Piezography Pro

[Calzone]

Many here know that I exploit Piezography to print Monochrom files big.

Because I purchased so much ink and paper I have been invited to be an "early adopter" of a new system that Jon Cone recently has developed called "Piezography Pro." Earlier today I placed a "Pre-order" on a 700ml kit and two sets of new carts to be able to load my 3880 and 7800 with this new inkset that offers the following advantages: a blacker black; variable split-tone via three sliders on Roy Harrington's Print Tool; and the most important to me, one-pass glossy printing.

Sometime in mid November I should get the first batch.

I only print glossy on either: Jon Cone Type 5 with is basically Jon Cone's version of a Crane's Silver Rag clone that is optimized for Piezography for a denser black that offers what I call a "Satin" finish, even though Jon Cone calls it glossy; or Canson Platine Fibre Rag which gives me a true glossy finish. Both 100% rag papers feature no optical brightners and have a Bayrata coating.

With the standard K7 inkset I blended my own custom inkset to create a three way split-tone where I have a true black, warm shadows and cool highlights that add dimention to my prints. Out of the seven shades of black I blend only in shade 3 and shade 4 to tone down the warmth and to give the highlights more range, but realize that my split-tone is fixed, and soon I will have control over the split-tone.

With K7 glossy printing a second printing of Gloss Overcoat is required. This eliminates bronzing and gloss differential, but an added benefit is that it makes ink jet prints durable so they can be handled without damage. I tend to use mostly the Canson Platine Fibre Rag for the true glossy look, but Canson papers require two passes of Gloss Overcoat with drying inbetween so basically printing a 20x30 image on 24x36 paper takes 41 minutes to lay down 7 shades of black, 45 minutes of a Gloss Overcoat, and lastly another 45 minute layer of Gloss Overcoat. Know that these times are so long because I only print unidirectional for higher IQ.

One pass glossy reduces all these extra steps and eliminates all the air time the print head sees that can lead to clogs and added maintenance.

Currently my printers are in storage mode loaded with carts filled with Piezoflush. Initially I will load first the 3880 for trials and testing. I recently refilled the 400 ml carts for the 7800 even though they are not presently loaded onto the 7800 to get an idea of how to expend my remaining K7 inks.

Some of you might question of why I might want to have two printers or double trouble, but my reasoning is that my most common print size is 13x19.9 on 17x23 1/2 inch paper, and to save wear and tear on my 7800, a 24 inch printer, it makes sense to use the smaller printer as a workhorse for small printing and proofing and keep the big printer fresh. Also know that because I own a spare set of refillable carts that I can safely store either or both printers safely by loading and flushing my printers with Piezoflush.

Anyways be aware that printing is where photography gets expensive, but printing surely has advanced me as a photographer.

Cal

 

[robert blu]

Anyways be aware that printing is where photography gets expensive, but printing surely has advanced me as a photographer.

Cal

I fully agree, 101 % 🙂

Cheaper for me because I like to print very small which reduce of course the costs. But I like to get the tones I need and this means they in spite of calibration and other procedura sometime a print has to be redone in order to get what I want.

But another benefit of printing, large or small is that you are force to a very selective editing and this is where I learn a lot.

Ciao, robert

 

[Calzone]

I fully agree, 101 % 🙂

Cheaper for me because I like to print very small which reduce of course the costs. But I like to get the tones I need and this means they in spite of calibration and other procedura sometime a print has to be redone in order to get what I want.

But another benefit of printing, large or small is that you are force to a very selective editing and this is where I learn a lot.

Ciao, robert

Robert,

Although I push the envelope, not all images are meant to be printed big. In my symposium at ICP we compared the same images via print size and with and without borders.

It seems that wide borders enhance a print by creating a space. The same sized prints looked and appeared signifigantly bigger with borders. The print also seemed a lot more spacial and 3-D with broad borders.

