I recently purchased one of those (Inkjet, pigment) and started learning how to make good prints in home. I am so far satisfied with the color generated by the printer - I am using Epson Prem Glossy paper so far with Epson provided profile.
Only think that is bothering me a lot is how much curve adjustment that I have to make for some of my prints (specially ones with broad dynamic range). Even with the soft proof, the resulting image looks ugly in the screen so that I can actually print a decent copy. This is not the case with images that have flatter light
Is custom profile only way to go here? Or am I doing something wrong?
(PS My monitor calibration system is little bit out of date - other than updating that what else should I try?)
Arnab,
This may or may not be related but I went through a very similar situation not long ago and it came down to a few simple adjustments. I'm away from my office right now but from memory- make sure the printer is set to "allow Photoshop to manage colors." Then in the printer preferences set the mode ICM and No Color Adjustments. Having either of these set incorrectly can create some strange prints. Calibration could be an issue but I would be more interested in the age of your monitor, they all lose the ability to be correctly profiled after age.
Not so much for color control as brightness some other NPN'ers recommended setting the brightness to 120 rather than the suggested profile settings and I've found this to be very helpful in printing what I see on the monitor.
For the most part I've found Epson profiles to be very good so if you're getting gross differences then it's probably a setting issue.
Posted by Paul Wegemann on April 14, 2009 at 11:37 PM
Arnab,
I struggled with the print matching issue when I bought my R1800, but I ultimately solved it. I found the following steps critical -
1. Contrary to what I read, I turned the brightness of my LCD down to 100. At the generally recommended 120, my prints were too dark.
2. You must calibrate your monitor. I use the Eye-one Display 2. Totally worth the cost.
3. I got a custom profile for the Epson Premium Glossy that I mostly use. This made a major difference. The Epson canned profiles were just not cutting it. NPN's Michael Gordon offers custom profiles for a very reasonable price BTW.
4. Viewing area lighting. I don't work in the dark, but my lighting is subdued and mostly lit by an Ott-lite. Viewing my prints under this light allows me to see what's really going on.
These steps are just a distillation of the pain and expense I went though to get things right. Entire books have been written on the subject though and the web is full of good, and sometimes confusing advice. Best of luck on your color calibration journey!
Paul
Hey Arnab,I had a very difficult time getting my printer to work the way it should. But even after the monitor calibration and the proper settings my prints were only coming out OK. I found that the custom profile made a big difference. If you want great prints as opposed to just OK prints, I recommend the profile for your paper/printer setup. I also used Michael Gordon and I was very pleased with the results and the service. He comes highly recommended.
I will suggest to buy monitor calibration device if you dont have one.
and then get a copy of Jeff Schewe book or that of Tim Grey, it will help you to get it right.
Custom profile will also help a lot.
Posted by Grace Blair on April 17, 2009 at 9:51 AM
Don't forget to check the color range that your printer can print by printing out a color and a gray tone chart and then setting the output for the image in a levels layer. Most printers can only separate above about 10 on the dark and 250 on the light ends, from what I have experienced. This often saves the expense of a new ICC profile.
Hi Arnab: everyone seems to have covered all the basics, so I won't be redundant.
I'd highly recommend getting a book on color management (Fraser/Murphy/Bunting "Real World Color Management" is a bit "textbook" in flavor, but if you really want to understand color management...), and ALWAYS recommend custom profiles if you care about your output and want to save money and time. A link to my profiling service is found here in my signature.
Many thanks to those who have recommended my profiling service.
Don't forget to check the color range that your printer can print by printing out a color and a gray tone chart and then setting the output for the image in a levels layer.
