The Black Printer

The choice of characteristics for the black printer of a four-color set of separations has often been arbitrary. Yet a black printer has a specific set of functions, and these can be applied to lead to sound objective methods for its generation. UCR and GCR have theoretical advantages, but only if the black printer is calculated correctly. GCR and conventional separations from four different makes of color scanner have been compared in practical print trials. The results show that there are still areas of weakness in the available systems, which can be partly explained by the theory presented.