Monochrome inkjet printing: The carbon on cotton principle

Printing monochrome images with inkjet printers has always been problematic. Mainly this is because mixing colour inks commonly found in inkjet printers rarely produces neutral monotone images. Prints made with colour ink often have ugly colour casts that are hard to get rid of or that exhibit severe metamerism (i.e. they look different under different lighting conditions). Also as colour inks fade at different rates these prints often exhibit unacceptable shifts in tone over time. The human eye is very susceptible to subtle changes in near neutral print tones.

However, recent developments in inkjet printing technology have begun to overcome some of the problems. For example, Epson's Advanced Black and White (ABW) system allows several different shades of grey inks to be used to produce nice black and white prints with varying tones. Prior to this a dedicated band of printers converted their Epson printers to accept monochrome inksets based on highly stable carbon pigments and printed on fine art papers that were supposed to be of archival quality. Carbon pigments are known to outlast most colour pigments by a wide margin.

Problems still remain with systems such as the Epson ABW system though. It has been shown that the Epson driver incorporates coloured inks to varying degrees in the ABW prints. For example, yellow, which is notorious for fading can clearly be seen in enlarged print scans (see, for example, http://www.paulroark.com/BW-Info/R1800-Lightfastness.pdf). Thus we don't really know how long these prints will look acceptable. A further problem is that longevity ratings for printer and paper combinations (such as those published by Wilhelm Imaging Research) are based on a 35% fade test which is a hangover from the days of traditional colour photography. In other words lightfastness ratings are based on a fade margin that many black and white darkroom workers would find unacceptable. According to Jon Cone (originator of the Piezography monochrome inksets) the human eye can perceive a 5% deterioration in density and therefore this is the figure he uses in his lightfastness tests. A good discussion of this can be found in a post by Jon Cone here.

Paul Roark (who designs monochromatic inksets for MIS Associates and has been a long time pioneer of monochrome inkjet printing techniques) argues that the best way to be sure we have the best archivally stable black and white inkjet prints is to use the 'carbon on cotton' principle. He has designed an inkset that is based purely on several dilutions of carbon pigment (known as Eboni-6) and he prints mainly on cotton based rag papers (which are known to museums to be the most stable and durable paper media that exist). These papers such as Arches Hot Press are reknowned for their archival stability.

So how does one go about it? I recently mixed my own carbon-based inkset for my old Epson 2100 printer based on Paul Roark's formulae. It was surprisingly easy to do and the chemistry required is readily available. I ordered a large bottle of the Eboni black ink from the USA which will last a long time and is used to create the various shades of grey ink. These were injected into a set of refillable cartridges (from Marrutt in the UK).  By using a black and white RIP such as Bowhaus Inkjet Control or the inexpensive Quadtone RIP it is fairly straightforward to profile various papers to produce nice images (although a densitometer or spectrophotometer is recommended, but you can use a scanner). It is also incredibly cheap to mix your own inks.

Useful links:
http://www.paulroark.com/
http://www.inkjetmall.com/
http://www.inksupply.com/
http://www.marrutt.com/ (UK)
http://www.bowhaus.com/
http://www.quadtonerip.com/

Digital black and white group
Piezography group

The 'Beercan' and the Sony A900

After reading a lot about the old line of Minolta autofocus lenses I decided to pick up a 'Beercan'. This is a 70-210mm f4 lens that was introduced in 1985. It has a great reputation as being a solid, sharp lens with nice bokeh. They are pretty cheap too. I gave it a try this afternoon in low light and high ISO on the Sony A900. I am pretty impressed with it (and the camera so far). The lens is big and heavy (hence the nickname, I presume).

This shot is with the A900 set at ISO 1600 with the beercan at f4.5 and 75mm. Shot cRAW with no noise reduction, just Lightroom for the conversion:

Bigger versions are here.

Some shots with the Sony A900 and 50mm f1.4 lens

First shots with the 50m lens and a Cokin close up filter. All cRAW files edited in Lightroom 2.5.

Sony Alpha A900

I have succumbed and decided to sell my Mamiya 7ii and lenses to fund this 24 megapixel monster of a DSLR. It has just arrived and the battery is now charging.

I have 2 lenses on the way: 28mm and 50mm Sony primes. This is the camera with an old Minolta 35-70mm F4 zoom that I had lying around.

A bit of colour from the G1

A shot from Tinos (Greece).

Street photography with the G10

I used to like the Ricoh GR Digital for street shooting. it was so small and compact no-one ever noticed it and it was easy to take stealth shots like this one:

I gave up digital for a while and went with a Leica M6. Leicas being classic street cameras. Even though the Leica is small it is much more noticeable than a Ricoh GRD and I never got the same level of keepers out of it.

Recently I decided to go back to using a small digital. I pondered getting another Ricoh, but felt like a change. I wanted to try an LX3, but they were hard to get hold of. In the end I acquired a Canon G10 and have had some success with it so far. The zoom which I thought I wouldn't use all that much proved to be pretty useful for candid shots.

Here are some examples:

Shot for the day with the Panasonic G1 and 14-45mm kit lens

Taken with the kit lens and processed in Lightroom.