Then many like being able to handle the prints, feel the weight of the rag paper, and holding the print made the viewer become intimate with the image. Kinda like holding a baby. My friend Robert Rodriguez who is the Artist In Residence at the Canson booth explained to me that he likes using rag papers whenever there is the opportunity for a person to handle a print, but the problem with ink jet prints is that they are delicate and easily damaged.

My friend Joe says he can always make another print, but the Gloss Overcoat allows me to freely give the viewer the experience of handling the print without the worry of damage.

It does seem that 13x19 1/2 is a great print size because the viewing distance is at arm's length.

Printing for exhibition is a different story...

Cal

 

[cz23]

...so basically printing a 20x30 image on 24x36 paper takes 41 minutes to lay down 7 shades of black, 45 minutes of a Gloss Overcoat, and lastly another 45 minute layer of Gloss Overcoat. Know that these times are so long because I only print unidirectional for higher IQ....

That's quite a process! Do you find that once under glass, the gloss overcoating still distinguishes the print from one without it?

I admire your commitment to the printing process and would love to see your work. Now that I think about it, after all these years on RFF, I don't even know what you photograph.

I spend my work days immersed in complex technical information and processes, and that last thing I want to do evenings or weekends is dig into more of it through photography. I'm thrilled with the way my new P800's ABW function spits out a very nice print with so little effort on my part.

Good luck with the new line of Cone products. Sounds like an enjoyable and beneficial partnership.

John

 

[Calzone]

That's quite a process! Do you find that once under glass, the gloss overcoating still distinguishes the print from one without it?

I admire your commitment to the printing process and would love to see your work. Now that I think about it, after all these years on RFF, I don't even know what you photograph.

I spend my work days immersed in complex technical information and processes, and that last thing I want to do evenings or weekends is dig into more of it through photography. I'm thrilled with the way my new P800's ABW function spits out a very nice print with so little effort on my part.

Good luck with the new line of Cone products. Sounds like an enjoyable and beneficial partnership.

John

John,

Nothing wrong with Epson OEM. Seen plenty of great prints. In my case I'm struggling to define myself as a fine art printer, and know what I do is kinda crazy and obsessive.

I don't post because I don't belive it is the best way to present my work. I'll present you with a link that basically set the hook that got me into a group show that is presently running. These are 5 large Piezography prints that are the product of a Leica Monochrom, but oddly the curator picked a silver wet print that was shot with a Tele Rolliflex.

I have a boring day job, so pouring through technical information is my way of exploiting the boredom to my benefit.

Know that I have this manner of annoying people because I don't post, do social media, or even carry a cell phone. LOL.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

John,

Check out FreshOutOfStorage.com, click on Artists, and then on Calvin Lom. There is a slide show of some 20x30 Piezography images printed on 24x26 paper. The internet in no way captures the IQ and tonality. The one vertical image was taken on that NYC Meet-Up field trip where seven New Yorkers hooked up with 3 Philly locals to shoot Eastern State Penitentuary, a prison that operated for 142 years and that was abandoned in 1971.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWhMVrbAZ8

The above link came up when I googled "Fresh Out Of Storage" and somehow I saw my name in one of the citations. There are a bunch of shots at the opening where basically I somehow being photgraphed and somehow some of my work is being shown. The photo of the Asian making "Chinese Eyes" is actually me when I was 26. Compare me to the almost 59 year old and you will say I am unrecognizable.

Cal

 

[Calzone]

WOW.

I found another link by googling "Fresh Out Of Storage" that actually has some video when the Curator, Ariela Krader, visiting my storage unit. It reveals this 40x50 inch "shipping container" that has about 70-80 pounds of exhibition prints.

Anyways this seems like a clip from the documentary that just features me, my photography and my Manhattan Mini Storage unit.

It seems the YouTube links do not work.

Cal

 

[rhl-oregon]

Thanks for the vision of your printing, Cal. If the exhibit stays up long enough, I'll see it on the next trip to NY, though my priority would be to make the monthly lunch meet with ya'll.

