B&W Printing with DSCL

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Barry
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Just had some B&W prints back from DSCL, which were taken in colour, process through Photoshop CS3 and Silver Efex Pro, then the DSCL profile added and final levels adjustment. They have come back with a very slight warmth to them, should I had changed the Mode to Greyscale before uploading as they were uploaded to DSCL in RGB Colour.
 
Don't upload as RGB either use sRGB or attach DSCL own profiles to the images
 
I do use the DSCL profiles, but I have never changed the Image Mode to Greyscale as this makes a difference on my monitor. Anyway I will have another go ordering the same image but using the Greyscale mode and see what happens.
 
Nikon Fan said:
I do use the DSCL profiles, but I have never changed the Image Mode to Greyscale as this makes a difference on my monitor. Anyway I will have another go ordering the same image but using the Greyscale mode and see what happens.

I would imagine that your black and white images aren't 100% desaturated, if changing to grey scale makes a big difference. The easiest way to check they have no colour is to open a saturation/hue adjustment layer and desaturate. If the images changes its a problem with your edit not DSCLs printing
 
Hi Jacob, you are spot on, I changed the image mode to Greyscale but this in turn changed the profile to Dot 30% or similar, so instead I did a further Levels adjustment and sent off for another print. They just arrived back today and are now spot on.
 
In a nutshell, just use Ilford labs for b&w that's all they do
 
I would imagine that your black and white images aren't 100% desaturated, if changing to grey scale makes a big difference. The easiest way to check they have no colour is to open a saturation/hue adjustment layer and desaturate. If the images changes its a problem with your edit not DSCLs printing

Jacob - I had some B&W prints from DSCL and they came back with a green tint. So I converted the files to grayscale and sent them off again - the prints were slightly better this time but they were still green.

Desaturating with a hue/saturation layer in Photoshop seems to make them a tad warmer on my monitor (which is calibrated) so I'm not sure if it would do the trick.
 
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Nothing to do with money. We all work hard trying to produce art why spoil it for pinching a few pennies.
I don't print a lot of b&w but Ilford is worth every penny.
 
Also Ilford only do b&w if you send the a mono or colour photo it will turn out the same, they never ever have a colour cast
 
Sorry no, but it's better than you and me may ever own.
Try their website and contact them they have always been helpful.
I just love I them as they are the only printers I've used that get no colour cast it's just pure grey scale
 
I've emailed them to ask what the printers are - will post here when they reply.
 
Sorry no, but it's better than you and me may ever own.
Try their website and contact them they have always been helpful.
I just love I them as they are the only printers I've used that get no colour cast it's just pure grey scale

Ilford say their printer is a 'special' Fuji Frontier. It runs a traditional black & white process and exposes Ilford digital panchromatic B&W paper using RGB lasers - and it has a modified calibration routine written specially for black and white.

For larger prints (above 15"x10" I think) they use a Lightjet printer.

For more info, see paragraph immediately below the shot of HP5 film rolls here - http://www.daveparryphotography.co.uk/silver-lining-ilford-tour
 
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Thanks for the info Ozel.
Whatever they use the results are very good
 
What paper are you printing at DSCL? The Fuji ones do have a slight green tint to them.
 
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