Ken Allen has a degree in Imaging and Photographic Technology from Rochester Institute of Technology, home of the Image Permanence Institute. After an education in traditional printing of silver gelatin prints, c-prints, Cibachrome, dye transfer and masking techniques, he experimented with digital printing technologies.

After spending five years at Eastman Kodak Company as a Professional Imaging Representative, he worked as a Product Manager for digital camera systems at Leaf. Ken has traveled the U.S. advising photographers on the transition from film to digital, color management, and new workflows. In addition to this work, he provided digital imaging and digital asset management solutions to publishers and museums. Now, over 30% of the business at Ken Allen Studios is helping museums make the transition to digital archives.

Ken Allen has been working in the field of photography for over 20 years. His participation in the Kodak PhotoCD project, respect for film and historic photographs, and involvement in commercial digital photography since its earliest years gives him his depth of knowledge in digitization. He has developed techniques for scanning and color corrections to optimized data and print results from digital files as well as special protocols for scanning color negatives. In May 2006, Canon introduced printers with photographic quality pigment inksets. Epson quickly followed with its K3 inksets, which provided a wider color gamut and greater archival integrity for digital prints than ever before. It was these new developments, which galvanized Ken to experiment with these new printers:

"I had been experimenting and testing digital printers since 1989, including the very first 5x7 inkjet printers from Sony and I had been on the launch team for the Kodak dye sublimation printers. As an avid photographer, I continued to experiment and test until, in 2005, the 800 Ultrachrome K3 7800 and 9800 printers came out. Finally the color, sharpness, depth, black and white capabilities, lack of metamerism, new papers, and archival features made this the clear choice for any of my fine art photography. As I showed my photographer friends the work that I was producing, one after the other, they began asking me to print their work. And that's how I starting the printing part of my business."

Image: Michael Berman