I'm just about through getting a 7800 calibrated using the
Imageprint RIP. It is a bit premature to claim victory, but early
indications are showing the following benefits:
1) the dithering pattern, when examined with a loupe, is both
finer and smoother, and to my eye, sharper than that generated by the
Epson driver.
2) highlights are beautiful - subtle in a way I have only
heretofore seen with in-camera negatives.
3) The prepackaged profiles for Pictorico make it possible to
print a decent palladium negative by simply inverting the file and
printing it!!!!
4) Fine tuning the output takes a very small correction curve,
if you even care to bother.
5) RGB space is the way to go, along with some subtle
colorization.
6) The RIP takes full 16 bit input. So you can stay in 16 bit
mode through the whole process, including the printing step.
7) Using roll media, you can tile many negatives on a single
print job and save a lot of wasted pictorico.
Weird things about the 7800:
The straight-ahead PDN system does some extremely strange things
when you use the standard Epson driver and colorize the negative. For
instance, the spectral tests I ran indicated that a Red 200, Green 25
blend would be ideal for palladium. Using the PDN test tablet, here are
the UV densities for the first couple of highlight steps:
Step 100: 2.03 logD UV
Step 93: 2.07
Step 91: 2.6 !!
Step 90: 2.85!!
Step 89: 3.17
Step 88: 3.24
Step 87: 3.52!!
Step 85: 2.93
Step 84: 2.68
Now this is just plain weird.
Visually, the steps appear to be getting less dense as you move
down to lower step numbers. But my UV densitometer tells another tale.
And I confirmed this by printing the negative again AND deliberately
overprinting the step tablet by a stop to see if I could even get any
tone in those strange steps in the middle. It tells the same story. So
a correction curve using this PDN color would be very difficult if not
impossible to make with these density reversals in a gradated step
wedge what in theory is the same tone.
More later.
Clay
Hi Don,
You can use a RIP with PDN—though once I noticed a strange repeating
pattern in a print made from a negative off a RIP. As you mentioned,
there seems to be no free lunch. It is a matter of finding a
combination with the least problems. Though I must say, other than the
Venetian Blinds, which I solved by getting an R1800, I have very little
problem making good negatives.
Mark
In a message dated 3/3/07 7:10:10 PM, dsbryant@bellsouth.net writes:
Thanks Mark. Seems like there is no free lunch with ink jet
printers, we are always chasing one problem or another. I wonder if a
RIP could solve some of the ink density problems. I think Clay Harmon
is working with IJC/OPM and the 7800. Could a RIP be used with PDN ?
Don
Best Wishes,
Mark Nelson
Precision
Digital Negatives - The System
PDNPrint
Forum at Yahoo Groups
www.MarkINelsonPhoto.com
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