QTR-Quadtone RIP

You're limited to 256 values because that's the number of different 
values that can be represented by an 8-bit integer, one of which is used 
to store the value of each channel at a given pixel in an 8-bit image.  
This works out fairly well because your eye needs just over 200 values 
in a gray scale to see continuous tone, it varies a bit from eye to eye 
of course, but 256 values will do it with a little wiggle room.  
Therefore digital output systems generally only use 8-bits because 
that's all that's required for human viewers to see a continuous tone.  
When you're editing, you may need more values than that because editing 
ends up degrading the image (discarding information).  So when doing 
serious editing to an image, it's generally worth it to use a larger bit 
depth, 16, with allows some millions of values to be represented, 
allowing for much heavier editing before degredation becomes apparent.  
But when that data goes to the printer, the printer doesn't need it all, 
and re-maps those 16-bit values into 8-bit values.  Hope that's helpful, 
and makes things a bit clearer.

Peter

dlruckus wrote:
> Yes. Along with the papers you are printing on.
>
> Regards
> Duane
>
>
>
> --- In QuadtoneRIP@yahoogroups.com, "andreas_engi" <aengi@...> wrote:
> >
> > My question: Is the bottle neck the printer-systems anyway? or why
> > this limitation on 256 steps?
> > 
> >
> > Thanks,
> >
> > Andreas Engi
> >
>
>
>
>
>
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