Digital BW, The Print

Is anyone using Eye-One Photo, Epson 2200, and UltraChrome inks to create
black & white prints?

It seems to me that it should theoretically be possible to get black & white
prints without a color cast using the UltraChrome inks and a printer profile
generated using Eye-One Photo.

Does reality live up to my expectations?

Regards,

/s/ Damon Kirschbaum

I have used Eye-One Photo to calibrate my Apple 23² HD Display and my Epson
2100.  The improvement for colour work was dramatic.  However, for B&W I
still get much better results with QTR and Carl Schofield¹s 2100/2200 curves
(I have yet to use the Eye-One to produce my own curves for QTR, ie those
refined for individual printer).  In my layman¹s terms I believe this is
because (at least) two key aspects to B&W printing with OEM UC inks need to
be controlled for quality output.   The first is the matching of a shade of
grey in the image and that shade of grey on the print.  Calibrating the 2100
with an Eye-One goes a long way to getting this right.  But the other is HOW
that shade of grey is achieved ie the use of colour inks to form the shade.
This is where a RIP such as QTR really kicks in by controlling and
minimising the use of colour inks in the production of grey scale.   Eye-One
calibration can remove colour casts but the issue of metamerism remains
because you still use the Epson driver to produce shade x at point y.
Moving to ink sets with more than two shades of black/grey makes this easier
and more effective still, eg MIS Ultratones.  The limitation with RIPs such
as QTR as they stand at the moment is the fact that while their input curves
map the relationship between a shade in the image and a shade on paper, this
has not yet reached the form of an ICC profile ­ so accurate previewing is
more difficult.  However, I believe that this is the smaller of the two
problems at hand.  It would be nice to see those elements of QTR which
control the print head and use of inks combine with the profiling capability
of devices such as Eye One to produce B&W ICC profiles but as Roy has said
in the past this is beyond his reach for the moment.  The current state of
affairs is, though, a wondrous result for those of us able to take advantage
of Roy¹s generosity.

From: Damon Kirschbaum <damon@damonkirschbaum.com>
Reply-To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2003 08:20:44 -0500
To: <DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com>
Subject: [Digital BW] Eye-One Photo, Epson 2200, UltraChrome Inks, and Black
& White Prints

Is anyone using Eye-One Photo, Epson 2200, and UltraChrome inks to create
black & white prints?

It seems to me that it should theoretically be possible to get black & white
prints without a color cast using the UltraChrome inks and a printer profile
generated using Eye-One Photo.

Does reality live up to my expectations?

Regards,

/s/ Damon Kirschbaum





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