Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Printing: Printers, Papers and Inks => Topic started by: kencameron on May 10, 2013, 11:03:10 pm
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Has anyone tried it? Tips and tricks?
I did a forum search but it came up with 40 pages and nothing on the first 3 was remotely relevant, so apologies if there it has already been covered.
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you need white ink to print on black paper
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What Aaronchan said. I tried it and saw nothing on the paper.
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Why can't you print with light gray?
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Because you need the white between the dots for it to work.
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you need something like an Epson WT7900. Its essentially a white ink capable 7900 designed for proofing in the packaging market. Kind of pricy as its a very special purpose thing...
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Why can't you print with light gray?
Inks typically work in a subtractive manner rather than an additive one. That is, an ink simply acts as a filter - absorbing wavelengths outside of the desired colour but depending on the underlying paper to actually reflect the remaining light. Light grey ink isn't a mixture of white and black, it's simply a black ink with a lower density so it absorbs less light passing through it (ie effectively a semi-transparent black).
A black paper will absorb most of the light hitting it's surface, so there isn't enough light passing through the ink for you to see any descernable colour. In order to print on a black paper, the printer would need to be able to lay down a white (ie reflective) undercoat on any areas that weren't black so that enough light was reflected for the rest of the inks to function.
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Inks typically work in a subtractive manner rather than an additive one. That is, an ink simply acts as a filter - absorbing wavelengths outside of the desired colour but depending on the underlying paper to actually reflect the remaining light. Light grey ink isn't a mixture of white and black, it's simply a black ink with a lower density so it absorbs less light passing through it (ie effectively a semi-transparent black).
A black paper will absorb most of the light hitting it's surface, so there isn't enough light passing through the ink for you to see any descernable colour. In order to print on a black paper, the printer would need to be able to lay down a white (ie reflective) undercoat on any areas that weren't black so that enough light was reflected for the rest of the inks to function.
Thanks (and to everyone else). This plausibly explains the results of the experiments I have conducted since starting the thread ;)