Referring to the reference image above from Keith Cooper, the first image I printed with my pro ink set up was on Epson Hot press paper because I have a lot of it and it was already profiled. I was quite impressed with the results and I paid quite a bit of attention to the image of the Indian ruins. The shadow detail was really quite good and when compared to the black and white that I got for my Canon 6400 was a definite improvement in many respects one being shadow and highlight detail. The next paper I looked at was the Cone5 paper. The first thing I noticed was how much less shadow detail there was in the test image. I thought I would re-profile the Cone5 paper but it became apparent that all I was doing was re-creating was already available.
I then decided to make a set of profiles for Museo Max paper. The results were more in keeping with the results that I was getting with the Cone 5 paper. The image was contraster and had less shadow detail than the Hot Press paper profile.
I then started looking at the respective quad profiles in the Quad viewer and the profiles that I made for Museo max were for all intensive purposes identical to the Hot Press profiles and worked quite well with Hot Press paper.
Backing up just a bit here I do want to make clear that the difference between the Piezo Hot Press and the Canon 6400 B&W hot press was not nearly as significant.
I’m not sure what my expectations should be here or if I’m just missing something. It takes a pretty strong move in Photoshop for me to get some of my black-and-white landscapes that I printed on Hot Press to have a similar look with the Cone 5.
In layman terms it just seems to me that this process of linearizing the various papers would even out the contrast amongst the various papers.
On the color side if I have a file that prints well on Hot Press it’s going to look very similar on Museo Max.
Can you confirm to me if your Cone 5 paper you are referring to is gloss or matte?
There are two Cone papers: Cone Type 2 is matte and Cone Type 5 is Gloss. If you are using the Type 2 curve on the Type 5 paper or the Type 5 curve on the Type 2 paper you would see issue like you are describing. It could be as simple as using the wrong curve (there are three Type2 curves and 3 Type5 curves).
Yes I do that. And I still don’t know what to think about the differences between the Muse0 Max and the Hot Press papers. No one else has noticed this so i am not sure what to think. I made cool and warm profiles for the Museo Max. According to the the Quad Viewer they are almost identical to their Hot Press counterparts. and if I use the MMax quads with the Hot press paper the images look identical to what I get with the Press Quads.
I just looked at a test I did on some PuraSmooth matte paper with the Hot press and HanRag profiles and the image contrast visually looks the same the test image on Hot Press Paper. so I am starting to suspect that the linearization process doesn’t work out the contrast differences between some papers.
I am thinking the next thing I am going to do is make a test print on the HPress and MMax with my Canon in the B&W mode. profiles aren’t involve so any differences are the papers
The “linear” workflow is different than traditional ICC profile workflows.
Linearization simply attempts to equalize the difference between all the tones from light to dark. If the gloss dMax is very dark (in the case of Piezography Pro) this can result in a visual print that is more contrasty than even a monitor calibrated for matte printing. When we were first making this ink it didn’t even look like Piezography because the black was such of a black hole. My hunch is that there will need to be a slight “tuning” of some very dark gloss printing on Pro ink to make the shadows details non-linear but more open in order to match to screen.
In short, linearization does not equalize contrast between papers, but ICC profiling does usually at the expense of shadow detail in matte prints if not done properly.
So I just made another test print on the Museum max with the Lasal Matte profile and the the shadow detail is much better but will have to wait to measure the D Max. the test on the Canon indicates that the Museo max really plugs up in the shadows. It just may not be a good choice for B&W
Last question, so I can assume that the 50% gray patch is not necessarily going to print to near the same density amongst the various papers that have been linearized?