Piezography K7 technical notes      rev. Nov 1, 2009

There are two approaches to making black & white prints with inkjet printers. One is to make them with color inks as best as one can (considering the limitations of printing a monochromatic tonal range using color pigments and 2 or 3 blacks.) The other approach based on not compromising was invented by Jon Cone in the early 1990s. Cone's practice is to only use monochromatic inks in sufficient density partitions to produce the highest possible standard print.

The Concept
This is the fourth generation Piezography product; a combination of carbon-based monochromatic inks and matching profiles that produces the highest-standard in black & white printing. Piezography K7 is unique in offering seven dilutions for ultimate quality. The introduction of printers with seven or more channels of ink has given Cone the opportunity to move from four dilutions of black ink to seven. While competing systems have chosen to utilize these extra channels to offer warm/cool "toners", Piezography is using these positions to increase print-quality. All seven of the Piezography K7 inks are used when making a print, which results in a print of the highest possible quality. Smoother tonal transitions and a completely dotless print are the hallmarks of Piezography K7 printing. Much greater highlight and shadow detail is possible with Piezography K7 when compared to any other competing product, or any of the current Epson, Canon and HP systems which combine three blacks with color inks.

We can say with the utmost confidence, that while Epson's latest generation of printers which use three black shades have exceeded its loyal customers' expectations from past experience with two black shades, Piezography greatly exceeds the capabilities of Epson's latest generation ABW printing. When Epson moved from two blacks to three, Piezography raised the bar considerably higher by moving to seven distinct shades of black.

Piezography has significantly better highlight and shadow detail, smoother tonal transitions, and prints with significantly higher resolution than can Epson ABW. Piezography K7 curves with the QuadTone RIP drive the Epson printer to produce detail at a significantly higher frequency as evidenced in the following image. Rather than print through the Epson RGB dithering patterns, K7 curves when used with the QuadTone RIP printer driver print greater detail by using lighter dilutions at higher dithering frequencies, an action that completely eliminating any spaces between the ink dots. If you capture or scan your work at extremely high resolution - Piezography can print enormous enlargements at contact print tack-sharpness. Piezography prints legible type at 1pt because the space which would normally be occupied by paper white with the Epson RGB printer driver dither pattern, is replaced with shades of gray ink that print without a noticeable dithering pattern. Look for yourself:

The presence of dots of cyan, magenta, and yellow ink in Epson ABW prints also accounts for its metamerism - an undesirable effect of using color pigments in for near neutral and neutral grays producing prints which shift color balance depending upon the light temperature under which they are displayed. But, Piezography inks besides being 100% metamerism free, also offer a unique aesthetic quality to the finished print. Our pigment process is near perfection producing prints of exceptional monochromatic beauty. Seeing is believing - and we offer inexpensive online-printing services so you can trial before you buy your own personal system.

The Options
Piezography inks are available in seven shaded or six shaded sets. K6 sets eliminate the lightest dilution (7) but are otherwise the same. Complete ink sets are available in Neutral, Warm Neutral, Selenium, Sepia, SplitTone, and Special Edition. The Neutral inks are the only true achromatic inks on the market. Their final color is paper dependent and returns the choice of paper to that which it was in the darkroom. Neutral users can print on warmer of cooler tones of white to arrive at final color tone - allowing Neutral to appear in a much wider range of tone. Sepia inks are quite warm without appearing "colorful". The Selenium set was designed to mimic a short-bath, selenium-toned fiber based silver print. SplitTone inks are available in several combinations of which the most popular is a Sepia/Selenium split. Special Edition inks are a blended ink set which produces crisp highlights, melding into selenium 1/4 tones, into sepia shadows. Any of the inks can be blended by an experimental user if desired. Each shade of the different ink sets has the same density as the same shade of any other inkset. So they can be mixed in any proportion to arrive at autographic color tones.

Matte - Glossy
All of the inks can be used on matte papers. For glossy printing, only Selenium and Warm Neutral ink sets, when used with the MPS black shade 1 and the Piezography Gloss Optimizer can be used with non-matte papers (lustre, semi-gloss, glossy). The Piezography glossy effect is a perfected gloss system which utilizes two printings. The first is an optimal ink linearization which becomes perfectly glossy and absent of bronzing when overprinted with Gloss Optimizer.

