My current inksets use MIS Eboni matte black carbon for medium warm matte paper printing and HP PK, a neutral blended carbon + color pigment ink, for more neutral matte and glossy printing. See 7800-EbHp.pdf and Eb1400.pdf.
There is no 100% carbon pigment that is totally neutral. Most are very warm. MIS Eboni is the most neutral and that is why I use it. For a more neutral print than carbon can make, inkset designers use color pigments to cool down the carbon. To hide the color dots and make a neutral ink, these color pigments might be blended into the ink mix. The dedicated B&W inkset makers do this, as does HP in the Vivera inkset used for the Z3100/3200 and in some of my inksets.
For fine art printing or any use where the best longevity and image stability are required, B&W photographers and printers have to be very careful using the "blended" carbon + color inksets. Colorants fade faster and at different rates, causing tone shifts (often a greenish tint) that will be a problem in most B&W inksets. The HP Vivera Photo Black (PK) pigment, is the only blended carbon + color pigment I recommend for top quality fine art. HP Z3100 carts are easy to use sources of these HP pigments, which work well in Epson printers.
I have designed and, in the past, used many blended (carbon + color) B&W inksets that I would not now recommend for fine art purposes. I still often recommend them despite their weaknesses. This is because for most printing uses these blended inks will last long enough, and such inksets can give printers considerable flexibility in paper and print tones.
There are two 100% carbon approaches being used regularly -- MIS Eboni-based inksets and Inkjetmall (Jon Cone's) Carbon Sepia PiezoTone inks. All of the relatively neutral inksets contain colorants, and the two carbon inks noted above cannot print on glossy paper.
For glossy paper, MIS warm carbon, including MIS K4-PK, LK, & LLK, as well as UT7-C & LC, and the C88 EZ-Warm can print on glossy paper. These are usually the warm channels of MIS variable tone inksets, listed further below. This warm MIS carbon ink might also be used in a printer as the warm channel where HP PK and/or dilutions of it are used in a cool channel.
While the Epson Ultrachrome K3 inkset has very good color inks in it and can print quite stable B&W images, I, personally, don't like color dots in my B&W images, and the ink positions needed for the color inks as well as the profiling difficulties introduced by high gamut colors makes them less than ideal for B&W printing. I prefer more gray inks with tones that are very close to the final print tones I'm targetting.
With respect to papers, Arches uncoated watercolor paper is probably the best there is. It has stood the test of time, having been used by artists for about 500 years. The lack of a coating makes it harder to print on, but there is no coating to flake off or crack. It can even be washed. The next best is probably coated, "natural" (no OBAs) inkjet papers that use a cotton substrate. Papers that use optical brightening agents (OBAs) are generally not recommended for any fine art use. The OBAs I've tested simply fade too quickly.
Until recently I printed with 100% carbon on a brightened paper to achieve a neutral print tone. But with recent tests by Aardenburg-Imaging and others showing that HP PK is very stable for a blended ink, I'm abandoning brightened papers for fine art printing. A 100% carbon image on a brightened paper will have a much less stable print tone than a neutral print using HP PK on a non-brightened, "natural" paper.
When the most stable B&W pigments are printed on a cotton substrate (paper) the resulting black and white print may be the most archival image possible with today's technology. Unlike wet process prints, digital printing allows substrates that are buffered to resist airborne acids and have not been subject to harsh chemical processing.
"Carbon on cotton" defines, in my view, the paradigm for fine art and archival B&W printing. One step back from this is a blend of carbon + HP PK on the best non-brightened coated inkjet paper.
For more information on carbon printing stabililty, click here.
There are 2 approaches to printing with Eboni (and HpPK) pigments that have wide appeal. First, one can use one of the Epson printers that use tiny 1.5 picoliter droplets to print only with the concentrated black ink. The Epson R1800, R1900, and 1400 printers, for example, can make very good B&W prints with 100% Eboni MK.
Second, one can dilute the Eboni MK (and HP PK) to make multi-channel, "K6" or other, monotone inksets that are very smooth on most Epson printers. The dilute Eboni prints warmer than the concentrated Eboni MK. The HP PK is neutral with cool shadows, whether concentrated or diluted. With these approaches one can often use the Epson driver or the QTR rip. With QTR one can balance the advantages of each approach.
Eboni MK is the standard MIS matte black ink. MIS also sells the dilute Eboni both in bottles and in pre-loaded Epson 1400 cartridges. MIS favors the blended B&W inks due to the limitations of the diluted Eboni ink: matte paper only, medium warm, and faster settling in wide formate printers, including the 3800.
