Digital BW, The Print

The camera that best matches my 2200 in B&W is/was a Rolleiflex with
3.5 Xenar, though in color my Canon F1's do pretty well. 

Or is the topic gizmos? 

OK, there are scanners in the workflow.




--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, James Parker
<dakota.kid@m...> wrote:
>
> Frank, in my opinion, it's largely irrelevant IF you're shooting
RAW. You
> can correct a RAW image in post-processing to get just about any
result you
> want, and duplicating the conditions that would result in the same
> parameters every time is almost impossible. Even shooting with all
manual
> parameters you'd need to take into account ISO, color balance,
exposure and
> any other custom tweaks that your camera allows. Many many more
variables
> than film. 
> 
> That said, it is useful to know how your cameras and lenses react to
light
> and how the sensors record it. Shooting a target under controlled
conditions
> and opening it in Adobe Camera Raw won't tell you what you need to know
> unless your monitor is calibrated. (You don't say whether you have a
> calibrated workflow.) If you do, then you can inspect the RAW file and
> compare it to the target under carefully controlled lighting
conditions and
> adjust ACR to suit (the calibration tab ys under Advanced).
> 
> There are many things that get in the way of an absolute linear match
> between camera and printed image, which is why I say it's largely
> irrelevant. If it looks good when printed, then maybe it's ok for
you and
> your viewers. If it's way off, then something needs to change. The
beauty of
> the digital workflow is that the camera exposure is less important
than it
> was in the days of Kodachrome. It's still important, but easier to
fix when
> necessary.
> 
> And as far as matching camera to printer, it depends on the paper,
the ink,
> the ICC profiles and the printer. If you use more than a couple of these
> variables, you may find that you're testing more than shooting. Again,
> printing a reference target to your printers will help, but if the
acquired
> values in the camera target are off, then you need to decide if you
want to
> tweak the printer to match those values or if you want to match the
correct
> values, which you'd need to get via densitometer reading off of a
standard
> target, not one that you'd shot under variable conditions. If you
have the
> tools to measure this, by all means go for it! From my perspective, it's
> much easier to edit the camera file look how I want it to look by
having the
> monitor and printer remain constant via profiling and paper. Which
renders
> profiling the camera redundant.
> 
> Jim
> 
> 
> On 1/19/06 2:51 PM, "DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com"
> <DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
> 
> > Subject: Matching Camera to Printer?
> > 
> > 
> > One process I did with my film cameras was to match my cameras
(and films)
> > to my printing.  This meant knowing the times to produce absolute
black with
> > a clear negative, then with a full-zoned subject.  This took into
account
> > variables of camera, film, development time, enlarger, paper, etc.
> > 
> > My questions is, once I get my Epson 220 set up and printing steps
> > correctly, should I then control for the digital camera variable?
It seems
> > that cameras might meter differently, creating a need for some
modifications
> > on the printer.
> > 
> > If so, I could shoot an image of a target that included absolute
black, pure
> > white (doing a white balance on it, of course), and some mid grays,
> > including an 18% card.  Then, upon printing the image, I could
tell if the
> > printer was matching what the camera recorded.
> > 
> > Crazy? Sane? Irrelevant?
> > 
> > Frank Vincent
>