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BWlover
Getting Fingers Dirty
slightly wet with water, but it all really does not make a lot of difference... A one to 10 dilution with water in advance will also work.
Building a pure B&W printer... advice needed
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I put some Inktec dye black ink (intended for the BCI-6 cartridges) on a saucer and brushed a streak on a sheet of Canon Photo Paper Plus Glossy. Since I didn't see any weakening of the ink flow, I continued on to a second line but both lines were just as dark. So I put some water in the saucer and repeated for a third line. I repeated this for several more lines, each one with more dilution. They all looked perfect shades of grey to me but since I'm color blind, I waited until this morning to show my wife. She immediately identified all the streaks as varying shades of blue except for the first two that will undiluted. She also said this scanned image looks the same:
This made me wonder if my statement on this post that the image has no color is accurate. I reprinted them and showed them to my wife and she says some of the shades of gray are slightly purple on some paper types. On Staples matte photo paper, she cannot see any color, but on Epson photo paper she does see a slight purple tint at the 80% point. This clearly calls for more study.
This made me wonder if my statement on this post that the image has no color is accurate. I reprinted them and showed them to my wife and she says some of the shades of gray are slightly purple on some paper types. On Staples matte photo paper, she cannot see any color, but on Epson photo paper she does see a slight purple tint at the 80% point. This clearly calls for more study.
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BWlover
Getting Fingers Dirty
Thanks very much!
This seems to resemble the original Canon BCI-6 ink a lot... The CLI-8 ink (at least the ink replacement of Inktec) is much warmer, brownish (although much closer to black/gray than to actual brown of course, just a tint). The CLI-521 original Canon ink seems to sit in between. If you print it on different papers you get different tint. My experience is that matte papers affect the colors the least...
It also makes mixing pure gray colours an interesting challenge...
This seems to resemble the original Canon BCI-6 ink a lot... The CLI-8 ink (at least the ink replacement of Inktec) is much warmer, brownish (although much closer to black/gray than to actual brown of course, just a tint). The CLI-521 original Canon ink seems to sit in between. If you print it on different papers you get different tint. My experience is that matte papers affect the colors the least...
It also makes mixing pure gray colours an interesting challenge...
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BWlover
I have being following your ongoing quest for thru grey by diluting the black down to get a real good grey colour. In the past when I was mixing up grey ink (pms) the best way to achieve the exact grey that meets your requirements was in fact to use colours first then tint it with black and dilute down to the shade that you are looking for. By using colour to start with you can control the final outcome of whatever shade of grey thats required. Have fun..
I have being following your ongoing quest for thru grey by diluting the black down to get a real good grey colour. In the past when I was mixing up grey ink (pms) the best way to achieve the exact grey that meets your requirements was in fact to use colours first then tint it with black and dilute down to the shade that you are looking for. By using colour to start with you can control the final outcome of whatever shade of grey thats required. Have fun..
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- #35
BWlover
Getting Fingers Dirty
Thanks. I appreciate the help and all the good tips.
I am now also looking into the kind of paper I want to use: since I noticed the blacks look very different on different papers, I thought I select the paper first and then try to optimize the colour.
I am reading about this 'swellable' vs 'microporous' papers. Not easy to find which are which. I assume that PR-201 and GP-501 are swellable and the others (including PT-201, PP-201 and SG-201) are microporous since the latter ones, according to canon, can be used with the 9500 Pro which uses pigment inks. The first two are listed with the 9000 Pro (dye) but not with the pigment printer.
A shame that you can't easily find these data for cheap third party papers. I got 50 sheets for one euro with the IP4700 printer. Very thick, glossy paper (not completely smooth though) which normally sells for 10 euro/50 sheets. According to the shops original MOAB paper. The colours are muuucch deeper and fuller than on the Canon paper.
Will it make a lot of difference if you keep it in a photobook?
The reason I am looking for relatively cheap paper it that I want to be able to make a lot of photobooks (50-100 pages) by directly binding the photopapers together. I like it with the white space around it (never a photo not straight!) and not having to glue them (they always seem to come lose in the end...). If you use say 100 pages, it would cost ~25 euros including other materials, which is very nice. The quality should be as good as possible, but not necessarily the ultimate best. For prints for framing I don't mind if they cost a lot: it not like I will put 100 photographs on the wall. So than I want to have the very best...
I am now also looking into the kind of paper I want to use: since I noticed the blacks look very different on different papers, I thought I select the paper first and then try to optimize the colour.
I am reading about this 'swellable' vs 'microporous' papers. Not easy to find which are which. I assume that PR-201 and GP-501 are swellable and the others (including PT-201, PP-201 and SG-201) are microporous since the latter ones, according to canon, can be used with the 9500 Pro which uses pigment inks. The first two are listed with the 9000 Pro (dye) but not with the pigment printer.
A shame that you can't easily find these data for cheap third party papers. I got 50 sheets for one euro with the IP4700 printer. Very thick, glossy paper (not completely smooth though) which normally sells for 10 euro/50 sheets. According to the shops original MOAB paper. The colours are muuucch deeper and fuller than on the Canon paper.
Will it make a lot of difference if you keep it in a photobook?
The reason I am looking for relatively cheap paper it that I want to be able to make a lot of photobooks (50-100 pages) by directly binding the photopapers together. I like it with the white space around it (never a photo not straight!) and not having to glue them (they always seem to come lose in the end...). If you use say 100 pages, it would cost ~25 euros including other materials, which is very nice. The quality should be as good as possible, but not necessarily the ultimate best. For prints for framing I don't mind if they cost a lot: it not like I will put 100 photographs on the wall. So than I want to have the very best...
