Black and white printing

it depends - like always, because there are various ways to print your B/W images - you may keep the printer in the regular color printing mode, but only feed B/W data to the driver, a color profile keeps data as well for B/W printing along the gray axis since in that mode B/W data are a subset in the color data range, and a profile handles that. You may alternatively use the B/W printing options in the driver, or you even switch to a special B/W ink set like that one from Piezographic. A profile not only would correct color variations but as well gray level variances and thus provide a kind of linearization function . So a profile may not be needed to acheive decent B/W prints, but in particular situations the use of a profile may be useful. You need to start practicing B/W prints, get your experience and evaluate where and how you can improve, and using a profile can be one element of it.

If you are going to print a picture on paper of your choice you need to tell the printer how much ink to lay down...that is an ICC profile.
If you use more than one type of paper regardless of brand, for best results make a profile for each one.
So now your computer can tell the printer how much ink to send to get the result it is a bit obvious that you would want to see colours the way the ICC profile sees them too...So you profile your screen.
Having made a profile for your papers, and the screen.....seems pretty obvious to me that when your printer takes the colour data and sends it to print that you have adjusted on your screen, that both screen and printer are on a common understanding of colour VALUE.

That is why folks choose to profile, it takes a single colour value and tells :
The screen, the printer that when it sees a particular colour value they both look the same, they ARE the same so that now you say i am going to print on the paper you loaded in the printers Select the profile to use and all the parts - computer, screen, and printer are all on a common value.

If you are using Epson papers Epson supply profiles free for their paper so that is an easy place to start
You still need to profile the screen for EASY COLOUR ADJUSTMENT.
Some learn by experience how to work without profiles, but that is real tough.

Harry Briels said:

I do have Lightroom 5 and I am going to follow the advise you gave me and learn printing in B&W.
There is one matter that still confuses me:
I understood from what I read that in B&W mode one can not or shouldn't use ICC profiles.
However Eric Chan did built special ICC profiles for the Advanced B&W photo mode of the Pro 3880.
http://people.csail.mit.edu/ericchan/dp/Epson3880/abwprofiles.html
Why did he do so if no profiles are needed in B&W printing?
Harry

Click to expand...

The Epson ABW mode is a "black box" and doesn't work in the same way as colour printing using ICC profiles. All of the information that would be in the ICC profile for colour printing is built into the firmaware of the printer. You can vary the parameters, but only using the adjustments that Epson provide in the ABW driver.

On its own ABW on the 3880 produces very good B&W prints, using "Printer manages colors". However, for some people the linearity is still not good enough. This is where ABW profiles come in - they can correct for any residual non-linearity in the native ABW response. The result, in my experience, is usually a very small improvement in the appearance of the print. For you, as a newcomer to B&W printing, it would be an unneccessary complication.

Since this is a new venture for you I suggest that you first print a B&W test image, just to see what your printer can do. You can find a good test image at http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/bw_printing/bw-test-image-2.html which also tells you what to look for in your print.

Good luck!

Harry Briels said:

...
I understood from what I read that in B&W mode one can not or shouldn't use ICC profiles.
...

Click to expand...

It's because the ABW mode is a printer driver or kind of "B&W RIP" within the 3880's driver. It acts like an adjustable B&W driver/menu. So there is no option (as in color mode) to apply ICM profiles in ABW mode, because profiles should not be adjusted.
Different than in color mode, there is no "match to screen" in this mode, only the sample image of the young blonde lady changing the tone.
Eric Chan's approach seems to apply a "gray curve" to this mode..
..I haven't tried this .. and I'm no expert for adobe PS or LR, letting the printer manage the color..

edit: posting was late... I agree with RogerB.. just try ABW, it is made for this.
(Don't use the option "black" as it will use only K, no LK and LLK)

Sometimes the answer is to "Just make a test print".

At the worst you risk a dollar for the cost of the paper and ink.

The information and beneficial knowledge gained could be priceless.

RS

There is a wealth of knowledge on this thread, thing is there is nothing in photographic printing as difficult or challenging as B&W.
EACH COLOUR is measured against gray.
IMHO @jtoolman has said ALL there is to say about digital b&w without a good colour image and a good profile all that is produced is less than it can be.
Shortcut the b&w process by all means.....in Aust photocopies are twenty cents a copy paper included........same results much cheaper.

Having said that if tone drop out is your goal then go for any shortcut you like.....

3dogs said:

There is a wealth of knowledge on this thread, thing is there is nothing in photographic printing as difficult or challenging as B&W.

Click to expand...

In my experience with the 3800 and 3880, printing B&W is not a big deal. ABW does a very good job. More challenging is producing a good B&W image to print. Hence my advice to print a known good B&W image as a starting point. At least, if this looks good you can't then blame the printer if your images are less than perfect.

As a postscipt, in response to an earlier post, leaving the image in RGB does not give you more "information" to print. An 8-bit RGB file gives 256^3 = 16,777,216 possible "colours". If you are working in B&W every pixel has R=G=B. This reduces the number of "colours" to 256^1 = 256, and every one of them is grey. In other words, 8-bit B&W images will only ever have 256 steps between pure white and pure black. The good news is that not many people can see the steps from 0-255 if they are printed correctly.

RogerB said:

As a postscipt, in response to an earlier post, leaving the image in RGB does not give you more "information" to print. An 8-bit RGB file gives 256^3 = 16,777,216 possible "colours". If you are working in B&W every pixel has R=G=B. This reduces the number of "colours" to 256^1 = 256, and every one of them is grey. In other words, 8-bit B&W images will only ever have 256 steps between pure white and pure black. The good news is that not many people can see the steps from 0-255 if they are printed correctly.

Click to expand...

I don't entirely follow this. If you print a B&W image as a colour image, with a colour profile, you may not get as good a B&W image, which will depend on the profile quality, but you will have more "information", (perhaps not the right information), but it could be more interesting, with variations of tone.

An interesting Northlight B&W image, I have not tried it before, I will print it on the 9000 II with the lustre colour profile and scan it and add it to the Xrite Color Munki vs Colour Navigator - Eizo Monitor thread post #21 or perhaps a new post.

Emulator said:

I don't entirely follow this. If you print a B&W image as a colour image, with a colour profile, you may not get as good a B&W image, which will depend on the profile quality, but you will have more "information", (perhaps not the right information), but it could be more interesting, with variations of tone.

Click to expand...

If we are talking about B&W then by definition R=G=B. So, 16,776,960 of the possible RGB triplets are not allowed because they are not neutral. As soon as you force R=G=B you limit the possible values to 0-255. When you print the B&W image you may well see variations in tone (colour), but that would be because the printer can't deliver true neutral tones. It has nothing to do with the input information.

If the R,G and B values are not equal then the image is colour, or at best toned monochrome, and would have to be printed as a colour image.

I am thinking that we are not all discussing the same thing here.
A true b&w printer has only black inks
And the best of those that i have seen are FLAT and belong in the same padded room as "nature" photography.