Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Colour Management => Topic started by: danstart17 on August 17, 2017, 08:59:50 am
-
Hi
I've just found this forum and decided to join straight away as it seems like the best place for me right now.
I'm learning about colour management and I am trying to profile my large format solvent printer. It's a 1600mm CMYKx2 if that helps at all.
Does anyone have any experience using Versaworks and i1Profiler?
Basically, I am going to write my whole process down from start to finish, I've not managed to profile the printer yet as I'm unsure what to do/If I'm doing it right. I'm hoping you lovely people can look at my process and tell me what I'm doing right or wrong and help me get over the line.
1: Prepare Printer
• Make sure all [Nozzles] are firing properly
• Make sure [Bidirectional Printing Alignment] is adjusted correctly for the media
• Make sure [Media Feed Calibration] is adjusted correctly for the media
• Lower Print head (does this give a better print than the higher option???)
2: Prepare Versaworks
• Correctly set the [Measurement Instrument] in preferences, choose Gretag Macbeth eye one for both selections (for i1pro2)
• Configure Queue A settings. (Remember to put these back to normal once done)
• Choose the [Layout] tab
• Click [Get Media Width]
• Change [Scaling] to 110% (i1Pro2 won't read it if printed at 100% i'm told)
• Select [Mirror] if it’s necessary for the transfer process
• Choose the [Mark] tab
• Under [Job Property Label] tick the following
• Print Job properties
• Quality Settings
• Color Management
• Device Controls
• Date/Time
• Choose the [Printer Controls] tab
• [Feed Calibration Controls] - User Printer Settings
• [Other Controls] - Use Default Media Settings
• [Heater Controls] - Use Custom Settings
• Print Heater - 40ºC
• Dryer - 50ºC
3: Create a [New Media Profile]
• Go to Media / Media Explorer and [Create a New Media]
• Choose a name and select a Template to match (i.e Generic Vinyl Dry, this does 10 passes as opposed to 8)
• Select the new media and click [Print Quality Settings]
• Go to [Calibration Settings] / Print Chart and make sure the limits are 100%, 100%, 100%, 100%
• Click Print chart
• Once printed on your required media, you'll need to measure the chart
• Open I1 Profiler on the Mac
• Under user mode select Select Advanced / Measure Chart
• Choose 4 rows and 21 columns and choose Duel Scan
• Calibrate the i1Pro2 and start measuring
• Once done, double click a swatch and change CIE Lab to CIE Lch
• Now start with Cyan and double click the far right swatch, it will now show you the Lch values (we want to find the highest C value which stands for Chroma)
• Start double clicking each swatch from right to left and make a note of the one with the highest Chroma value
• Do the same for all 4 colours
• Once done, click save and save it to the desktop as a .cmxf file
4: Read the chart using Babelcolor Patchtool (Trial Version)
• Open Babelcolor Patchtool
• Open the file you’ve just saved and select the M1 measurement
• Change the rows to 4
• Now start with Cyan and select the patch that had the highest Chroma value and select it
• Starting with the selected swatch hover over the patches from right to left and wait for the ΔE* (Delta E) value to be around 1 - 1.5 and take a look at the colours in the window to look at the colour change
• As it stands, my current values for MD3 vinyl are
• C: 60%
• Y: 70%
• M: 50%
• K: 85%
5: Set ink limits in Versaworks
• Open Versaworks and select Media Explorer
• Select your new media and click [Print Quality Settings]
• Now change the single colour ink limits to match your findings and re-print the chart
• Once you've printed it, scan the patches in Versaworks then click on fine tune and apply once done
• Take a look at the graphs and they should all have a nice smooth curve, adjust the nodes if any seem out of line. (I have attached my images)
• We now need to find the total ink limit, select Total Ink limit > print chart and click print
• Once printed, look at the chart and determine what the % value has the brightest colour without going dull and mark each row, my average appeared to be 190%
• Once done, click the set ink limit and change it to match your finding i.e 190%
So far is this correct???
Now creating a profile chart to read is something else.
How many patches do I print?
Should I scramble them?
What shall I use for Patch Weighting?
Patchset Ink Limiting, this is set at 400% as default, should I match this to the 190% I've just set in Versaworks?
What is Linearization?
(https://www.dropbox.com/s/xel77mapk2lw0o3/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-17%20at%2013.42.44.png?dl=0)
(https://www.dropbox.com/s/q75pkpfsa2qiaih/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-17%20at%2013.42.51.png?dl=0)
(https://www.dropbox.com/s/xuc0vuc034esahc/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-17%20at%2013.42.57.png?dl=0)
(https://www.dropbox.com/s/rydmiqkhylywrbg/Screen%20Shot%202017-08-17%20at%2013.43.03.png?dl=0)