Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/07/17
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Alex: Having tried both ink jets, dye sub, and Ciabachrome, I have come to the conclusion that ink jet prints and dye sub prints pale in comparison to a Ciabachrome Print. When you print on the high end ink jet papers and factor in the printer consumable, Ciabachrome is not much different in price. As far as the rest of it goes, a darkroom is probably cheaper than a computer, Photoshop, slide scanner, and high end printer. Add it all up some time. My used V35 enlarger was about $1,000 and the Jobo Cpe2 new was about $600. That is $1,600, about the price of a Nikon Scanner. Add a dark closet and you have all you need to make prints. The other thing that is missed in most of these digital darkroom threads is the lack of permanence of the image and the limited image size. An ink jet or dye sub print will start to noticeably fade in a matter of months, while a Ciabachrome print does not show signs of fading until about twenty years on display. With digital, you could reprint the file every six months or so and have a sort of permanence. To prove it to yourself, make your best print with your ink jet and then get that same slide printed on Ciabachrome. It is like the difference between Leica glass and Zenit glass. All this hinges upon you having a darkroom to do your own printing in. I had one and the move to Ciabachrome was relatively cheap. Ilford used to have a discovery kit that included a quantity of 4X6 paper, filters for the enlarger, a processing tube, manual, and the chemistry. If you can print B&W, you can print Ilfochrome (Ciabachrome). If you are like me, having a V35 enlarger and a Jobo Cpe2 anyways, all you need is the paper and chemistry. If you do not use slide film, you can ignore all above. Although, Ilfochrome is much sharper and more brilliant than traditional prints of negatives or other reversal prints. Regards, Robert Stevens At 12:09 AM 7/18/98 +0100, you wrote: >Hi again LUGnuts. > >For those of you with digital darkrooms and ink-jet printers, can I extol >the virtues of plastic? > >Hitherto I have proofed on plain copier paper, and printed the final >version on high quality coated 'photographic' paper. > >Just started using glossy white photographic plastic film on the ink-jet >instead, and I'm amazed by the improvement. Colour quality is similar to >coated paper, but definition is now very near that of a photographic print >from the same negative - in other words it's doing real justice to those >Leica lenses. > >It's probably because any paper will absorb and spread the ink to a certain >extent, whereas with a plastic surface there is no spreading of the ink. > >I'm using an Epson Photo Stylus printer and Verbatim stock. My only >complaint is that the price of the plastic stuff is a rip-off - at the >moment I can't find any source which sells it in anything other than packs >of ten A4 sheets. Anyone out there got a source for bulk-buying? > >Slan > >Alex > > > >Alex Hurst >Waterfall >Nr. Cork >Ireland > >Tel: +353 21 543 328 (H) > +352 21 270 907 (W) > >Fax: +353 21 271 248 >email: corkflor@iol.ie >Home website: http://homepages.iol.ie/~corkflor/ >Business website: http://www.flowerlink.com/corkflorists > > > > > >