Could you hazard a ballpark figure on your cost per 13x19 print in ink/paper, i.e. setting aside the startup costs of a 3000 series printer and the Cone conversions? So guesstimating the cost of your paper and cartridge refills--though you may need to extrapolate those costs over 10-20 prints or more to get a realistic cost divisible down to one print! If it has been part of your budgeting to think about this and you can share the info, great. If not, send me a Buzz Off Robert PM.

I'm trying to decide whether to keep a 3800 and switch to piezography, but don't know whether I can or even want to print enough to keep the machine humming i.e. Unclogged. I know what I can pay my neighborhood developer/printer pro for a good 13x19 print, and it may be more sensible in the long run to not maintain a big printer at home.

Thanks for whatever light you can shed on cost. The benefits for you are plenty clear ;-)

 

[Calzone]

Thanks for the vision of your printing, Cal. If the exhibit stays up long enough, I'll see it on the next trip to NY, though my priority would be to make the monthly lunch meet with ya'll.

Could you hazard a ballpark figure on your cost per 13x19 print in ink/paper, i.e. setting aside the startup costs of a 3000 series printer and the Cone conversions? So guesstimating the cost of your paper and cartridge refills--though you may need to extrapolate those costs over 10-20 prints or more to get a realistic cost divisible down to one print! If it has been part of your budgeting to think about this and you can share the info, great. If not, send me a Buzz Off Robert PM.

I'm trying to decide whether to keep a 3800 and switch to piezography, but don't know whether I can or even want to print enough to keep the machine humming i.e. Unclogged. I know what I can pay my neighborhood developer/printer pro for a good 13x19 print, and it may be more sensible in the long run to not maintain a big printer at home.

Thanks for whatever light you can shed on cost. The benefits for you are plenty clear ;-)

Robert,

The 3800 is a robust printer with a long print head life. Basically the difference between your 3800 and my 3880 is basically my 3880 uses an improved inkset.

A set of refillable carts is about $135.00 and two sets I feel is required: one for inks; and a second for Piezoflush to store and maintain your printer.

I bulk up on inks and buy 700 ml bottles to keep costs low. The cost of ink is roughly about a quarter the price of the OEM inkset, but know that I think with Piezography one lays down more ink than OEM printing. The tonality has to come from somewhere. Add onto that the added ink of a second or third printing of Gloss Overcoat (depending on paper used) that costs as much as ink per ml. In the end any cost savings in ink is kinda slight in my case.

Know that when I print a 24x36 that basically I use about six times the amount of paper and ink than a 13x19. I really drain the carts the way I print and on my 3880 when I printed only with that printer I had to refill my carts every other week.

In the end the cost savings I think gets washed out, so why do the extra work, and what are the real benefits? Cheap local printing is just that, but the quality of an Adorama print for me is really not so great and is unlikely to be archival like my prints. I have total control, there are no compromises, and I get what I envision to fully exploit the medium.

My prints are archival, printed on 100% rag paper, and I consider them fine art prints of superior quality. Because Piezography is based on carbon and has no color it will have more permanence than any color inkset used for B&W. Then there is the durability where Piezography prints can be handled and are not so delicate like an OEM inkjet print due to the Gloss Overcoat that acts like a protective layer. With the new Piezography Pro and the one pass glossy printing "Pizzawheels" when printing on Canson papers won't be an issue anymore.

Anyways I strongly feel that printing has made me a better photographer, and I think I am making better prints than I could get made by an outsider. Know that by having a second set of carts loaded with Piezoflush that you can flush out all the inks, can even restore a clogged printer, and that you can store your printer unused safely for a year so you don't have to be chained to your printer.

In my case I mostly exploit my printing capabilities in the winter. Now with Piezography Pro the one pass glossy printing saves me lots of time and gives me added capabilities. Jon Cone has done all the engineering and heavy lifting. More or less the system is turnkey. Then there is the next advancement for me: printing digital negatives and making silver wet prints via contact printing using a vacuum frame. Jon Cone already has another system for this built up, but I don't have the studio space required. Basically we can do a "Salgado" and we don't need the best lab in Paris.

