Affordable B&W printing ? - DPChallenge Forums

Olympus 50mm f/1.8 MF Normal Zuiko

11/02/2004 02:39:38 PM · #1

Anyone tried out the inksupply.com
MIS Easy B&W ultratone ink sets ? An Epson printer to dedicate to
one of these inksets costs $60, the inks are about $40. This is finally
a reasonable affordable option for dedicated B&W printing.

(Cribbed from a Mike Johnston article, available at luminous landscape and photo.net amongst others)

Anyone looked at this other similar ? I have some Piezography samples from West Coast Imaging that are far beyond anything I've seen from a standard colour Epson inkjet.

emorgan49

Olympus E-5

11/02/2004 06:11:35 PM · #2

bump

11/02/2004 08:23:18 PM · #3

I'm trying to figure out how this might work. Let's say you have a pure B&W image open in photoshop (which that page says you can do). Won't a print to the Epson printer, sans any special drivers, just utilitze the ink in the black cartridge? Won't the toned inks in the other three slots go unused in that case?

And how does one feel confident about the output when the cyan in an image is translated directly to a certain warm tone, with no consideration for gradation output?

I'd be very curious to get some first hand opinions on this.

Nikon AF-S DX Zoom-Nikkor 18-70mm f/3.5-4.5G IF-ED

11/02/2004 09:53:06 PM · #4

Originally posted by welcher:

Won't a print to the Epson printer, sans any special drivers, just utilitze the ink in the black cartridge?

I think, given that you don't tell the driver anything, that it would try and print it like a standard CMYK image, but would actually be using the different grey toned inks. So it would use all the inks, somehow it would work out right as a default converted B&W, but the driver would still 'think' it was printing a colour picture.

As to how you'd feel confident, you probably wouldn't using the defaults. I'm sure it would work out reasonably well. But you have the options of a whole lot more control, using profiles.

Message edited by author 2004-11-02 21:56:59.

skylen

Nikon D200

11/02/2004 10:00:06 PM · #5

Originally posted by Gordon:

Originally posted by welcher:
Won't a print to the Epson printer, sans any special drivers, just utilitze the ink in the black cartridge?

I think, given that you don't tell the driver anything, that it would try and print it like a standard CMYK image, but would actually be using the different grey toned inks. So it would use all the inks, somehow it would work out right as a default converted B&W, but the driver would still 'think' it was printing a colour picture.

As to how you'd feel confident, you probably wouldn't using the defaults. I'm sure it would work out reasonably well. But you have the options of a whole lot more control, using profiles.

So, you don't convert to B&W on the computer?? You process entirely in color and let the printer inks do the conversion? Wacky. I'd like to see it and tweak it in B&W before it's on paper.

11/02/2004 10:00:46 PM · #6

Originally posted by Gordon:

Good point. Still, I wouldn't feel super confident that the "best" choices would be made, though I must admit the black art of B&W printing is beyond me.

Originally posted by Gordon:

As to how you'd feel confident, you probably wouldn't using the defaults. I'm sure it would work out reasonably well. But you have the options of a whole lot more control, using profiles.

I didn't see anywhere that profiles were talked about. In fact, it was specifically mentioned that they weren't needed. I wonder how much work will be put into them.

11/02/2004 10:08:22 PM · #7

Bit more info here

You are right, I was wrong, they make no mention of profiles. You can
though print B&W images using this system. I.e., you can do all the converting yourself first and print it a whole lot more cheaply than with
other B&W ink solutions.

I guess as usual, more control comes with more cost.

11/08/2004 10:35:00 AM · #8

Just ordered the whole shebang, printer, inks, and paper. Been wanting to jump into fine art b&w for a while, and this is a nice, easy way in.

I'll keep folks updated about my results.

11/08/2004 10:49:31 AM · #9

Originally posted by welcher:

Just ordered the whole shebang, printer, inks, and paper. Been wanting to jump into fine art b&w for a while, and this is a nice, easy way in.

I'll keep folks updated about my results.

I'm really interested in hearing what you think of it.
How much did the shebang cost ?

11/08/2004 11:01:21 AM · #10

Paid $85 ($65 after rebate) for the printer, and $90 for all the inks. (Couldn't decide on warm or neutral, so I got all of them). Paul Roark, who helped develop them, posts a lot over at the Yahoo group, and actually answered a few of my questions. He said that mixing the warm and neutral inks could get you different results. I really love the look of platinum prints, and am going to try and get that hue.

I got 50 sheets of the Hahnemuhle PhotoRag for $65. The paper thing I'm still a little fuzzy on.

11/08/2004 04:59:08 PM · #11

Well, it'll be a few weeks. Just got word that the inks are backordered. Didn't say anything about that on the site. A little disappointing.

12/13/2004 10:23:23 PM · #12

I finally got my inks. Got the full set of both warm and neutrals, as well as matte and glosst black, and started with warm matte.

Wow.

Simply unbelievable quality for this price. I've gotten the samples on similar paper from WCI, and to my admittedly untrained eye, there's not much difference.

As I suspected, what I see on the monitor differs from what I get, but not significantly.

I am truly THRILLED with the results. Simply incredible.

Canon EF 17-40mm f/4.0L USM

12/13/2004 10:24:50 PM · #13

Originally posted by welcher:

cool. So about $150 total ?

jimmythefish

Canon EOS-10D

12/13/2004 10:25:56 PM · #14

I've had a HP 7660 with a grey ink cartridge for a while, and to say I'm impressed with the results is an understatement. I can print 8x10s that are better than what I'd get from the average photo lab. I wouldn't hesitate to use them in a gallery display.

Message edited by author 2004-12-13 22:27:13.