The characteristic of the black ink has a lot to do with the firmware RIP of the printers it was intended for. You know that printers shoot color even when printing black, might it be shooting color even when black or near black is called for? This allows usage of the color inks to prevent clogs without wasting it. Could this be happening?
Remember that Grays are a very delicate mix of all colors to create that shade. ANY misbalance will show up and be noticeable on grey tones and especially the lighter tones. That is why grey scales very revealing images.
You already know that different papers react differently to different colors so that by extension is going to mean that the delicate balance of colors will be out of balance for different papers and show up instantly. Out eyes are much less sensitive to color photo balance but sensitive enough that things called custom profiles are still called for.
Pigment inks are less sensitive to the paper but not insensitive. Dye inks are much more so. What you're attempting will be a tricky process. I'm doing the same.
Let me go further and indicate that even if you use pure pigment ink solely made from small particles of pure carbon, you will get normally get a warm tone and this will change with the paper and light combination. B&W, there's a lot of stuff in that category and possibly more complicated than color, I think.
Remember that Grays are a very delicate mix of all colors to create that shade. ANY misbalance will show up and be noticeable on grey tones and especially the lighter tones. That is why grey scales very revealing images.
You already know that different papers react differently to different colors so that by extension is going to mean that the delicate balance of colors will be out of balance for different papers and show up instantly. Out eyes are much less sensitive to color photo balance but sensitive enough that things called custom profiles are still called for.
Pigment inks are less sensitive to the paper but not insensitive. Dye inks are much more so. What you're attempting will be a tricky process. I'm doing the same.
Let me go further and indicate that even if you use pure pigment ink solely made from small particles of pure carbon, you will get normally get a warm tone and this will change with the paper and light combination. B&W, there's a lot of stuff in that category and possibly more complicated than color, I think.
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- #37
BWlover
Getting Fingers Dirty
I must say it is going well. I get some very nice prints. Some learnings:
- the 'colour' (or better: the tint) depends TO A EXTREME EXTEND (I am really suprised just how big this effect is!) on the kind of paper used. Same ink, very different colours.
- I get very sharp and powerful pictures. Especially on matte papers it is remarkable how much more contrasty the picture are.
- I only get it right at the moment if I adapt the pictures to look much more cyan on the screen, which shows that the gray colour in the PM tank is not ok yet: I have concentrated and diluted it, but both do not improve it. I have to look further into this.
- I only get a good print with the HR-paper setting (on all paper). Otherwise the detail is just lousy: it affects the 'colour' profile (use of the different inks) apparently more than I expected. I won't follow up on this one: once I have a good profile it is OK.
- the durchstich method does not really work for me: it gave me ink flow problems. I might have ruined the sponge and I think that if ink is taken from the catridge, instead of being replaced in the sponge by ink from the ink tank it is coming from the hole (it needs to form this bubble in the ink tank letting in air, which it does not).
- I will dilute the solvent a bit more: I think 1% propylene glycol is a bit too much. Viscosity seems to get very high and bubbles formed at stable to an extreme extend (for days! I can even wash the soap bubbles free from ink without destroying them!!!). Also the paper is getting out very wet after printing. I hope that dilution will help.
Will let you know the final recipe once everything is working the way I want it to!
- the 'colour' (or better: the tint) depends TO A EXTREME EXTEND (I am really suprised just how big this effect is!) on the kind of paper used. Same ink, very different colours.
- I get very sharp and powerful pictures. Especially on matte papers it is remarkable how much more contrasty the picture are.
- I only get it right at the moment if I adapt the pictures to look much more cyan on the screen, which shows that the gray colour in the PM tank is not ok yet: I have concentrated and diluted it, but both do not improve it. I have to look further into this.
- I only get a good print with the HR-paper setting (on all paper). Otherwise the detail is just lousy: it affects the 'colour' profile (use of the different inks) apparently more than I expected. I won't follow up on this one: once I have a good profile it is OK.
- the durchstich method does not really work for me: it gave me ink flow problems. I might have ruined the sponge and I think that if ink is taken from the catridge, instead of being replaced in the sponge by ink from the ink tank it is coming from the hole (it needs to form this bubble in the ink tank letting in air, which it does not).
- I will dilute the solvent a bit more: I think 1% propylene glycol is a bit too much. Viscosity seems to get very high and bubbles formed at stable to an extreme extend (for days! I can even wash the soap bubbles free from ink without destroying them!!!). Also the paper is getting out very wet after printing. I hope that dilution will help.
Will let you know the final recipe once everything is working the way I want it to!
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That is the reason I recommend putting tape over the German refill hole. If you still have a cartridge that has this problem, why don't you put tape over the hole to see if it cures the problem?BWlover said:
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- #39
BWlover
Getting Fingers Dirty
Yes, good tip. I am trying that. Actually I took a slightly more rigoruous step by sealing it with a plastic glue gun. Will see whether it work correctly now.
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If it doesn't work, it could be because the air is now flowing from the air vent at the top of the cartridge, directly down through the air path that was opened up by the refill hole. If this is the case, I would recommend refilling one more time, making sure that you saturate the bottom sponge, especially near the outlet port and the refill hole and then reseal the refill hole.
