Good black and white with pigment or dye inks can be achieved provided the ink paper combination is perfectly matched with a custom printer profile. I've made like over 10 profiles in the last couple of days and am quite surprised at the results achieved. It's nearly like getting a new printer altogether and not a downgrade but a huge upgrade. For interest's sake I started trying some dollar store photopaper and while it is not as good as better brands, I can say wow, nobody can tell it is bottom of the barrel photopaper, except for the lighter weight.
Properly profiled, my Epson R220 using pigment inks is now easily rivaling a high end Epson R2400 that is unprofiled in the color arena. When you consider that many R200, R220, R300 etc sell for less than $40 in the used market. That is a heck of a way to get archival prints.
By the same token, using the correct setup I am getting Epson's newer CXseries like a CX6000 4 color multifunctions, converted to dye ink, getting close to Epson's newest photoprinters, with the major difference seen in the grain and is not that bad as it makes it look like film. The conversion to dye ink is key here, and the reason is that Epson uses matte black ink for their blacks in all their Durabrite multifunctions and they mix CMY for generating blacks. This can work and does except that the depth of the black can be more like a dark gray instead of black but is still neutral. Using Matte paper with durabrite you can get deep blacks because the printer will now use the black ink.
Converting all inks to dye and then using the matte settings now allows you to get photoblack being used in all printing. This now allows deeper blacks and the bonus of much lower running costs. This is a great mod for these printers again, provided a proper profile is utilized.
Properly profiled, my Epson R220 using pigment inks is now easily rivaling a high end Epson R2400 that is unprofiled in the color arena. When you consider that many R200, R220, R300 etc sell for less than $40 in the used market. That is a heck of a way to get archival prints.
By the same token, using the correct setup I am getting Epson's newer CXseries like a CX6000 4 color multifunctions, converted to dye ink, getting close to Epson's newest photoprinters, with the major difference seen in the grain and is not that bad as it makes it look like film. The conversion to dye ink is key here, and the reason is that Epson uses matte black ink for their blacks in all their Durabrite multifunctions and they mix CMY for generating blacks. This can work and does except that the depth of the black can be more like a dark gray instead of black but is still neutral. Using Matte paper with durabrite you can get deep blacks because the printer will now use the black ink.
Converting all inks to dye and then using the matte settings now allows you to get photoblack being used in all printing. This now allows deeper blacks and the bonus of much lower running costs. This is a great mod for these printers again, provided a proper profile is utilized.
