Re: Digital negatives - Epson and grain.

Roman wrote:

> I have been doing digital negatives with my Epson 2100 (in us: 2200)
> and OHP of Pictorico and Agfa Copyjet. I use Epson pigment inks -
> UltraChrome.

> I test these negatives in a traditional silver process on paper grad 0
> and I can see the negatives are making like "grain" in the midtones
> and the highlights on the print.

There may well be improvements you can make in your inkjet negatives, but
part of what you are seeing is very likely the greater resolution of the
silver-gelatin paper as compared to most hand-coated processes. Commercial
photo paper is coated on very smooth stock that has been precoated with a
bright white barium sulfate ("baryta") layer that is polished smooth. It
can show much more detail than salted paper or Pt coated on even a very
smooth paper surface. Don't get me wrong, I love Pt prints and have
probably made nearly as many of them as I have made prints on commercial
photo paper. But at their "best" -- I mean, their most technically perfect
-- their resolution falls far short of a good baryta-coated silver-gelatin
print. (As an aside, I have tried various methods to make Pt prints on
baryta-coated paper, hoping to get the best of both worlds -- or at least
something interesting -- but so far with little success.)

Also, your Grade 0 paper is still significantly more contrasty than most
hand-coated processes, further accentuating the "grain" of the negatives.

Best regards,

etienne
Received on Thu Mar 31 01:02:47 2005