Cal

 

[rhl-oregon]

Cal, thank for a thorough and authoritative answer that is likely to make my decisions about printing much harder ;-).

The explanation about dedicating a set of carts to piezoflush really does change the economy of use equation with a big printer being idled.

 

[Calzone]

Cal, thank for a thorough and authoritative answer that is likely to make my decisions about printing much harder ;-).

The explanation about dedicating a set of carts to piezoflush really does change the economy of use equation with a big printer being idled.

Robert,

You already have one of the most durable Epson printers ever made. You can really print with that printer for a very long-long time. Parts are still available and Piezoflush freshens up any printer.

Jon Cone also has a lot of free info on maintenance. When was the last time you cleaned the capping station? Do you know how to reset your maintenance tank, and that basically you can use it twice before replacing it? Did you know that you can use other materials as bedding? I even cleaned the bedding in a lab sink at work on my 7800 maintenance cart.

If you get a free clogged printer many can be saved. I also down loaded the 7800 maintenance manual for free. Basically my 7800 is one of the most durable printers Epson ever made, and they had a long prodiction run. Call me a Hill Billy but if I had the space I would collect printers and have a salvage yard for printers. I could likely keep my 7800 going the rest of my life kinda like an old pick-up truck.

Whatever you do keep that 3800 stored in Piezoflush because it is an asset. Do your research and there are just too many possibilities. Even if you decide to print at a later time know that you have an asset to preserve. Know that the 49XX, 79XX and 99XX series of printers are prone to clogging and do not have long print head lives.

Cal

 

[Mark C]

I had the original Piezography setup years ago and kind of miss the results. At that time, it was pretty much a matte paper only system. I'd always been a glossy paper darkroom printer, but came to like the matte prints quite a lot. I haven't kept up with what Cone has been producing, so will have to check out the current offerings.

After a fling with the lovely, but flawed, HP B9180, I've been using an Epson 4900. I've been very happy with the black and white results straight out of the printer, but don't know how much permanence I'm giving up with that.

Cal, sorry if I missed it, but do you print color too? I bought the 4900 mostly because it lets me produce the large panoramic color prints I make for my business. I imagine switching carts on that printer would involve some expensive ink waste. Anyway, thanks for these updates on an alternative to the usual printing solutions.

Mark

 

[Calzone]

I had the original Piezography setup years ago and kind of miss the results. At that time, it was pretty much a matte paper only system. I'd always been a glossy paper darkroom printer, but came to like the matte prints quite a lot. I haven't kept up with what Cone has been producing, so will have to check out the current offerings.

After a fling with the lovely, but flawed, HP B9180, I've been using an Epson 4900. I've been very happy with the black and white results straight out of the printer, but don't know how much permanence I'm giving up with that.

Cal, sorry if I missed it, but do you print color too? I bought the 4900 mostly because it lets me produce the large panoramic color prints I make for my business. I imagine switching carts on that printer would involve some expensive ink waste. Anyway, thanks for these updates on an alternative to the usual printing solutions.

Mark

Mark,

I owned a HP9180 that someone gifted me. I took it home on the Subway and kinda broke both my arms. LOL. I ended up giving the HP9180 to a friend. I understand it is a pretty good printer for matte, but not so good for glossy.

The 4900, 7900 and 9900 do not have the long print head life of the 38XX, 78XX and 98XX, but they have 10 functional channels and 11 carts for switching blacks which makes it interesting printer. One reason is that it is well suited for proofing on paper and also printing digital negatives for contact printing without needing to change inksets or purging channels. For me I am interested in contact printing silver wet prints, but alternative processes are also available.

