  So here are my questions (and I would love to hear 
from others
> in addition to Jerry and Paul!)
> 

When I first started printing B&W with an inkjet printer I was blown 
away by what could be done with the MIS quadset. Compared to printing 
with Epson OEM dyes, this was B&W heaven. But not quite.

Some prints looked great, but others were always too grainy. Getting 
out the loupe, there was always an overlap of colors (grays if you 
will), mixing a darker tone with a course dot dither with a lighter 
tone.

The logical solution was to work in PhotoShop with quadtone settings, 
convert each color to CMYK and send it to the printer. WRONG!

Epson drivers work in RGB, then convert to CMYK on the fly. CMYK 
files sent to the driver are converted to RGB then converted to CMYK.
Some people say that they can use curves to get around this all the 
time. I don't see how. I've downloaded every curve set that I could 
get hold of.

I think that if you tweak enough, you can get a curve that will get 
you there, but you are working blind. You can't see onscreen what you 
get from the printer. I think that the next image or paper will put 
you back to square one.

It was suggested that I needed the PostScript driver to directly 
print CMYK files. I bought the Epson ColorStylist RIP, set out to 
learn it, only to find that this is not a true RIP and once again, 
the Epson driver does its conversion thing.

When faced with the idea of buying a true RIP for my little desktop, 
I decided to take a gamble on the Cone Piezo system. I didn't believe 
half of what they said but it seemed the only way.

I've never looked back. No problems with deep blacks, no problems 
with microbanding (like I had with MIS oddly enough), after getting a 
CIS, no problems with clogs--ever.

I spend all of my time working the print, knowing what it will print 
to.

My hat I off to all of you that find great success with quad and hex 
inks and the Epson driver. I never could, and it wasn't for lack of 
trying.

David, I think you'll find most VarMix MIS users are there because they 
didn't have a choice! They wanted cold tones or could not afford piezo! If 
you want cold tones then your decision is made. I've spent a month of my time 
and a couple hundred in ink and paper only to come close to piezo quality. 
I've been using Piezo since it came out, and you can't beat it. If you want 
to fool around, or like to even, do it on a second printer and get going with 
piezo. To be clear I'am not using MIS VM MIX. I'am using closer to full 
spectrum. There just are not enough curves availible, unless you make your 
own, I like at least 3 papers and would like to be able to print on just 
about anything and thats what you get from the cone system...
Steve M.
In a message dated 09/10/2001 8:33:15 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
davidcorwin@... writes:

<< 1. Learning curve- yes, one may save several hundred dollars by going MIS
 instead of Piezo, but Piezo is basically plug-and-play, no?  How many hours
 of tweaking, testing, reprinting, re-doing curves, downloading new curves,
 trying Nevins/Woolf/Brandin transfer functions, etc. are required with MIS
 VM to get acceptable prints?
 
 My experience has me leaning towards going with tried-and-true systems.  I
 can't tell you how many dozens of hours I have wasted trying to profile Gen3
 inks (with Profiler RGB) on my 1160, even on old faithful EAM.  With
 hindsight, it would have been WAY cheaper to pay for custom profiles, even
 at $150 a pop, considering how I value my time.
 
 So I don't want to be penny wise, pound foolish again.  >>