Grace: a custom profile accomplishes this automatically
All, I ran through some similar issues and got mine resolved recently. One of the issues was with the profile I was using. The profiles that come with the printer are not the one's you want to use. You need to download the profiles from Epson site and launch those. Once those are launched, you should then see profile names with icc in the name. If you do, then the new profiles were loaded correctly. If you do not, you should re download the profiles and and relaunch. My issue was with the later. The soft proof with the profile when you are editing, works great. I am using Photoshop manages color and in the printer pref. the color cal. is turned off. It is working great. I worked through a few of the issues with Epson Tier 3 support and they were very good. One point of reference, if you do a print preview, there is a color cast but it prints out as I see it on my screen.
As far as purchasing or generating custom profiles is the cost to keep it up. If you change monitors, paper, etc. you need a new profile. This can get expensive. Some appear that they do this and if you keep things the same and not change paper, graphics card, etc. then go for it.
As far as what monitor collaboration to use makes a difference to what monitor and graphics card you have. A lot of people do not look at the different specs to ensure it is compatible and meets the requirements. There are a few sites that are good for helping you determine based on tests/performance.
This is not an easy process but you do learn a log going through it. I have a lot better knowledge and understanding on color and flow.
Discussion
10 repliesOnly think that is bothering me a lot is how much curve adjustment that I have to make for some of my prints (specially ones with broad dynamic range). Even with the soft proof, the resulting image looks ugly in the screen so that I can actually print a decent copy. This is not the case with images that have flatter light
Is custom profile only way to go here? Or am I doing something wrong?
(PS My monitor calibration system is little bit out of date - other than updating that what else should I try?)
This may or may not be related but I went through a very similar situation not long ago and it came down to a few simple adjustments. I'm away from my office right now but from memory- make sure the printer is set to "allow Photoshop to manage colors." Then in the printer preferences set the mode ICM and No Color Adjustments. Having either of these set incorrectly can create some strange prints. Calibration could be an issue but I would be more interested in the age of your monitor, they all lose the ability to be correctly profiled after age.
Not so much for color control as brightness some other NPN'ers recommended setting the brightness to 120 rather than the suggested profile settings and I've found this to be very helpful in printing what I see on the monitor.
For the most part I've found Epson profiles to be very good so if you're getting gross differences then it's probably a setting issue.
I struggled with the print matching issue when I bought my R1800, but I ultimately solved it. I found the following steps critical -
1. Contrary to what I read, I turned the brightness of my LCD down to 100. At the generally recommended 120, my prints were too dark.
2. You must calibrate your monitor. I use the Eye-one Display 2. Totally worth the cost.
3. I got a custom profile for the Epson Premium Glossy that I mostly use. This made a major difference. The Epson canned profiles were just not cutting it. NPN's Michael Gordon offers custom profiles for a very reasonable price BTW.
4. Viewing area lighting. I don't work in the dark, but my lighting is subdued and mostly lit by an Ott-lite. Viewing my prints under this light allows me to see what's really going on.
These steps are just a distillation of the pain and expense I went though to get things right. Entire books have been written on the subject though and the web is full of good, and sometimes confusing advice. Best of luck on your color calibration journey!
Paul
Wim
and then get a copy of Jeff Schewe book or that of Tim Grey, it will help you to get it right.
Custom profile will also help a lot.
I'd highly recommend getting a book on color management (Fraser/Murphy/Bunting "Real World Color Management" is a bit "textbook" in flavor, but if you really want to understand color management...), and ALWAYS recommend custom profiles if you care about your output and want to save money and time. A link to my profiling service is found here in my signature.
Many thanks to those who have recommended my profiling service.
Grace: a custom profile accomplishes this automatically
As far as purchasing or generating custom profiles is the cost to keep it up. If you change monitors, paper, etc. you need a new profile. This can get expensive. Some appear that they do this and if you keep things the same and not change paper, graphics card, etc. then go for it.
As far as what monitor collaboration to use makes a difference to what monitor and graphics card you have. A lot of people do not look at the different specs to ensure it is compatible and meets the requirements. There are a few sites that are good for helping you determine based on tests/performance.
This is not an easy process but you do learn a log going through it. I have a lot better knowledge and understanding on color and flow.
Tim