My 7800 only has 8 functional channels so I have it dedicated to glossy only where I print 7 shades of black and then either a second printing of Gloss Overcoat, or a second and third printing of Gloss Overcoat depending on paper (Canson papers require two passes of Gloss Overcoat). Now imagine me trying to print 5-6 prints in a batch. The result is added maintenance.

The new Piezography Pro is "One-Pass" glossy printing which is a boon for me because I print in batches where one night I will lay down the seven shades of black, and the next day Gloss Overcoat. This batch processing leaves either one channel on my print head to go unused, or alternately 7 channels to go unused when I am applying GO. This can expose my print head to too much "air-time" and can require added maintenance to deal with ink drying (partial clogs where I don't get a perfect nozzle check). Know that when printing 20x24 on 24x36 that it is 41 minutes to print my blacks and 45 minutes to print a pass of "GO."

An inkset made of carbon is less prone to fade than any color inkset, but the term "Archival Pigment Print" applies to inkjet prints made with color inksets, but clearly the carbon based inkset is more archival. The application of Gloss Overcoat makes prints as durable as a traditional wet print as far as handling. I think matte prints can be wonderful with the right image, but I have not explored any matte printing yet.

I only printed heavily using Jon Cone's Type 5 paper and Canson Platine Fibre Rag. Both are 100% cotton and Baryta coated. Understand that the Baryta coating makes the print a more fragile surface, but the Gloss Overcoat allows me to handle my prints and stack my prints without interleaving. It is truely a great thing to allow someone to hold your print and feel the paper. Jon Cone Type 5 to me is a satin paper and not a true glossy like the Canson Platine Fibre Rag.

I have read that many early adopters had problems with clogging and even destroyed printers, but over my 1 1/2 years of Printing with Piezography K-7 any clogging/maintenance was due to me printing and using my printers heavily.

Blending inks is a development I exploited where I blended and merged two inksets to have a three way splitone: black; warm shadows; and cool highlights. I blended warm neutral and Selenium inks in shades 3 and shade 4 that seems to create more depth, and this particular splitone is really beautiful for urban NYC night shots.

The Leica Monochrom and Piezography is a match made in heaven. The Monochrom files are so clean, and they print big/huge. For me that is a problem because a 20x30 on 24x36 for wide borders is about six times the surface area of a 13x19. A 50 foot roll only gives me 16 prints.

It seems that the difference between my new K-8 Piezography Pro glossy and the K-10 Piezography Pro for your 4900 is the addition of a matte black and a warm light grey a nd a cool light grey for better highlights.

Your 4900 is also a good machine for proofing on paper and also exploiting digital negatives because you can do both without any ink changes due to the 11 carts. You are correct in assumming that purging inks to go from color to B&W is not practical, but know that you already have a good printer for exploiting Piezography Pro, and even digital negative. Understand that to contact print like a large format shooter it requires a vacuum frame and mucho studio space, but for printing large limited editions of wet prints it would be impecable IQ.

If you saw the Salgado Genesis show at ICP you saw a masterful presentation of where analog and digital manipulation created extreme image quality. It is really amazing how even a guy like me can get really-really close to that level of image quality in my one bedroom apartment without the best lab in Paris like Salgado exploited. It seems that revolutionary jumps are now available to people like us.

PM me with your e-mail and I will forward you some information. BTW I recently bought a Leica SL (still own my Monochrom). For Color I will have to add printers. It seems that some people use the K-7 Gloss Overcoat over Epson OEM inkset prints as well as Cone Color inks (Epson OEM compatable). The GO adds saturation and detail. I would get another Epson printer (the bigger the better) to print color, but then I would have a dedicated "GO" printer where all the carts would print "GO" for speed and utility. The GO printer could be used for K-7 printing with other inksets.

Cal

 

[Mark C]

Cal,

Thanks for all the info. I probably have more questions, but need some time to process all you've written.

