new member, ignorant questions
2003-01-22 by johngeyles <jge@cs.unc.edu>
I am new to this group, and new to the digital darkroom in general. I worked in a conventional darkroom for many years as a kid, and am just now getting back into photography. I elected to go with a digital darkroom this time 'round, because I've got no place to set up a chemical- based darkroom, and I didn't particularly want all that chemical exposure. But most of all, I wanted to retain the ability to work in color (which is, of course, very complex in a chemical darkroom due to the precise temperature control required). Ironically, I've pretty much decided to do mostly B&W work after all ! I'm scanning 6x9 on an Epson 2450 and printing on an Epson 2200 with the stock inks, mostly Matte Black and Epson Enhanced Matte paper, and I'm pretty impressed with the results I'm seeing. But I'd like to take it to another level now, and this seems like the place to learn how to do that ! I'm obviously way behind most of the discussion on this group, and I hope you will indulge a few questions. I am getting the best results by selecting "black only" in the printer dialog (Photoshop 6 on a Mac), ignoring the warning that it's suitable for text-only, and manually upping the rez to 1440 or 2880. I also use the 2200/enhanced-matte profile and select "no color management" under advanced. I was under the impression that this uses the Light Black ink as well, but recent messages suggest that this is not the case, and indeed, the ink dots seem a little more noticeable that when printing with "color". But of course "color" gives the prints a tint which is noticeable under daylight (although it looks "correct" under incandescent light). I'm also very interested in Paul Roark's methods of coating prints with polyurethane. This seems like a great way of killing two of the limitations of inkjet prints with one stone - the need to protect the print from the elements to attain the advertised longevity claims, and the problem of dynamic range (since evidently the coating makes the blacks blacker). Am I understanding correctly ? What I do not understand is this business of using a "rod" to apply the poly; is the point simply to "squeegee" the coating across the print to get a very even coating ? Since the poly tends to be self-leveling is it inconceivable to get decent results simply brushing it on ? But I ramble. My question is this: what is the simplest way for me to get decent quality B&W prints now, given that I'd like to stick with the Epson inks, and avoid buying (and learning to use) any 3rd-party profiling software ? Thanks, John