A happy long life

[Bill Pierce]

I was recently scanning Henry Wilhelm’s web site ( http://www.wilhelm-research.com ) and noticed that in many cases black-and-white inkjet prints had a considerably longer print permanence ratings than color prints from the same printer. Since a lot of my work was for “Time, the colorful newsweekly,” I shot a lot of color. Since it was news, the color image certainly wasn’t used creatively. You just accepted what was there even if a bright blue sky and fluffy clouds made a funeral or a war seem cheery. Later when these pictures were printed for personal use, they got converted to black-and-white. Just because of the permanence issue, I’m now thinking of reprinting the family snapshots that are in color and some of the other pictures presently in color which I would like to see last in black-and-white. I don’t think they will suffer much from the loss of color and may gain a happy long life. Does anybody have any thoughts on this?

 

[helen.HH]

Your Title "A happy long life"
brought to mind a Fortune Cookie ... brought a Smile to my face

There are some things I will never go back and tweak... even with imperfections, they breathe 'Atmosphere'
and lots that could always be more fine tuned, be it in post processing or printing

 

[Calzone]

Bill,

"Archival Inkjet Printing" still uses a color inkset, and any use of color makes a print vulnerable to fading. Archival I think is a misnomer.

I use Piezography for B&W printing because in K-7 it is seven shades of black, and in Piezography Pro it is basically using 4 shades of black that also allows for control of split toning in the lights, mids and shadows.

Currently I'm using the new High Density Photo Black in my K-7 to create a new K7-HD inkset that adds about a F-stop to the tonal range and makes for a blacker black than I could get on a wet print.

Carbon based inks lack color and do not fade. The Piezography inks I use are all carbon based.

I also print glossy, and with Piezography that means a clear coat is printed. I find that this "Gloss Overcoat" protects the print and allows for a good amount of handling. I can spit on my hand and squeege a print with no ill effect. If you are looking for permenance I would print Piezography glossy.

The inks cost less, but I find that you lay down more ink, and the tone has to come from somewhere. The cost ends up being about the same as Epson OEM inks.

Currently I'm construction a "Workbook" of 12x18 images on 17x22 paper. I already have 44 pages made and I'm using threaded binding posts to secure my spine. I used linen tape to join my pages to the spine, and the pages lay flat. I expect this book will exceed over a hundred pages. The idea is to annotate on the back the file number, my Lightroom settings, gear used and any other imformation that will help organize this archive I created about a disappearing NYC.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

Your Title "A happy long life"
brought to mind a Fortune Cookie ... brought a Smile to my face

There are some things I will never go back and tweak... even with imperfections, they breathe 'Atmosphere'
and lots that could always be more fine tuned

Helen,

I figured out why I have been photographing so frantically over the last decade: pretty much it is so when I an forced to leave NYC one day that I have a sense of home to take with me.

Cal

 

[Timmyjoe]

May I digress a bit Bill. In your years shooting color for Time, did you ever use Kodak Ektapress negative film? The reason I ask is that in the 1990's and early 2000's I shot a lot of Ektapress (it had an almost magical way of balancing flash/tungsten/daylight that no other color film seemed to possess). As I go back thru those negatives now, they have "turned" and the colors are almost garish. B&W seems to be the only way to print them.

Or did you mostly shoot Kodachrome?

Best,
-Tim

 

[Oren Grad]

Bill,

"Archival Inkjet Printing" still uses a color inkset, and any use of color makes a print vulnerable to fading. Archival I think is a misnomer....

Carbon based inks lack color and do not fade. The Piezography inks I use are all carbon based.

Best to study Aardenburg Imaging's test results before concluding that the Cone inks will necessarily give you greater stability than is achieved by the mix of color inks that the printer vendors use for monochrome.

http://www.aardenburg-imaging.com/

 

[Franko]

I have a wall full of 11x14 framed prints that were printed on an Epson 1200 approx. 15 years ago that look as crisp as they did when they went on display. The 1200 had a black ink only setting and, according to all the Internet experts, the devil himself lived in that setting. Well, those pictures have received close to direct sunlight for a good portion of their display time. They still look fine - for casual display. The Wilhelm reports used to say that even the cheapest of the Epson inks would last a long time when used in monochrome on rag paper.

I absolutely hate how this site kicks me off when I'm halfway through writing.

 

[Calzone]

Best to study Aardenburg Imaging's test results before concluding that the Cone inks will necessarily give you greater stability than is achieved by the mix of color inks that the printer vendors use for monochrome.

http://www.aardenburg-imaging.com/

Oren,

Thanks for the link. I will look into it.

I based my comments on my art school training. The worst color for fading is red. I was taught that carbon based pigments are really the only permanent color.

I see the term "Archival Pigment Prints" being used (perhaps overused), and they do not distinguish between color and B&W. From my training color prints are not and cannot be as long lasting as B&W prints due to fading. They lack permanence.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

I have a wall full of 11x14 framed prints that were printed on an Epson 1200 approx. 15 years ago that look as crisp as they did when they went on display. The 1200 had a black ink only setting and, according to all the Internet experts, the devil himself lived in that setting. Well, those pictures have received close to direct sunlight for a good portion of their display time.

