Printing snowy owls

I am finding it hard to get good prints for my snowy owls. It looks as if the ink is almost "burned" on the blacks and the whites are not bright. It also doesn't look as if the optimizer covers everything. seems to only affect the blacks and whites. Printer works great for other images in full colour. It is really hard to explain what this looks like but does anyone have suggestions for getting the best prints of snowy owls? Should I use matte or lustre paper?
Current equipment: Imac, Epson R1800.

Thanks

Lindy,

We need some more info in order to see if we can help...

What program and version are you using to edit your images?
Which color profile is assigned or embedded in the image?
What are your print settings in your image editor and in the Epson printer driver?
What paper are you currently using?

Printing to get whites that have a nice 'glow' without being harsh, and good, rich blacks is tough. Color balance and contrast has to be finely tuned so that you can realize detail in images that are predominately white, or have significant areas of white. It may take a series of proof prints, with careful adjustments between proofs, to get it right.

--P

Thanks Preston. I am getting used to trial and error
Working with Lightroom 3, prophoto color space, print settings are lustre paper (glossy on the type vs matte), lustre premium best photo icc with the epson lustre paper. Sharpening is set to standard. These are the most current printer drivers for Mac Lion.

after many tries, i think I may have had the paper set to matt

Lindy,

I don't use Lightroom, so I am not familiar with its print setup, but I will offer a few things to check.

1. If Lightroom is managing color, be sure that Printer Manages Color is turned 'Off' in the Epson driver.
2. Ensure that the paper profile chosen in the Epson driver matches the one chosen in Lightroom.
3. Profoto is a very wide color space. If you are allowing the printer to manage color, it will convert the Profoto colors as closely as it can. However, because the default color space of the printer has a more narrow gamut than Profoto, the conversion will not be truly accurate.
4. If you do allow the printer to manage color, I suggest that you convert the image to sRGB, adjust color and contrast in Lightroom and then run a proof print.
5. If Lighroom will allow it, set its rendering intent to relative colormetric and black point compensation and, again, ensure color management is turned 'off' in the Epson driver.
6. Sharpening does increase contrast. Therefore, be sure the image is not over-sharpened.

I hope this helps. I do all my printing from PSCS5 on an Epson R2400, so some of the items I mentioned above may not be applicable to your system. Perhaps someone who prints using Lightroom will also chime in.

--P

Also remember that true whites are affected by the whiteness of the paper itself (there is not white ink - just gloss optimizer to even out metamerism and other issues). I'm not familiar with the Epson Lustre paper, but if it's a more "natural" toned paper that could be affecting the whites as well.

And there is the possibility that the profile, even if it's the right one, just isn't very good for your particular printer. So if you get through Preston's suggestions or anything else we come up with here, you could just need to try a custom profile.

David, I use the Epson Ultra Premium Luster paper. It tends to be a 'cool' paper with a slight gloss.

Lindy: Do you have the latest Epson profiles? If your profiles are older, they may not take into account any changes Epson may have made to the paper. I suggest you download and install the latest profiles. Here

--P

Thanks for all the help - it is getting better with all your suggestions.