Digital BW, The Print

I've been using a UT2 inkset in my Epson 890 for a few weeks and have 
produced some beautiful black and white prints, however, I think I've 
run into my first snag.  

I recently refilled my carts, but continued to produce great output, 
until I tried to print a recent digital photo.  The image (located 
here – http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo.tcl?photo_id=2226399 if 
you're interested) goes from extreme black to extreme white and looks 
great on-screen, however, when printed I seem to lose both ends of 
the spectrum.  The print lacks any deep blacks or bright whites – 
everything just appears in boring shades of grey.  The image, 
produced like all the successful ones, is RGB, but converted to B&W 
and is printed using Paul's Neutral curve.

Thinking there may be a problem with the carts, I ran a head cleaning 
cycle and a nozzle check, which produces perfect results.  I also 
printed a copy of the 21-step wedge, which printed just like it 
should.  This leads me to believe that my problem is not ink, 
printheads, cartridges or printer, so I'm stumped as to what it could 
be!

Anyone have any thoughts on what's going on with this one image?   
Any suggestions on what I might try??  HELP!  I'd really like a good 
copy of this pic!

Regards,
 Bob

I've been using a UT2 inkset in my Epson 890 for a few weeks now and 
have produced some beautiful black and white prints, however, I think 
I've run into my first snag.  

I recently refilled my carts, but continued to produce great output, 
until I tried to print a recent digital photo.  The image (located 
here – http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo.tcl?photo_id=2226399 if 
you're interested) goes from extreme black to extreme white and looks 
great on-screen, however, when printed I seem to lose both ends of 
the spectrum.  The print lacks any deep blacks or bright whites – 
everything just appears in boring shades of grey.  The image, 
produced like all the successful ones, is RGB, but converted to B&W 
and is printed using Paul's Neutral curve.

Thinking there may be a problem with the carts, I ran a head cleaning 
cycle and a nozzle check, which produces perfect results.  I also 
printed a copy of the 21-step wedge, which printed just like it 
should.  This would lead me to believe that my problem is not ink, 
printheads, cartridges or printer, so I'm really stumped about what 
it could be!

Anyone have any thoughts on what's going on with this one image?   
Any suggestions on what I might try??  HELP!  I'd really like a good 
copy of this pic!

-Bob

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "bbiess" <bbiess@y...>=
 
wrote:
> 
> I've been using a UT2 inkset in my Epson 890 for a few weeks now and 
> have produced some beautiful black and white prints, however, I think 
> I've run into my first snag.  
> 
> I recently refilled my carts, but continued to produce great output, 
> until I tried to print a recent digital photo.  The image (located 
> here – http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo.tcl?photo_id=2226399 if 
> you're interested) goes from extreme black to extreme white and looks 
> great on-screen, however, when printed I seem to lose both ends of 
> the spectrum.  The print lacks any deep blacks or bright whites – 
> everything just appears in boring shades of grey.  The image, 
> produced like all the successful ones, is RGB, but converted to B&W 
> and is printed using Paul's Neutral curve.
> 
> Thinking there may be a problem with the carts, I ran a head cleaning 
> cycle and a nozzle check, which produces perfect results.  I also 
> printed a copy of the 21-step wedge, which printed just like it 
> should.  This would lead me to believe that my problem is not ink, 
> printheads, cartridges or printer, so I'm really stumped about what 
> it could be!
> 
> Anyone have any thoughts on what's going on with this one image?   
> Any suggestions on what I might try??  HELP!  I'd really like a good 
> copy of this pic!
> 
> -Bob

Hi Bob,

I looked at the image you posted and I don't see any blacks or whites.
The darkest black is about 88% and except for just a few pixels the
lightest white is about 12%.    Just a Auto Levels helps a lot.

Roy