Re-purposed old 17-35mm EX HSM to Sony

Ceistinne wrote:

DMillier wrote:

Ceistinne wrote:

DMillier wrote:

Ceistinne wrote:

David,

That looks like a really good mono image and it should make a good print.

I hope the SC P900 becomes available soon.

Everything seems to be in short supply right now.

S

P900 suddenly available. I guess a container arrived. I now have one sitting in my spare room.

It's more compact than I feared and the packaging suggested. The unit is 24" (60cm) wide, which is not a lot bigger than the A3+ printer I used to have. It's a bit deeper and will obviously need more space around it for the print trays, but not bad compared to the old R2400. A bit flimsy perhaps, thin plastics, but you can't have low weight and bullet proof construction. I carried the box upstairs one handed, while earlier generation A2 printers used to ship on a pallet.

The t47 ink carts are much bigger than I'm used to - they hold 50ml but look like they could hold twice that. A lot more than the 9ml/10ml carts for A4 printers.

I need to download drivers and install the carts, then I can test out whether there was any point to full frame but before I do that I need a table to put it on. Eventually, I will convert my garden tool shed into a mini editing suite but for now I need a table of some kind.

David,

Good stuff. Those printers produce really fine prints. I've been using the A3 + SC-P600 for the last 3 or 4 years with excellent results. The only criticism I have of it is ink waste changing from Photo Black to Matte Black which is no longer necessary in the newer SC-P700 or in your new SC-P900.

S

I don't have any A2 paper yet, but I've printed 15 A3, colour and B&W. More consistent and reliable colour compared to the little Claria ink printers I've struggled along with for the last couple of years. No sign of the colour casts I couldn't entirely dial out from the Claria.

The B&W are neutral and warm neutral using the ABW mode, no colour shifts.

I can't say the results show any obvious technical improvement from the older generation K3 printers, the results seem identical to my last good quality printer, the R2400. But I guess that means ink jet tech is already as good as it is ever going to be. Better than Claria colour-wise on matte paper. Never tried the Claria on shiny paper, which it supposedly better suits.

I also think this is the end of my experiments with pure carbon ink printing - just too difficult to get hold of the materials and the ABW mode is excellent. Not sure I'm that bothered that the ink may start to fade in 5000 years...

Printing again reminds me why it is also useful from an editing perspective, not just as an output medium. It looks like I have formed the habit of rolling off the highlights early (presumably because LCD panels make the highlights look hot). It's quite obvious on the prints in a way it isn't on screen, even though the histogram has all along been telling me the image could do with an extra 1/2 stop of lift. No doubt once you print. It's that old transmissive vs reflected look again.

As I continue to work on my website (a retirement project), I'm going to have another go at scanning prints to evaluate and present image quality on the web (like Chromelight and I did way back when with our SD14 vs Kodak 14 comparison). It seemed a good way of showing the impact of gear on print quality then, and it still does to me today. Not sure there are a lot of people pursuing this approach (any?) to reviewing. Might make a point of difference.

David,

You will see no colour casts with that printer and as for the print quality being the same or very similar that is true. However the print heads are away more reliable in the newer printers and much less prone to clogging. Like all Epson printers I would not recommend using anything other than Epson inks in it,

S

50 ml ink carts make Epson ink carts the best bet, I agree. I checked with my regular supplier of bulk inks in the past and the savings are not that great anyway. So Epson ink it will be (and a nozzle check every day!).