Thanks Walker! Just read your email regarding the reorganization of all the different sites and am very excited about what you and the team back in Topsham are doing!
I was hoping to get more explanation of this. Is this something unique to PiezoDN? Does it still use QTR? Because on Windows it’s certainly possible to use greyscale ICC profiles to print with when printing on paper using QTR, so long as you do the conversion to the ICC in another program such as PS. If PiezoDN uses QTR, why wouldn’t it be the same?
We don’t want to force people to convert to an ICC manually until we can come up with a very good workflow and documentation for it. We may burn the ICC curve into the .quad and not require ICCs for windows too. Haven’t decided on the most elegant way. Generally the whole reason/goal for PiezoDN is to maintain “original file equilibrium” meaning no added adjustment curves or burned profiles, etc.
Basically, we are launching for mac first. If enterprising PCers want to get into it with conversions in PS they can. Until we come out with that workflow and instructions (whether manual conversion or special .quads) then we will be only outwardly supporting mac.
It’s been only 3 months since I came to IJM and we want to come out with a good product for OS X first where the workflow is natively supported. This is a VERY quicklike turnaround for a total shift in the way people can produce negatives.
-W
The way I read what’s been written was that on Mac, you’ll do something or other in PS and then switch to another program, PT, to convert and print. I.e. much like the print on paper workflow. It’s much the same on Win, you’d do whatever you have to in PS and then switch to QTRGUI, the only difference being that in PS there’s an extra step to convert and save as for PiezoDN. But even that isn’t strictly the case if you configure QTRGui to use a “hot” folder, as printing then starts as soon as you do the extra save.
This is all speculation until we see the final release, but it just reads to me that you’re making the Win worklfow sound a lot harder than it is in practice. That’s my only point.
Cool. Have you decided on the cost? Will the linearization tools be applicable to prints as well? Can you post the .7 point type image of Alice in Wonderland? I want to try that test, but I’m too lazy to make my own image of small text.
It will probably be about $75.00 (maybe a little more depending on some stuff to work out next week).
This gives you permanent access to the updates.
We are going to drum-scan the .7type text but I took a crappy little iPhone macro photo of it. Here it is. (bare in mind, the text is sharp, the camera lens I used wasn’t.) Epson OEM K3 or K4 would just print dots not txt.
Thanks. That’s a very reasonable cost for what you are offering.
Test looks really good. I was wondering about providing the original TIFF to print out on my printers (both with and without Peizography).
I’m not at work at the moment so don’t have it. However, it’s simple enough to make a .7pt txt file in something like Illustrator, export as PDF, open in Preview and then save that as a 2880dpi image.
results will vary based on the quality and alignment of your printer-head!
best,
W
[QUOTE=Brian_S;11076]The way I read what’s been written was that on Mac, you’ll do something or other in PS and then switch to another program, PT, to convert and print. I.e. much like the print on paper workflow. It’s much the same on Win, you’d do whatever you have to in PS and then switch to QTRGUI, the only difference being that in PS there’s an extra step to convert and save as for PiezoDN. But even that isn’t strictly the case if you configure QTRGui to use a “hot” folder, as printing then starts as soon as you do the extra save.
This is all speculation until we see the final release, but it just reads to me that you’re making the Win worklfow sound a lot harder than it is in practice. That’s my only point.[/QUOTE]
Brian_S, have you found out what works for a Win workflow? (Convert ICC)
Ok. It’s released (for mac). Anyone who buys it and wants to walk in the PC world pre release for PC I can send a zip.
best,
Walker
Let me say that I am not a PiezoDN user and am highly unlikely to be. And therefore I haven’t seen the workflow in detail. On OS X, when you print on paper, you have to print using Print Tool - you can’t print an untagged image or an image in Grey Gamma 2.2 direct from Photoshop to QTR, because if you try, there is some silent profile conversion that occurs. From what I have read in posts here, for PiezoDN on OS X you do convert the image to an ICC for printing, something which isn’t normally recommended for printing on paper. On OS X I’m not sure whether this profile conversion means that you can print PiezoDN direct from Photoshop to QTR, or whether you still have to use Print Tool. But either way I imagine that it would be much the same - you specify an ICC in either the PS print dialog or in Print Tool settings. This means that an ICC conversion is done on-the-fly as part of the printing process.
In Windows you can’t print direct to QTRGui, so to do an ICC conversion you simply take your image, manually convert to the ICC in Photoshop, save it as a copy, open the copy in QTRGui and print. If I’ve understood this correctly, I honesty can’t see what’s so hard about that and why there’s been all this talk of PiezoDN not working on Windows. People using Windows who have been converting to ICCs for printing (against the usual IJM advice) have been doing this for years. What Windows users won’t have is an installer program that puts all the right bits (curves and ICCs) in the right place, but I don’t regard that as all that hard either.
You won’t have the ability to linearize the .quad directly on a PC or custom-tune it. Nor will you actually be able to make the ICC profiles used to print with (to my understanding) + a few other things that will be lacking.
Basically, if you only have a PC you are limited to the canned curves and profiles (something that isn’t always practical when making negs for a darkroom). While the canned profiles are AWESOME, we want to make it AWESOMER and let people tune their curves and calibrate themselves. That’s kinda a large part and point of PieozDN.
If you want to do a PC, I can send a zip after purchase if this is requested, but you won’t get the full functionality or support necessarily to fully use the system as it was intended.
I hope thisclarifies things a bit.
best,
Walker
If one wishes to print on paper, with no current interest in printing digital negatives, and one wishes to use well documented, user-friendly tools for linearizing .quad curves (rather than Roy Harrington’s droplet), does IJM advise purchasing PiezoDN? Will the linearization tools be available separately from the PiezoDN package? And finally, are the linearization tools useable with a ColorMunki Photo? PiezoDN looks like a ton of work for you to put out- well done!
Wayne
[QUOTE=walkerblackwell;11289]You won’t have the ability to linearize the .quad directly on a PC or custom-tune it. Nor will you actually be able to make the ICC profiles used to print with (to my understanding) + a few other things that will be lacking.
I hope this clarifies things a bit.[/QUOTE]
Up to a point. For printing on paper, I can linearise myself and create profiles using the QTR droplets, on either Win or OS X. Are you saying that these aren’t applicable with PiezoDN? Are there additional / different tools included with PiezoDN?
PiezoDN utilizes the QTR-Linearize-Quad droplet in a unique way built specifically for negatives.
Soon we’ll release a tool for doing this with Piezography that is different than the way we handle measurement data with negatives. Both methods will rely on the droplet though.
best,
Walker
[QUOTE=walkerblackwell;11289]You won’t have the ability to linearize the .quad directly on a PC or custom-tune it. Nor will you actually be able to make the ICC profiles used to print with (to my understanding) + a few other things that will be lacking.
Basically, if you only have a PC you are limited to the canned curves and profiles (something that isn’t always practical when making negs for a darkroom). While the canned profiles are AWESOME, we want to make it AWESOMER and let people tune their curves and calibrate themselves. That’s kinda a large part and point of PieozDN.
If you want to do a PC, I can send a zip after purchase if this is requested, but you won’t get the full functionality or support necessarily to fully use the system as it was intended.
I hope thisclarifies things a bit.
best,
Walker[/QUOTE]
What functionality will be missing with the zip file on a PC?
Walker, can you answer this?
I did an initial test on windows yesterday and today. (whew)
You will be able to do everything but print directly with ICC and there will be a few procedures that are different.
I will include a PC .zip (beta) of all relevant files in the Downloads section of piezodn.inkjetmall.com that is accessible after purchase.
best,
Walker
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