Can two shades of gray ink make photos more vibrant? Oddly enough, yes!
HP’s 8-ink printing technology adds two neutral shades of gray—adding rich color and lifelike texture to your color snapshots and making it easier to create black-and-white photos that are truly works of art.
Gray area
Gray inks, in combination with the black ink, make your black-and-white photos pop off the page with deep, velvety blacks, bright whites, and the 4,097 shades of gray in between.
Most other printers use a combination of colors to make gray. Their black-and-white photos often have an odd purple or green tint; HP's gray inks are color-neutral—no tints here.
There's a substantial decrease in graininess. Your pictures look more realistic, with smashing contrast between blacks and whites.
HP also designed the inks to blend and mix together before they're absorbed into the paper, virtually eliminating graininess and the appearance of dots.
Color consistency
Different types of light can make your black-and-white photo appear to have slightly "off" colors. That is, unless you printed with HP's 8-ink printing system.
Look at a print under a normal bulb, then under a fluorescent. The fluorescent probably has a sickly green hue—not too pretty if it's a portrait of Mom.
Scientists call this color shift "metamerism."
HP chemists designed the gray inks in the 8-ink systems to remain color-neutral when using HP photo papers, regardless of the type of light.
Printable version