The Inks
Piezography K7 ink is an encapsulated pigment formulation that gives unprecedented ease in start-up so that even flush cartridges are unnecessary. This lowers the cost of entry for new users. But also, this is the first ink we have designed which is conducive to long resting periods within the printer. Further, this ink was designed for the new EPSON print head technologies. We made it finer in particle size, with a more precise distribution band afforded by superior filtering with a one-micron fiber type osmosis filtering system for six cycles. Our decision to filter to a very narrow spread is rooted in a commitment to quality that is reflected in the final print. We put the finished pigment in a suspension we call "slippery" so that it works through the smaller micro-channels of EPSON print heads. The encapsulation of the pigment ensures that each pigment particle remains separate and distinct from others so that agglomeration is avoided and clogging problems are no more than what would be expected with the OEM inks. And finally, we were able to give it additional longevity protection. The polyester coating which encapsulates each pigment particle also acts to absorb UV light so that it can not affect the pigment particle. All in all this is our best ink to date.

The RIP
Piezography Neutral K7 inks are designed to be controlled by Roy Harrington's QuadToneRIP (QTR). QTR now comes bundled with support for Piezography K7 inks for the EPSON Stylus Photo 1400/1410, 2100/2200, R800, R1800, R1900, R2400, R2880 desktop printers and EPSON Pro 3800, 4000, 4800, 4880, 7000, 7500, 7600, 7800, 7880, 9000, 9500, 9600, 9800, and 9880 printers. QuadToneRIP provides independent control of all ink channels, which enables the photographer to use the Piezography K7 inks to their full potential. Rather than use the QTR tools to build ink curves, we developed the Piezography Profiler and produced a large array of free K7 profiles which are part of the QuadTone RIP download. QuadTone RIP is a $50 shareware software. You will need to download it at the QuadTone RIP website, where you pay your $50 shareware fee to its author, Roy Harrington. We have more experience than anyone else in designing tools for black & white inkjet printing. Simply install our inks in your printer, dial up the Neutral K7 curve for the appropriate printer and paper, and print! If you wish to experiment with papers which we do not support, we can create custom K7 curves for you.

When you are ready you can download QuadTone RIP (QTR) by clicking here. It's a $50 shareware that you can pay when you download.

In addition to QuadTone RIP, users of pro printer models can purchase ErgoSoft's StudioPrint RIP which has full support for up to seven shades of Piezography ink in the Epson 3800, 4000, 4800, 4880, 7000, 7500, 7600, 7800, 7880, 9000, 9500, 9600, 9800, and 9880 printers. In addition to these printers, we provide ink for Roland Hi-Fi Jet printers with up to 12 inks available using the ErgoSoft D'Vinci software system. Users with the Gretag EyeOne Specto can print out their own targets and produce linerarization profiles of their favorite papers. It's very easy and powerful, combining a quick Piezography profiling method with a state-of-the-art RIP interface and layout program that prints rapidly. Additionally, StudioPrint and D'Vinci software while expensive, gives the user unprecedented control over mixing, blending and split-toning inks. We can make specific recommendations of combinations of Piezography and PiezoTone inks to create very customized and unique solutions.

The Software
The Piezography Profiler application is not sold nor licensed to the public. Rather, it has been continuously updated for new technologies...remaining an evolving concept. But, it is used to make the included K7 curves for Quad Tone RIP. The architecture of the curves is designed for each supported printer by Jon Cone. These curves, known as a "Master Curve" are used to profile each paper in a supported printer group. The software defines the paper white as L255 and defines the blackest possible combination of ink as L0. The seven curves are then transformed by the software to produce more than 65,000 gray points which when printed form as perfect as a result possible. The contrast mimics a display Gamma of 2.2. There is absolutely no visible crossover from ink to ink. The separation of tone from L0 (dMax) to L255 (dMin) is so perfected that one can see the difference in shadow detail L values 1,2,3,4,5,6...and so on just as easily as the highlight details from 245, 253,252,251...and so on. The K7profiles in QTR are provided for free. However, the Piezography Profiler is available to our customers through a custom service for those who wish to experiement with unsupported papers. Occassionally, a customer can have an aging printhead profiled to extend the life of the printer before refurbishment. Some customers simply prefer that when they decide on a favorite paper, to have their printer custom profiled for their exact environment. You can read more about custom profiling by clicking here.

A Piezography Master Curve

If this product has a PDF instruction sheet, or other information items...you can download them here by clicking on the "Download" links below:

If this product has a PDF instruction sheet, or other information items...you can download them here by clicking on the "Download" links below: