August 13, 2012
ivantheboneless-blog asked: Is this what I would do with my own printer? Print out 100 values of gray, decide what values match the stouffer scale and then create my own curve that I would apply to the negatives? Now where I get really confused is how does it correspond to my negatives. I am assuming that it takes the values of the original negative and compresses them into 8 values. What if you have a high key image vs. a low key image? Does that matter? I don’t even know if I am asking the right questions!!! Thanks!
Correction to answer I just published. 21% of black ink is the equivialent to step #2 on the step guide, 49% is the equivalent to step #3 and so on.
Yes, once you find the black ink squares that are equivalent to the Stouffer steps–those percentages of black ink become your “out put” in curves. The “in puts” are the numbers from 0-100% in curves divided into aproximately 8 equal points (0, 16, 30 and so on). Defining the D-max and D-min will depend on your printing method. For my gum prints, I can’t print higher than 85% of black ink on the shoulder and there isn’t much of a printable difference below 21% of black ink in the toe. Once you find a curve that works for you, it can be applied to any image regardless of contrast. Hope this helps.