For more information on this 1800 "3-MK" workflow, click here. See also the February 2008 issue of Shutterbug magazine, reproduced here.
Although I have not tested the 1900 with this workflow, it should work very well.
The 1800 3-MK approach and profiles can be ported to the Epson 1400 rather easily by anyone who knows how to re-linearize QTR profiles.
The 1400, with several inksets, appears to bring top notch 13" wide printing to a more affordable level, and it is now my primary printer, except, of course, where the 13 inch wide paper limit is too small. See my Epson 1400 PDF for my current top desktop recommendation.
While all pigment inksets settle with time, dilute Eboni settles somewhat faster than most. Note that this settling can result in inconsistent print densities, but it has not resulted in clogging. In desktop units, where the carts are agitated continuously during printing, this is not an issue. With dilute Eboni in wide format printers, the carts must be agitated manually for consistent densities. Wide format "K2" and newer carts are easy to remove and agitate.
I do not recommend Eboni-6 for any cartridges that have sponges in them. Check with MIS to verify whether their carts are compatible with Eboni-6. Carbon-6 has not had trouble with any cartridges. The MIS 1400 cartridges are totally spongeless and trouble free with Eboni-6. For details on this 100% carbon pigment inkset, click here. Eboni-6 in my 7500 for the last 2 years and now Carbon-6 in my 7800 have produced the best display prints and been the most clog-free inksets I've ever used.
For information on Eboni-6/Carbon-6 in my Epson 7800 see my 7800-Carbon-6.pdf. Note that I'll be adding HpPK as well as LK and LLK C6 dilutions to the 7800 soon to bring glossy and neutral printing to the platform.
For the C88+ version of Eboni-6 and Carbon-6, click here. A C88+ with Carbon-6 is about the least expensive and easiest to care for B&W printer possible. And the images are 100% carbon pigment; so they'll have state-of-the-art stability. Just remember to agitate the CIS if one is used. My non-technical daughter is in her second trouble-free year at college with a C88+ and CIS with C6 "EZ" in it -- all year on a single initial fill. Note that 20% HpPK in C6 makes a neutral, glossy-compatible EZ ink for the printers.
As noted previously, one can also combine Eboni-6 with a neutralize Photo Black ink ("PKN") in a 1.5 picoliter printer like the 1400. I personally use a 1400 with Eboni-6 and HpPK for all my serious printing that can be done on a 13" printer. See www.paulroark.com/BW-Info/Eb1400.pdf.
The same "C6" clear dilution base and approach appear to work well with the HP Z3100/3200 PK pigments. This approach can be used to make a variety of inksets, including the dilute neutral gray inks that are glossy and matte compatible.
The C6 inkset base is composed of just a few common, readily available, economical, and safe materials. Because the cost of the dilution base is so low, the cost of the dilute inks can be very low even when relatively expensive inks are used in the mix. This is because dilute inks are mostly just water.
These inksets must be considered experimental. So far, I have seen no problems with these inksets that relates to the C6 bases I describe. The C6 diluted inks I've used have been the most clog free inks I've used, including OEM dye-based inks.
For details on these inksets and user mixing, click here.
The dilute Eboni inksets discussed above can be printed with either the Epson driver or QTR.
In my view, the most convenient workflow for Windows users includes
an easy to make ICC in the Photoshop or Elements Print Preview.
For a tutorial on making B&W ICCs with a flatbed scanner,
click here.
For the 100% carbon Eboni-6 option, click here.
For the latest variation of Eboni-6 with PKN
for glossy printing and cool matte prints, click here. This is what I currently use.
R260/280 and similar Claria ink printers
(The R340 appears to print the same as the R220.)
7000 & 7500 - 100% Carbon beta test
7600 & 9600 - 100% Carbon beta test
Washing Arches watercolor paper,
Possible way to hold printer chips in place without the need for a cartridge,
Large format 100% carbon-pigment prints in Epson K2 printers to match R1800 Eboni prints,
Printing 100% Eboni carbon B&W plus color with the R800 and R1800,
QTR, 2200, 4K+, Matte BW, Carbon & general monotone inkset curve profiling,
(The most recent QTR workflow notes, above, are now my prefered approach and what I'd recommend to the extent they use different settings than the notes below.)
QTR, 2200, 4K+Ccm, Matte BW profiling
Sample 4K+, IJC, Split-tone profiling
Making B&W ICCs with a Flatbed Scanner and Gray Card
Selected Canon (and comparison) lens MTF curves
Inks are not affected by Epson's actions. As such, once one has a printer with refillable cartridges or a CIS/CFS, there are no barriers.
Paul Roark
Solvang, CA, USA
www.PaulRoark.com