F,

Good to here. Evidently and likely only carbon inks were used.

Not sure if this applies to other B&W printing where only the carbon blacks are used.

Cal

 

[Oren Grad]

And not to ignore the question with which our host launched this discussion...

I’m now thinking of reprinting the family snapshots that are in color and some of the other pictures presently in color which I would like to see last in black-and-white. I don’t think they will suffer much from the loss of color and may gain a happy long life. Does anybody have any thoughts on this?

I like this idea. It's something that I've been considering for those of my color family pictures that can stand the conversion to monochrome.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Then I purchased my Eoson c88+ I read about Epson archival paper and about Epson inks archival properties. I was completely satisfied.
And I'm lucky dude, because my wife prefers photos on matte paper. 🙂
Oh, I already have some family pictures printed on FB darkroom paper, will continue.

 

[charjohncarter]

I've tried to convert some color into B&W, it works sometimes and not others. I'm wondering about important files that you have printed on 'true black and white paper.' (MPIX and FROMEX) I've done this a few times and they seem 'archival' but who knows.

 

[Dogman]

I had not heard B&W inkjets had longer, happier lifespans. It's heartening to hear this.

For the last couple of years I've concentrated on digital B&W. I shoot Raw so, of course, everything is color when it goes into the computer but I've been converting to B&W in Lightroom. This got me to thinking about what some of my older digital photos might look like when converted. Sure enough, once I got into it I realized a lot of what I had shot over the years works better in B&W than it did originally in color--not everything, mind you, but an awful lot carries better in B&W.

For the last few months, I've been retracing my steps and reprinting a lot of those shots. Nothing fancy to start with, I'm just printing 6x9 on 8.5x11 but I now have a huge pile of "work prints". Don't know what I'll ever do with them other than show them or gift them to family and friends but it's really nice to know they might be around for whoever cares.

 

[Franko]

I print on 90-110lb 100% rag drawing or watercolor papers, usually the highest quality papers of that weight in the art world and believe the limiting factor will be the inks. The real "who knows" factor with inks is what quality pigments are used and what are they suspended in? Just because they are priced like liquid gold is no comfort. I trust monochrome but almost never print color for anything I'm keeping.

My experience with specific inkjet papers is that, other than Epson Heavyweight Matt, everything else I have that's over five or six years old has yellow borders, used or blank and that's with careful storage in acid free materials.

 

[nikon_sam]

Look up the term "Photodegradation".
I'm in the Printing Industry and over the years notice that posters left in store windows over time will fade...when color posters start to fade the Red ink goes first due to their absorption of Blue light rays...
Then on the other hand I've seen posters fade even when left in a dark place but in that case the Blue ink fades first..
Sunlight attacks the pigment in inks...Black & White prints might fade also but you're not seeing a color degrading or color shifting...they just might get a bit lighter...
U.V. inks used in the Printing industry may last longer because of the chemical reaction in drying the ink (UV lamps) in which the ink polymerizes with the paper and actually becomes part of the paper. Paper recyclers don't like UV inks because they can't bleach out the inks in the paper...

 

[Bill Pierce]

May I digress a bit Bill. In your years shooting color for Time, did you ever use Kodak Ektapress negative film? The reason I ask is that in the 1990's and early 2000's I shot a lot of Ektapress (it had an almost magical way of balancing flash/tungsten/daylight that no other color film seemed to possess). As I go back thru those negatives now, they have "turned" and the colors are almost garish. B&W seems to be the only way to print them.

Or did you mostly shoot Kodachrome?

Best,
-Tim

We shot transparency film because the positive transparency was easier and faster to edit than negative. I shot Kodachrome when I could. Kodak would pick up the film at the Time-Life building in Manhattan late at night and take ti to their processing plant in Fairlawn, N.J., returning slides to the T-L building the next morning. Often you needed the film speed of High Speed Ektachrome. That and regular Ektachrome were processed in house at the Time-Life lab. Sometimes you couldn't get Kodachrome in some countries once you ran out of what you brought with you. That's how a lot of us were introduced to Fuji films.

 

[Bill Pierce]

I see the term "Archival Pigment Prints" being used (perhaps overused), and they do not distinguish between color and B&W. From my training color prints are not and cannot be as long lasting as B&W prints due to fading. They lack permanence.

Cal

Cal - My understanding (actually lifted from Henry Wilhelm's website) is that the 4 black inks in the Epson 3880 are carbon based. This would certainly account for the increased permanence of the b&w prints over the color in his studies.

 

[Dogman]

I might be wrong but I thought Epson mixed the color and black inks when printing B&W. I use an R3000 printer and I know it uses up the color ink cartridges even though I'm only printing B&W images.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

You are not wrong.

 

[Oren Grad]

Epson does mix other colors in with the "K" inks when printing neutral ABW monochrome, because the K inks by themselves aren't inherently neutral. But monochrome prints still use so much less of the other colors than do color prints, that image stability is substantially greater.

IIRC, with Roy Harrington's QuadTone RIP you can set up a monochrome profile for the supported Epson printers that will use *only* the K inks, if you don't mind the particular warmish tone that results.