Digital prints on Silver paper?

[Ron Marshall]

Adorama advertises digital prints on "Real black and white, Ilford paper" which I assume is silver gelatin, for $5.99 for an 11x14.

Also 20x24 color on Kodak Endura Supra Luster for $14.99.

[Donald Qualls]

Yep, Ilford makes a special silver gelatin paper specifically intended for digital/laser printing. As I understand it, it comes in only one contrast grade (because it's so easy to control contrast in software), and is rather on the hard side for optical printing, but then Ilford makes a good range of traditional graded and multigrade papers for optical printing.

I don't recall if the Ilford digital silver paper is panchromatic -- if so, it wouldn't even require special settings on the printing machine, just print your color image and get a nice B&W print. OTOH, it's also pretty easy to desaturate or channel mix in software, so no reason the paper would need to be panchro...

[David A. Goldfarb]

The paper is more panchromatic than conventional papers, but less panchromatic than Panalure, as I understand it.

They might also be using the DeVere digital enlarger, which can enlarge on any conventional B&W or color paper, up to around 16x20 or 20x24 before you would notice the pixel pattern. There's a lab in New York that has two of these.

[Bruce Watson]

Adorama advertises digital prints on "Real black and white, Ilford paper" which I assume is silver gelatin, for $5.99 for an 11x14.

Also 20x24 color on Kodak Endura Supra Luster for $14.99.

According to what I read on the Kodak website, Supra Endura paper is an RA-4 color paper. This is not a sliver halide paper; the image is formed from dyes, not silver, and the base is RC, not fiber. They do, I think, make a monochrome version, but the resulting print is not silver gelatin.

My understanding is that Ilford has several silver halide papers that are fast enough to use with LightJets, Chromiras, etc. These would include Ilfospeed RC Digitial in a couple of surfaces, and Ilford Galerie FB digital in at least one surface. These are not RA-4 papers and require conventional B&W processing. That may account for their slow penetration into the marketplace as most labs don't have automated roll paper processing equipement in place for conventional darkroom papers.

The real problem isn't the papers IMHO. It's the rumors I keep hearing that Oce has quit making LightJet printers and is not renewing service contracts on existing printers. If Lightjet printers go away, there will be considerably fewer outlets for this new paper. I mean, if you were running a prolab and Oce did this to you, would you be inclined to buy a Durst Lambda or a Chromira to replace your Lightjet? Or would you be inclined to spend 25x less money on a 60" wide format inkjet printer?

The money difference is huge, but it might be worth it if you can be sure you can pay it off in print sales. It's an interesting question for the prolabs.

[Ron Marshall]

According to what I read on the Kodak website, Supra Endura paper is an RA-4 color paper. This is not a sliver halide paper; the image is formed from dyes, not silver, and the base is RC, not fiber. They do, I think, make a monochrome version, but the resulting print is not silver gelatin.


I know the Kodak is not silver halide. The Ilford paper is what I was refering to.

I mentioned the Kodak because I found the price for a 20x24 to be fairly interesting.

[PViapiano]

Adorama lists it as:

black & white, luster finish – Ilford Multigrade IV Deluxe paper

I've had really good service and results from Adorama in the past, very high quality color prints using a color-managed workflow.

The only other online service I've used that equalled or bettered it was WHCC.

[Gordon Moat]

. . . . . . . If Lightjet printers go away, there will be considerably fewer outlets for this new paper. I mean, if you were running a prolab and Oce did this to you, would you be inclined to buy a Durst Lambda or a Chromira to replace your Lightjet? Or would you be inclined to spend 25x less money on a 60" wide format inkjet printer?

The money difference is huge, but it might be worth it if you can be sure you can pay it off in print sales. It's an interesting question for the prolabs.

The operating cost, or perhaps judging on cost per sq.ft. output, will probably override initial purchase cost. Of course, a place could be running a ColorSpan (72" smallest width) near 0.12¢ per sq.ft. output. The other issue is outputs per hour, which the Durst and Chromira machines easily trump even very large inkjet printers. Then the cost factor would be profit driven, in that the greater output capability, even at a higher initial purchase level, would give greater potential profits. This is probably why there are not that many wide inkjet printers servicing this market.

I spoke with my local pro lab about the Ilford paper, and even put them in touch with Ilford. At this point, it is entirely tied to a business decision of volume potential driving profits, and at what point after set-up would profits meet and exceed initial expenses. Currently they can do up to 50" wide RA-4 prints.

Ciao!

Gordon Moat
A G Studio (http://www.allgstudio.com)

[E_Aiken]

There's a lab in NYC that's offering digital laser or something printing onto a traditional BW paper, fibre, I believe. I saw some prints. They were okay, but really, I think most of us could make better darkroom prints in about 20 minutes and the costs were extortionate. I didn't see an advantage to this service over my own BW printing on 3800 and 9800 printers using nice heavy paper like Innova F type or Hannemuhle Satin.

[David A. Goldfarb]

With any of these methods, the skill of the printer still is the most important thing.

The lab with the two DeVere digital enlargers (these are essentially conventional condenser enlargers with an LCD panel in place of the neg) is using them to crank out headshots. It seems a perfect application for this technology, because the normal print size is 8x10" (well within the resolution limits of the system), it makes it easy to put text on the image, which used to be stripped in, and to do standard retouching, and if you're set up for processing conventional B&W prints, it's much faster and cheaper to crank out batches of 100 8x10's this way than with an inkjet printer.

[David A. Goldfarb]

The Ilford paper for LightJet/Lambda/Chromira is fiber based and is processed in normal B&W chemistry. It's around grade 3, and the spectral sensitivity is optimized for laser and LED exposure.