Digital BW, The Print

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Tyler Boley" 
<tyler@t...> wrote:
> > All you need (along with your spiffy RIP) is a really good max K 
gen
> CMYK profile. All neutrals will automatically be replaced with your
> nicely partitioned K inks, and very minimal color inks will be used,
> only for neutralizing hue, or tinting if you like. Your hue will 
show
> nicely in soft proof, and your entire workflow can be RGB letting 
the
> RIP convert on the fly.
> I know it already works for the standard UCs, with only a 2 part K,
> and am waiting for the x800s to come out, and StudioPrint support, 
to
> do it with 3 parts.
> Obviously high quality profiles are vital.
> In the meantime, I also know it works with a 4 part K because...
> 


Actually it works with 1 black, just gets a little grainy, and I was 
surprised at how small the percentage of GCR used still keeps the 
neutral portions neutral. Really great profiles may not be needed. 
Simply build a CMYK profile with Printopen and select GCR. Even at a 
GCR of 25 (%??) there is a huge amount of black in the neutral areas, 
and the black extends all the way to paper white (if the inks will go 
that far). You can do this right now with the current (and older) 
printers. As long as you have 6 channels, you are set to go (assuming 
that 3 black inks works for your images). If you have a 7 channel 
printer, you can now have 4 black inks. It will of course be a small 
gamut set, but should produce very good B/W, and as you said, toning 
in photoshop, and softproofing.