Digital BW, The Print

I got started down this road based on reading this forum and trying 
out Clayton Jones' ABW workflow for my Epson R2400.  Great articles!  
I find Clayton's work flow easier and more versatile than using QTR 
on my Epson 2200, which was my previous workflow.  The blacks on the 
R2400 really help make black and white printing yield richer results, 
IMHO.  For my on topic point -- for those of you who like semigloss 
papers like I do, the Epson Semigloss paper works great with 
Clayton's workflow and ABW.  I find I'm able to tone the Epson 
Semigloss to both get selenium/blue tones and to get rich deep 
browns.  A great versatile paper.  It bronzes much less with the 2400 
and ABW than it did using the 2200/QTR workflow. . .  Now for my off 
topic (color) question.  I'm in the process of ordering COLOR (bad 
word around here) printer profiles for my Epson R2400. I'm going to 
profile Museo Silver Rag at the "Best Photo" (2440 dpi) setting. 
Based on Clayton's suggestion for using the Museo SR for ABW, I was 
going to set my color ink density at -3% to get a bit less ink, to 
hopefully make it easier to profile and get better shadow separation. 
(In ABW mode, per Clayton's suggestion, I use a -4% color ink density 
setting, a bit more conservative than his suggested -5% setting.) I 
ran tests and could see slightly more shadow separation at -3%. Has 
anyone else tried profiling the R2400 for COLOR prints with a color 
ink density setting of something other than zero? Any 
comments/recommendations? I've searched for more information on the 
color ink density setting on the web and have found a few comments, 
but they're few and far between. My concern is that by setting the 
ink density to -3% I may be limiting the DMAX I can get, or the 
saturation, but I figure in any event a -3% setting is pretty 
conservative so it shouldn't limit the gamut too much. . . I'm also 
getting profiles made for the Epson SemiGloss paper. Here, I figure 
I'm better off just using the Epson driver and "0" color ink density 
setting, unless others have different experiences. I figure Epson 
probably got this one close enough; if I had my own densitometer and 
color profiling software I might be able to improve on things, but 
that's way beyond the amount of time and effort I'm willing to put 
into this. Thanks for any insights. . .  BTW, I was going to use 
Cathy's profiles for $40 each.  She's gotten good reviews for her 
profiles for years on the web.  . .  Or can someone share their 
experiences with the inkjetart.com color profiles that are only $25 
each?  Thanks in advance.

Howard

My best results with 2400 and SR are when I set ink density at -3% 
and the ABW as "light". Sounds like our notes roughly line up

Cheers

Brian


--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Howard Slavitt" 
<howard.slavitt@...> wrote:
>
> I got started down this road based on reading this forum and trying 
> out Clayton Jones' ABW workflow for my Epson R2400.  Great 
articles!  
> I find Clayton's work flow easier and more versatile than using QTR 
> on my Epson 2200, which was my previous workflow.  The blacks on 
the 
> R2400 really help make black and white printing yield richer 
results, 
> IMHO.  For my on topic point -- for those of you who like semigloss 
> papers like I do, the Epson Semigloss paper works great with 
> Clayton's workflow and ABW.  I find I'm able to tone the Epson 
> Semigloss to both get selenium/blue tones and to get rich deep 
> browns.  A great versatile paper.  It bronzes much less with the 
2400 
> and ABW than it did using the 2200/QTR workflow. . .  Now for my 
off 
> topic (color) question.  I'm in the process of ordering COLOR (bad 
> word around here) printer profiles for my Epson R2400. I'm going to 
> profile Museo Silver Rag at the "Best Photo" (2440 dpi) setting. 
> Based on Clayton's suggestion for using the Museo SR for ABW, I was 
> going to set my color ink density at -3% to get a bit less ink, to 
> hopefully make it easier to profile and get better shadow 
separation. 
> (In ABW mode, per Clayton's suggestion, I use a -4% color ink 
density 
> setting, a bit more conservative than his suggested -5% setting.) I 
> ran tests and could see slightly more shadow separation at -3%. Has 
> anyone else tried profiling the R2400 for COLOR prints with a color 
> ink density setting of something other than zero? Any 
> comments/recommendations? I've searched for more information on the 
> color ink density setting on the web and have found a few comments, 
> but they're few and far between. My concern is that by setting the 
> ink density to -3% I may be limiting the DMAX I can get, or the 
> saturation, but I figure in any event a -3% setting is pretty 
> conservative so it shouldn't limit the gamut too much. . . I'm also 
> getting profiles made for the Epson SemiGloss paper. Here, I figure 
> I'm better off just using the Epson driver and "0" color ink 
density 
> setting, unless others have different experiences. I figure Epson 
> probably got this one close enough; if I had my own densitometer 
and 

> color profiling software I might be able to improve on things, but 
> that's way beyond the amount of time and effort I'm willing to put 
> into this. Thanks for any insights. . .  BTW, I was going to use 
> Cathy's profiles for $40 each.  She's gotten good reviews for her 
> profiles for years on the web.  . .  Or can someone share their 
> experiences with the inkjetart.com color profiles that are only $25 
> each?  Thanks in advance.
>

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Howard Slavitt"
<howard.slavitt@...> wrote:
>
> topic (color) question. I'm in the process of ordering COLOR (bad
> word around here) printer profiles for my Epson R2400. I'm going to
> profile Museo Silver Rag at the "Best Photo" (2440 dpi) setting.
> Based on Clayton's suggestion for using the Museo SR for ABW, I was
> going to set my color ink density at -3% to get a bit less ink, to
> hopefully make it easier to profile and get better shadow separation.
> (In ABW mode, per Clayton's suggestion, I use a -4% color ink density
> setting, a bit more conservative than his suggested -5% setting.) I
> ran tests and could see slightly more shadow separation at -3%. Has
> anyone else tried profiling the R2400 for COLOR prints with a color
> ink density setting of something other than zero? Any
> comments/recommendations? I've searched for more information on the
> color ink density setting on the web and have found a few comments,
> but they're few and far between. My concern is that by setting the
> ink density to -3% I may be limiting the DMAX I can get, or the
> saturation, but I figure in any event a -3% setting is pretty
> conservative so it shouldn't limit the gamut too much. . .

You may be limiting your gamut a bit in the upper midtones and
highlights with that approach, but I can't really say how much. One
thing you might want to do is try the different media settings to find
out which gives you the best separation in the shadow tones. I recently
profiled Innova F-Type Gloss, which I believe is pretty similar to
Silver Rag in many ways (gamut, dmax, etc).  I found that using the
Epson Semigloss  media setting with ink density at it's default '0'
position gave very good results.  The semi-gloss media setting seemed to
do better in the shadow tones than the luster setting.

oh - and also his curves he lists in note 9b. That made a real 
difference as well.

B