Museum and Book Prints

This post from a Word Press blog - March 10, 2018


Since my last post I've been printing 13x19 b&w ink jets from a few random negatives of girls but primarily from my 3 trips to England and Europe - 1987, '89 and '90. These will be for the DIA if they will have them. Gifted of course so why wouldn't they.
I am also designing another Blurb book in one of their editing platforms called Bookwright. It's quite different from their other one called Booksmart which I've used for years for other books. Those books took shape as 8x10s, 7x7s and 6x9s. This one, called LONDON, LIVERPOOL and EUROPE, is in magazine format - 8.5x11 as was a previous one in Bookwright called FACTORY, published just a couple months ago.
Anyway,  I said in my previous post that I switched completely back to OEM Canon inks to see if I could print without the blues and magentas in b&w prints. Well I couldn't! That is, not the usual way.

Cont'd 4/3/2018 * So far as of this date I've printed over 40 UK and Europe negs on 13x19 paper. I've settled on OEM for all colors and blacks (2) and gray (1). I'm primarily using the pigment black to print these pics. The printer mixes in the other colors and the one black and the one gray by default. The resultant print looks a bit harsh and xeroxy but there are absolutely no RGBCMY colors apparent. The grays and shadow areas get a bit depressed but as in the darkroom I can use the dodge, burn, contrast, brightness controls in PSE to adjust the tones. Also, printing on matte paper isn't ideal if the result wished for is snappy and brilliant blacks.
The main thing about OEM inks is the cost. I've buying the OEM black pigment carts on ebay at discounts of 20-30%. Not using as much of the other inks but am considering using the 3rd party color inks from 4Inkjets when comes time to replace. I still have a set of OEM inks to go through first.

What A Kick Printing 13x19 prints

The following is a posting on my WordPress blog from August 31, 2017

Ever since I was forced to print 13x19 b&w on my Canon printer, a whole new world has opened up for me.

Earlier this year I was informed that a local bank expressed an interest in a few of my Detroit architectural photographs for their art collection. A gallery I was once affiliated with was to be the broker for this sale.

My choices were to print them myself or farm them out. My other choices were to print wet or digitally. The 16x20 wet prints I would have to do myself since there wasn't and isn't any printers that I know of who print wet. I checked around for ink jet print labs and found one individual in Canton who seemed OK. (The largest paper size the Canon accepts is 13x19. The image size on 16x20 wet prints would have been about 12x18 with a wide white border. Image size on the Canon prints would have been 12x18 with a narrower border all around.)

But I decided to wet print the four negatives for one reason or another but mainly I realized it would be my opportunity to begin to use up a freezer full of gelatin silver paper. Paper that had been in there for 8,9, 10 years. I was curious to find out if the 50 sheet box of Agfa 16x20 matte paper was still "good" - hadn't fogged because of age.

I tested the paper and found it was good. Before I printed I wanted to give the Canon a chance to prove it's worth. Up to that point I was having trouble getting satisfactory b&w prints. I should say extreme trouble getting neutral prints without color casts of green, magenta, blue. Everything I tried in Photoshop to get the right combination matching paper to color management choices hadn't really worked up to that point printing my factory archives on 8.5x11 paper. Plus the four prints for the bank were to have a brownish/sepia tone to them. That's what the bank saw when they chose the photographs.

The digital prints were terrible. Blue color casts in the darker shades of gray and some magenta in lesser shades of gray. I left on a scheduled two week vacation during which I mulled over my problem. I returned and wet printed the first negative of "City Woman". I had to use a diffusion filter to throw off the sharpness but it also reduced the contrast considerably. But it was unsuccessful. I could not get the contrast up even while printing through the #5 contrast filter. (I realized later that I didn't really have to use the diffusion because the enlargement was so big that it softened the sharpness enough anyway).

In a panic I went back to the Canon and tried again. This time I was able to get the brownish/blackish tones to closely match one print to the other but still with the blueish/cyan cast in the darkest grays. I reasoned that the client wouldn't care or understand that the casts shouldn't be in there. I decided they would accept it. And apparently they did. I delivered the final prints to the gallery and I got the check payment in the mail a few weeks later. I have no idea how they look on the walls of the bank's offices or conference rooms.

Because of that experience I had a 50 sheet box of 13x19 Canon Matte paper with about 35-40 sheets left. It wasn't until this month - actually a couple of weeks ago and 2 months after delivery of the bank prints - that I tried a couple of 13x19 b&w prints on the Canon. In the interim I've gone back to printing the factory negs but still having problems getting a neutral b&w print without color casts. I was having some success until I stumbled on a combo that gave me completely color cast free prints. The combo consists of choosing Plain Paper in stead of Matte, gray scale in color management and color space.

The Canon has 6 ink cartridges; cyan, magenta, yellow, gray, photo black and an over-sized pigment black for printing text. Well, the settings above use more pigment black than anything else, especially the color inks.  The resultant prints can look a little xeroxy before I adjust the tones. I'm not getting the full range of 256 shades from pure white to pure black. a lot of the mid-tone grays are dropped. But I'm having success adjusting the black densities and bringing back the grays. I really like what I'm getting - higher contrast with deep blacks, suppressing extraneous detail. Definitely not the Ansel Adams school of zoning.

 

DIA Exhibit Set for June 2019

A promised exhibition of my work is now planned for June 2019. It was previously set for September 2019.

I learned of this change last week via a return email from the curator, Nancy Barr. My email to her was an inquiry to the possibility of an appointment with her to hand over reprints of a set of photographs I'd gifted to The DIA in May 2018.

Subsequent to that May 2018 set delivery, I decided they were at least substandard and decided to reprint. Took me several months to research paper and inks and finally to print again. I've ended up with close to 100 prints - mostly 13x19 with also around 15 - 11x14 which were not included in the May 2018 gift. Plus 8-10 from the Belle Isle series. By the time of delivery I may have added more. 

Most of the photographs are from 3 trips to England and Europe in 1987, '89 and '90. There are also a set of photographs from a (photo) shooting in 1987 at the so called Belle Isle Love-In on the island of Belle Isle in Detroit. There are additional photographs in each set than were delivered in May 2018.

So a March meeting is good, just have to set a date with Nancy. 

DETROIT DOC

DETROIT DOC is now published and available for purchase from Blurb.com and  http://www.thebookbeat.com/backroom/  in Oak Park, MI.

SPECS; 9x6 soft cover perfect bound / 182 pages with 119 of black and white photographs many of which are 2-page spreads of Detroit (mostly people) from 1960s - 2000s

Russ' freelance career took him from the streets of Detroit into the factories, jazz clubs, Tommy Hearns' Kronk gym, Eastern Market, strip joints and corporate boardrooms. Interspersed are a few pages of narrative description of scenes and experiences. As described by Book Beat;  "Detroit Doc is a compact paperback collection of fifty years of gritty urban photographs by Russ Marshall. Self-published without compromise, a small masterpiece for fans of Brassai, Invisible Cities and noir movies."