Yes, the HP was pretty much a matte only printer, but unmatched longevity. I recall the other carbon inks I used to have would warm up tremendously under a variety of conditions. I thought the Cone inks did that too at the time, but maybe not. I learned to "age" my prints by hanging them in my very bright stairwell for a couple weeks to avoid surprises later. Luckily, I really liked the warm tone. Still, the whole thing was a bit of a hassle, as your separate run for gloss sounds like. I'm glad you've come up with a solution for that.

I miss the tested permanence of the HP, but this Epson sure makes nice looking prints. A friend has an older printer, I think 7600, but maybe 7800, and his black and white prints on baryta kind of sold me on the system. I came to like matte, but also wanted to be able to print glossy, especially on baryta paper.

I tend to print fairly small (other than the panoramas) and would be perfectly happy with a 13" printer, but the 4900 was the smallest that was really effective for long roll printing. I do runs of about 60 to 80 4 foot long prints over a day or two. I'm down to doing that only a couple times a year now, so might look at other options when this printer quits. It has been hard to keep it alive through the winter. I intended to do my film proof sheets on it last winter just to keep it running, but just didn't get it done.

Mark

 

[Harry Lime]

Hey Cal

Would you say that the quality of the prints you are getting out of the Pro version is better than the K7 version?

I would be running this on a 2880.

The one pass gloss feature seems like an enormous time saver

thanks

 

[Calzone]

Hey Cal

Would you say that the quality of the prints you are getting out of the Pro version is better than the K7 version?

I would be running this on a 2880.

The one pass gloss feature seems like an enormous time saver

thanks

Harry,

I do not know yet. I pre-ordered the Piezography Pro Glossy K-8 set, and it will be shipped November 17th.

This is a brand new product that Jon developed in house over the years, but the story told is that he was patient with development and this is not the first iteration. PM me with your e-mail and I will forward more info.

From what I glean partly this was a long evolutionary process, and then again it was re-engineered, redeveloped through several iterations, and tested extensively in house. So now it is being offered to the public, but it hasn't scaled up into a warehouse full of inksets on the shelf yet, but sometime after January 2017 it will be available to the general public. I have been invited to be an early adopter because I have placed some big orders before and evidently I print a lot to have been noticed.

I still have a huge stockpile of K7. 400 ml carts are loaded and I still have mucho shade 3 and shade 4 blended. All I need is more shade 5 to print a lot. Know that my mid tone shades get depleted and consumed the most, and my prints look like and resemble medium format in tonality.

As an early adopter I got a big savings on the price and new sets of carts, so I loaded up the truck. I surely will be comparing and running two systems to evaluate both of them: the good, the bad, and the ugly.

I think one pass glossy is a game changer for me. Speeds up printing by requiring either half or 1/3rd the time. Multiple passes are a pain, and drying area is a serious limitation in my studio. The "air-time" on my print head presented maintenance problems for me where I did not get good nozzle tests and developed micro clogging due to the alternating cycles of printing 7 shades of black and then Gloss Overcoat in long sessions.

Jon raves about the black being the most dense available, even against Epson's latest inkset. It is reported that that this denser black opens up the dynamic range so one has to shift the tonality to compensate.

I already blend inksets and developed my own "fixed" splitone, but it seems like my big plan of needing several printers to dedicate to inksets will likely be surplanted by the variable splitone.

If you use Roy Harington's "Print-Tool" it seems the three sliders that are normally set at 100% are utilized to infinitely blend a warm and cool inkset embeded within a K-8 inkset along with that dense glossy black.

It seems the 4900, 7900 and 9900 printers with their 11 slots have an additional warm light-light grey, and an additional cool light-light grey to enhance the highlights. From what I understand a R3000, 3800 or 3880 would be a better choice for you as a small printer then your 2880 due to the other printers having "pressurized" carts. Basically they are heavier duty. Again PM me with your e-mail and I will forward more information for additional clarity.

Anyways sounds promising, but I will report sometime in November with some real experience.

Cal

 

[Mark C]

This discussion made me remember the Piezography print exchanges I participated in years ago. I was surprised to see that was around 2000.

