Digital BW, The Print

What is the difference between quadtone and peizography.. . 
am I missing something or is the Roark method a different  process  
form peizography . . any advantages of one over the other?
jerry in toronto

Jerry,

Piezography is a brand-name of a complete system of
quadtone products and drivers/profiles used with the
inks.

Piezography = price, excellent quality when it works.
Roark = same high quality but with greater
flexibility, much more cost effective.

The advantage, if you are using UT2, is that you can
print an image completely neutral; very similar in
tone to an Ilford fiber base paper (or, with controls
you can have the look of Agfa warmtone papers).  The
images print without colorcasts and are tonally
smooth.

With the same cartridge you can print images using
carbon only which imparts a traditional platinum look.
 Check Paul's site for more information, it also shows
a great example of the many print tones available with
one cartridge.  You can go pretty sepia with this set
if you really want to.

UT2 is the most superior quadtone product available. 
And it is extremely fade resistant - so long that it
isn't worth mentioning.  Just print and smile.

Don

P.S.

Comparative cost of quadtone systems for the 1280:

Piezography ICC with CIS, $724.95 (without printer)
MIS UT2 with CIS + NEW 1280, $615



--- jerdiakiw <jdiakiw@...> wrote:
> What is the difference between quadtone and
> peizography.. . 
> am I missing something or is the Roark method a
> different  process  
> form peizography . . any advantages of one over the
> other?
> jerry in toronto
> 
> 

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On Thu, 2004-03-04 at 20:12, jerdiakiw wrote:

> What is the difference between quadtone and peizography.. . 
> am I missing something or is the Roark method a different  process  
> form peizography . . any advantages of one over the other?
> jerry in toronto


Hello newbie. 

Quadtone is a term that refers to an inkset that is four different
dilutions of the same black ink. Black, dark gray, middle gray, light
gray. 

Piezography is a trade name for a family of quadtone inks from Jon Cone.
See:

http://www.inkjetmall.com/store/bw/piezographyBW.html

Piezography inks are fixed tone inks - each inkset gives you exactly one
color.

MIS makes both fixed tone and variable tone inks. Their variable tone
inks let you choose at print time what color you want your print, from
cool tone to sepia. See:

http://www.inksupply.com/index.cfm?source=html/bwpage.html

Lyson makes both fixed tone and variable tone inks too. All these
companies seem to feel obligated to use different terminology, all the
better to confuse the customer ;-) Lyson, for example, calls their
variable tone inkset "small gamut." Their website uses frames, so you'll
have to click on the appropriate links to get there:

http://www.lyson.com/includes/frames.html

Our esteemed Mr. Rouke works mostly with MIS, and in fact has done a
fair amount of research for MIS. The "Rouke method" is indeed a very
different process than Piezography.

That's enough to get you started - go do some reading, and research the
archives from this group and others when you have questions. You almost
certainly aren't the first one to ask.


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

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, hogarth
<hogarth@s...> wrote:
> On Thu, 2004-03-04 at 20:12, jerdiakiw wrote:
...
> Quadtone is a term that refers to an inkset that is four different
> dilutions of the same black ink. Black, dark gray, middle gray, light
> gray.

May I elaborate a bit? I think the concept has evolved a bit from the
original 3000 4 ink printers quads were developed on, next the 1160
printers. They were indeed 4 ink printers, and the scale was
partitioned into 4 tonal zones to send to those inks. Now we have 6
and 7 ink systems that to me are still quadtones, because of the
technique. For example I have a seven ink printer, and depending on
what I want to achieve may use from four up to all seven inks, yet
they are still quadtones to me.
This is because of the tonal partitioning technique, four tonal areas.
Which, or how many, inks I assign to any of those areas is user
adjustable. Also, a simple example is what the older Piezograpgy
system did with the 6 ink printers, it assigned two ink tanks to the
same tonal area, twice, still quadtones.
Another example being the Small Gamuts, four inks but no partitioning,
not Quadtones.
Following that logic, today there are many other systems, some I would
refer to as tritones with an additional toner ink, or two. Even more
variations on theses approaches are being used.
Some don't agree with me, the obvious being the Septone system, named
because of seven inks. But they are still partitioned into four tonal
areas, and appropriate inks assigned to those areas in ways adjustable
by the user. But they choose to call them Septones not Quadtones.
Also, offset press clearly calls xxxtones by the number of inks, period.
It could be that the Quadtone name has faded into irrelevance, but
that's how I keep my head around it.
Tyler