Convince a purist to switch to B&W digital printing!

[patricklavoie]

<p><em>The Epsons work fine but the<br /> use of the K3 inks with the black and white mode will not get you even close to<br /> what can be done with John Cone's Piezography system</em></p>

<p>A friend of mine bought a system like this years ago, needed a PC to run the software, dedicated a epson 9200 (or something similar) with it.. the BW look fabulous! Then he got a 9880 later, and keep telling me how this new printer CANT beat the 9200 because of the piezo system etc.... thing is he never tried it either, and when he did, didtn do it correctly...</p>

<p>So i told him to make is best BW print wiht his well run system, and i do the same using is 9880 using Advanced BW mode... whe the 2 print together on the table and look at them, at first they where pretty similar, under close examination he found that the epson one look smoother...</p>

<p>he sell is piezo system 2 weeks after, as he didtn need 2 mega printer, 2 set of ink and 2 thing to care about.</p>

<p>I think that when all the parameter are well done from scan / capture to print.. the xx80 epson printer will meet anyone expectation.</p>

[steve_swinehart]

<p>I have a friend who's into the Piezography system and has been running it for about 3 years. He's done a lot of testing with it so he knows the ins and outs of it really thoroughly. I can't come close to what he gets with my 9800 using the stock Epson driver. The Quadtone RIP gives far smaller dots and better detail making a smoother tonal transitions.</p>

[patricklavoie]

<p>Steve, so what you say is without a piezo system and without a RIP such as QTR you cant get good (or amazing, or else .. use the word you like) result wiht a epson 2400-2800-etc....?</p>

<p>So all the photographer i know (like me) who dont use such a system dont really know BW printing or at least are not getting into real BW printing?....</p>

<p>im curious ; )</p>

[PaulWhiting]

<p>Throwing in my $0.02 here...</p>

<p>I've used two procedures, both giving me excellent results. I started off using a very simple Black Only process, with one Eboni inked cartridge (available from www.inksupply.com) in an Epson 220.</p>

<p>Clayton Jones describes this process on his website: http://www.cjcom.net/digiprnarts.htm</p>

<p>Slightly more advanced but a still very straightforward approach uses 3 such cartridges in an Epson R1800, which allows for bigger prints. Here I use the QTR driver instead of the Epson driver. Again, am getting great prints. Paul Roark's website describes this approach and also more advanced inksets:</p>

<p>http://www.paulroark.com/BW-Info/</p>

<p>(apologies if these resources have already appeared in this thread. In which case, just consider this post an added endorsement!)</p>

[jonathan_borden]

<p>Arguments for digital:<br>

1) dMax readily achievable with modern inkjet printers visibly greater than readily achievable with silver gelatin printing<br>

2) archival carbon based pigments probably have longer life than silver (given proper choice of paper etc)<br>

3) Once you have overcome the substantial learning curve it becomes substantially easier to achieve an optimal print using digital techniques e.g. curves, histograms, masking etc.<br>

4) Once you have a print you like it is very easy to reproduce any number of copies.<br>

Of course there are also arguments against digital (e.g. who really knows how long the prints will last) so YMMMV.</p>

[Uhooru]

<p>Not sure how this is for one and against the other type of discussion.</p>

[pdbphotography]

<p>I guess another factor is what facilities do you have? for most people the convenience of the computer means digital is a favourite, but if you have a darkroom and no computer/software then the cost involved can be quite high ( and vice versa)<br>

For me, I think with care and attention you get excellent results from digital and i find it very enjoyable to work on B&W.<br>

Also another consideration is with digital you convert colour images so you have the best of both worlds whereas film you only have the one option.</p>

[PaulWhiting]

<p>Just thought of another digital printing advantage, to add to Jonathan's excellent list.</p>

<p>When I was doing darkroom prints I had to figure out different exposures for different size prints. So, if I had a good 8x10 exposed at say, 12 sec at f/8, when I went to 11x14 I'd have to do some figuring to know how much longer to expose the paper. Sure, there were many ways to do this, but even then the 11x14 may not have had the same look as the 8x10. Other variables came into play, especially when printing in a different darkroom session, such as developer freshness and temperature, aging enlarging bulb, varying line voltage, etc.</p>

<p>Now, I can make prints of any size and they are consistent, whether I do a 5x7 or an 11x14 or anything in between.</p>

<p>By the way, I'm glad this thread has avoided flaming... such discussions often drift into contention. I thoroughly respect those who make quality darkroom prints. They do have a certain craft aspect and a colleague of mine finds an analogy in say, hand-crafted fine furniture to take just one example.</p>

[duckrabbitdigital]

<p>Chris,<br>

My husband and I own an artisan black-and-white printing shop called Duckrabbit Digital (http://www.duckrabbitdigital.com). We use Piezography inks (which were mentioned in this discussion). We started the company because I used to print my photographs in the darkroom, switched to digital, loved it because of the amount of control I had over my image, but still wanted to be able to print my images myself. <br>

If you want, I can walk you through the process of getting your stuff to look great once it comes out of the printer. E-mail me and I'll tell send you a PDF on how to set up your files (color space, etc.) and walk you through preparing it to print. Then, just to prove how great it is, I'll send you a free 8x10 print. <br>

Try it! I think you'll convert. <br>

tempest@duckrabbitdigital.com</p>

[stwrtertbsratbs5]

<p>I still make wet B&W prints because I enjoy the process and I'm happy with the results. Color, on the other hand, I print digitally because color corrections are fast and easy - color correcting when making wet prints can take quite a while, and feeding color paper into a machine isn't as much fun as rocking a tray.</p>