Richard Vanek - Black and White Photography

My computer is back again. I am installing all back, hopefully it will be as stable as it was before crash. So, I hope soon I will present you new set of pictures, there is still plenty to scan from Sweden!

Chess, hmm yes I play a bit with player on my level I still would like to play better but I do not have all the time I wish to have so I play when I like :-) and do not improve much.

My development of imgArchive is freezed for the moment as I discover IMatch soft which can do a lot of things I like to have in it. Maybe I will do some small utility instead.

Yesterday I have scanned new roll. I had a lot of problems to make vuescan work. New version I installed has few problems which were not there before. Anyway I did about half roll until I fall a sleep.
Today I will continue and put some new shots on web. This roll contains experiments with 21mm/f4 Color Skopar lens for my Bessa R2 which I have borrowed for few hours back in March in Stockholm.
I have also made improvement in my work with IMatch. I have all my photos in it and also categorized photos from this year. It is real joy to work with that software. I am going to buy it!

Weekend is over and you do not see any new photos, what's wrong? Well nothing, I spent whole Sunday behind computer and learn and learn. I did lot of experiments on one picture from roll 2003-15. I scanned in raw format in vuescan and tried to make best of it in Picture Window Pro and than print it, still using standard Epson inks on Epson 890.
It takes a while until I get grip to modify picture right, first I did all things wrong and I was more and more disappointed. Than I started again and made few observation:

• scan with multiple pass on my ScanWit do not work always right. I have to check if picture is not blurred. It happens!
• Scan raw to get all info, set correct exposure, use long exposure button and try multi pass. Scan in max (48bits).
• In PWP extract green channel as it is more sharp of all. Check other or mixed than together if you wish. Convert from negative to positive, use Bright Curve to get nice histogram.
• After all bright curve modification resize to final print size, for proofing A6 and sharp it a bit.
• When printing position picture on A4 the way you can print 4 on one sheet of paper. You do not need to cut and you can easily compare different version.
• Printing using all cartridges give very nice smooth tones, but they have color cast. The best it can be see on printing 21level shade card.
• I wish I have MIS inks here, but until than I have a lot of other things to improve!

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I was also playing with IMatch again and find out it has a lot of features which I do not need and some which I like to have are missing. This is probably very normal situation. So I was still playing with idea to make my own. I just like software design :-) I am only afraid it will have in java quite low performance.
I think I am going to give a try, I will with small utility which will give me back my xml-rpc publishing on web.

I have prepared two new picture to publish on web today and scanned three photos in raw format and high resolution for Bart. While scanning I realize that setting exposure higher will bring some more details from dense (on positive white) areas. As those three shots where done on snow it was very useful to increase exposure.
I also put my experimental print from Sunday to mat. It looks quite nice I must say, 13x19cm is quite small but nice size with mat 20x30cm.

I made quite a few successful prints. I found on internet icc color profiles for my printer/paper combination and even with color inks I am getting nice results. MIS UltraTone inks suppose to arrive in few weeks.
I am bit delayed with uploading scans on web, but as one my friend suggested better make it good. Soon will be my new version of the upload tool ready and I can that show you new nice photographs.
Hang on!

When I came home today I was shocked and surprised! I have ordered special black & white carbon inks to my printer from MIS 17th of july and there arrived today!!!
So, guess how I spent evening, filling new cartridges with those inks, of course!. They need to rest over night and I will do some cleaning tomorrow and day after or maybe later tomorrow I'll print first archive high quality black and white ink-jet prints! Wow!!!

When I saw this dog I can't resist. Up to that moment I saw such equiped dogs only in some comics. Poor dog it even can't drink alone.

When we went up the small hill in Stockholm, it was a Sunday, we found these two boys silently eating on the sun, in front of church.

So waiting is over! Three new photographs on web. I did quite a progress with my software for uploading to web. I like it, finally I did some useful piece of code and I enjoyed it a lot! It is not finished yet, maybe it is just begging of reborn of my imgArchiver, who knows.
Anyway you know what is waiting for me this evening, cleaning a printer from epson ink and try of new ones!!!

Cartridges filled with new MIS Ultra Tone inks, and few prints done. And how does it look? Yes it does look good, I still need to do more experiments and print more different photos, but I am glad I am there now!

After a printing few pictures with new inks I realize that my negatives do not look as good as I though. Now when printing time is here you can see what real good negative is. I definitely must improve my developing and exposure technique to perfection.
I also realize that black ink is not as black as I would like to have it. After printing on EAM and Ilford Smooth Fine Art ink jet paper I have need to try PhotoRag and new Forte inkjet papers. I asked friend to bring me some Forte from Sweden and maybe I will succeed to order some PhotoRag from UK or DE wherever I can get it cheaper. It is really pity that I do not know and can't find source of these goods in Netherlands.
Soon going on holiday so I do not have much time for too much experiments but I like to develop some lately exposed Neopan this time in Ilford LC29 for change.