I dug out my box of prints from the exchanges a itt was nice seeing all those again. There were some very nice prints, and a chance to see papers I've never used. Plus a number of people experimenting with split tone a lot like you describe. It is hard to believe, but that was early days for digital cameras, and there was a disproportionate share of large and medium format film shots, probably because scanning those was easier for most people than 35mm negatives. A lot of landscapes and urban landscapes and interiors, but some nice people shots too. These were open to everyone, but some very good photographers participated which made it nice.

Anyway, Cone has been at this a long time, and I'm glad to hear about the latest progress. I'll check out his site and catch up on what has been going on the past decade or so since I used his system.

 

[Calzone]

It is really unbelievable at all the developments.

I have been watching very closely the develpment of turnkey digital negative systems. About 4 years ago I used a credit card to put down a deposit for a 13x19 portfolio that featured an image from Lewis Hines of a coal miner. The idea was to have one image printed on various papers with different inks, but one was a digital negative for contact printing. I brought this folio to a NYC Meet-Up to share with the group.

About two years ago I decided to explore Piezography and a new development was being able to blend inks and do splitone. My splitone is fixed, but now a new formulation is blended via the print head and infinately variable between warm, neutral and cool.

Eventually I would love to not only do silver wet prints, but also platinum via contact printing, but at this time I do not have the studio space. Presently fully developed systems with profiles exist today. I believe the silver wet printing profiles uses Ilford Gallery as its paper. A system like this is ideal for printing limited editions.

How crazy would it be to contact print on a paper with a vast tonal range like AZO with a digital negative printed on overhead projection film. How about large format shooters using digital manipulations to make the perfect negative and printing an enlarged negative for contact printing.

We basically are almost in paradise if you are a fine art printer. I can see one day using Pigmented Archival Prints as a system for proofing wet prints that were made by contact printing. The future is almost now.

Cal

 

[thompsonks]

Please give us a full report on differences/improvements when you've installed the new inkset. I heard some time ago that the Pro version was in the works – I think it was supposed to be ready much earlier? – and have been putting off experimenting with Piezography until I could try the new version. If you're impressed, I might go to one of J Cone's workshops.

Kirk T.

 

[Calzone]

Please give us a full report on differences/improvements when you've installed the new inkset. I heard some time ago that the Pro version was in the works – I think it was supposed to be ready much earlier? – and have been putting off experimenting with Piezography until I could try the new version. If you're impressed, I might go to one of J Cone's workshops.

Kirk T.

Kirk,

Will do.

I'm also upgrading my studio. I'm repurposing my gal's 21.5 inch IMAC to have a bigger screen than my Mac PowerBook. I have to set up Vuescan and a Nikon LS8000 I acquired, and this all involves rearranging my workstaion and intergrating my 27 inch EIZO. I utilize hardware from ELFA acquired from The Container Store that offers modular flexability and efficiency. Know that My studio is also a shared space with a Fashion Blogger, so it is like a huge closet filled with clothing racks, woman's clothing, and shoes.

I'm also wondering about the new "Gloss Optimizer" verses the older "Gloss Overcoat." On the Piezography some color printers rav about using "GO" over color prints for added contrast, detail and saturation. For me the added durability of Gloss Overcoated prints is a very big bonus because this allows for simple and safe storage of archival prints that is easy.

I'm hoping that the new Gloss Optimizer uses the same cart and slot as the Gloss Overcoat when doing K7 on my 7800 because then perhaps I will set up 3880 as a color printer with Cone Color pigmented inks. I could then use the new Gloss Optimizer printed using the K7 GO process with my 7800 to top coat a color print made on my 3880 and still have full Piezo Pro one pass glossy.

Anyways if the above is possible then I have no compromise or loss of capability, and I best exploit having two printers in a very clever manner.
I believe my guess is likely and highly probable to be true.

Funny thing how creative printing can be.

Cal