ABSTRACT
Tone reproduction is concerned with the reproduction of original intensities and intensity differences, as well as with the observer's impression of these quantities, that is, brightness and contrast reproduction respectively. The theory of tone reproduction was established by L. A. Jones in the 1920s and 1930s, who first distinguished between objective and subjective tone reproduction. The aim of objective tone reproduction is a one-to-one reproduction of the relative input intensity, that is, relative luminance reproduction. The aim of subjective tone reproduction is to have a linear reproduction of brightness relative to white, that is, a linear lightness reproduction. The relationship between original scene intensity and reproduced image intensity characterizes the tone reproduction of an imaging chain and is affected by the tonal characteristics of each component in the chain. The tonal characteristics of desktop printers are described by the relationship between input digital counts and the generated density produced on the paper.
