Color Mode for B&W
The Advanced B&W mode in the Epson driver has yielded some beautiful results over the last week, I have said that many times over, but I'm finding it harder to see that it has a place in my workflow vs Color mode, which also yields beautiful B&W.
Via Adv B&W:
- The preview is small, and not of the image I'm printing.
- The controls are crude compared to Photoshop
- Great B&W results can be achieved via Color mode
Via Color Mode:
- My preview is the image in Photoshop
- Fine and deep controls for everything imagineable in Photoshop
- All adjustments are kept in the file vs matching saved settings to files
- Supports profiles
My only concern with Color mode vs Adv B&W for B&W prints is that it may be using a wider range of inks (am investigating) vs the B&W mode which may lead to the prints being less neutral and more prone to metamerism. I haven't observed any problems though, but will keep a look out for it.
I can see that for some applications Advanced B&W mode may be very useful - in a high volume/rapid turnaround environment for example, where you can have one master file and out a range of toned options easily. Some people may just prefer working with Advanced B&W Mode - no worries!
But for me Advanced B&W is currently feeling like why go this far with any image and leave critical adjustments until you're in the printer driver where the preview and tools are crude and limited, where you won't have much of an idea at all of what your image is going to look like until the job has started printing?
I'm not suggesting to anyone not to explore or use Advanced B&W mode for all their B&W. As it stands at the moment I prefer the results via Color mode by a small margin and I prefer the workflow - I'll be continuing to assess this moving forward.
posted by Pete Walsh @ 4:23 PM 9 comments
At 5:39 PM, stephen best said...
The point of Advanced B&W Mode is that you can tune the output of your (preferably) grayscale file to the paper ... tone, shadow density etc. Used for such it doesn't need a paper profile, just a media type to tell it how much ink to lay down.
I've started printing the same image on a number of papers and with different Advanced B&W settings to get a feel for what works best where. The thumbnail image is just a guide. These settings will then be saved as printer driver setups. Really, this is no different to traditional darkroom work where you decide what paper and toning would go with a particular neg.
Advanced B&W prints on Hahn. Photo Rag and Sterling 250 are great ... I'm really chuffed.
At 9:08 PM, andrew said...
It's also no different to printing through QuadTone RIP for the most part. There are some soft-proofing profiles for QTR, but I think the warm/neutral/cool toning is still a matter of trial and error.
At 9:55 PM, Pete Walsh said...
I agree the results from Advanced Photo mode are great, but the results are also great via Color mode.
After the last week of playing around I'd rather do the 'tuning' in Photoshop vs the Advanced B&W settings/mini preview - for a range of reasons.
I don't know about you guys but I strive to minimize the number of prints I waste - it's wasted time and money.
I'm just saying that's my workflow decision for now, I'm completely ok with other people doing whatever suits them :)
At 12:54 PM, andrew said...
FWIW, a member of the Yahoo Digital Black and White Print group has posted profiles to allow soft proofing of advanced B&W in Photoshop. Link.
At 4:57 AM, eolake said...
I am rather interested in whether the printer uses more color inks when printed from color mode... I'll look forward to any solid info you'll find.
Thanks for a useful blog, Pete.
At 12:02 AM, Pete Walsh said...
eolake, I should be posting information on that tomorrow. I've started on a few test prints today, Color vs Adv B&W, tracking the ink usage.
At 12:05 AM, Pete Walsh said...
Thanks Andrew, that's pretty cool. A lot of options to cover in the B&W mode - hopefully more profiles will be provided by people over time covering the popular options.
If Advanced B&W mode is the route Epson want people to take with B&W maybe they'll expand the driver to make wysiwig.
At 1:33 PM, Nill Toulme said...
What happens if you first convert your image to B&W in PS, then print using Advanced B&W mode?
Nill
~~
www.toulme.net
At 10:07 PM, Pete Walsh said...
Hi Nil, sorry to miss your comment here. I'm not sure if the question is addressed to me and with regards to what.
Fwiw, out of interest I played around with both approaches i.e. converting to B&W in PS (which is really what I do anyway, I'd never want to leave that up to the driver) and giving the convert on the fly in the driver a go too.
I'm still preferring the Color Mode route for B&W, but not by much. I'm still primarily printing color images so fortunately it's not something I've had to settle on too soon.
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