Epson P800 Questions

[Dale Villeponteaux]

Installed new P800 printer via USB. Made profile with i1 Pro 2. This and subsequent profile almost identical, but both have smaller color volumes than now-deceased 3880. Prints are dark with poor skin tones. Printed a test file of Andrew Rodney's and found it also dark with poor skin tones.  Can alter image
to get acceptable prints, but this is expensive in terms of paper used. I also re-installed drivers with no improvement. Am I doing something wrong or have
I got a lemon?

Thanks,
Dale

[Jager]

Have you tried printing with a canned profile?

[Mark D Segal]

Installed new P800 printer via USB. Made profile with i1 Pro 2. This and subsequent profile almost identical, but both have smaller color volumes than now-deceased 3880. Prints are dark with poor skin tones. Printed a test file of Andrew Rodney's and found it also dark with poor skin tones.  Can alter image
to get acceptable prints, but this is expensive in terms of paper used. I also re-installed drivers with no improvement. Am I doing something wrong or have
I got a lemon?

Thanks,
Dale

Are you using a 3rd party paper or Epson paper? If a third party paper, is the choice of the reference paper in the Epson driver similar to the paper you are profiling and do you have that reference paper selected in the driver when you are printing with your profile?

[Dale Villeponteaux]

To Jager: tried an Epson premium luster with canned profile. A little lighter but still dark.

To Mark Segal: Printed on Ilford Gold Fibre Silk with my own profile. Will print with canned profile, assuming one
                       is available. In general, have been printing with Photoshop manages color, proper profile selected
                       and no color management selected in printer settings.

Thank you,
Dale

[cortlander]

Maybe try Printer Managed color just to compare?

[Mark D Segal]

To Mark Segal: Printed on Ilford Gold Fibre Silk with my own profile. Will print with canned profile, assuming one
                       is available. In general, have been printing with Photoshop manages color, proper profile selected
                       and no color management selected in printer settings.

Thank you,
Dale

Hi Dale: could you please check what Epson reference paper you have selected in the Epson driver printer settings menu. And advise whether this is the same paper that you used for printing your profiling target(s). I'm trying to help analyze what may have gone wrong, because I used this same paper with my own custom profile when I beta-tested the P800 (see my review on this website) and I did not experience the kind of difficulty you are reporting. Before assuming there is anything wrong with the printer - which of course is not impossible - it is essential to be assured that ALL the driver and software settings are correct. Also, I assume you did a nozzle check to make sure all the colours are firing correctly? Clogged nozzles can cause such issues.

[Mark D Segal]

And Dale, yes, my findings concur with yours about the gamut volume: that of the P800 is less than that of the 3880 (see data and graphs in my review). But this is not material to the problem you are having. I came very, very close to making P800 prints look as good as 4900 prints (same photo, same paper) and the gamut volume for the latter is even very much larger than that of the 3880. A great many photos don't need huge gamut volumes to reproduce very well.

[Dale Villeponteaux]

Got good results using Ilford Gold Fibre Silk profile. This time used premium semi-gloss setting for printer after searching web.
Apparently using premium luster and premium glossy was source of error. My profile, however, is still too dark but I can reprofile
after reading profiling instructions again. Have wasted a lot of paper, with cost approaching that of the GDP of a third-world country,
which is why I asked for help rather than continuing to flounder around. Responses much appreciated. I will use the canned profile
until I produce a profile I like better. Even with good profiles, I tend to adjust each image to taste but profiles usually get close to
what I want

Thanks,
Dale

[Mark D Segal]

Got good results using Ilford Gold Fibre Silk profile. This time used premium semi-gloss setting for printer after searching web.
Apparently using premium luster and premium glossy was source of error. My profile, however, is still too dark but I can reprofile
after reading profiling instructions again. Have wasted a lot of paper, with cost approaching that of the GDP of a third-world country,
which is why I asked for help rather than continuing to flounder around. Responses much appreciated. I will use the canned profile
until I produce a profile I like better. Even with good profiles, I tend to adjust each image to taste but profiles usually get close to
what I want

Thanks,
Dale

Hi Dale: OK this is getting down to where I thought the source of the problem may have been. Two factors for your future consideration:

(1) When you make your new custom profile for that paper, when you print the target(s) that you will be reading, you may use either Epson premium luster or Epson premium semi gloss as the reference papers in the Epson driver. But note carefully which one you DO use, and then when you actually go to print real photos with this profile, make sure THE SAME paper (eitherthe premium luster or premium semi-gloss) is also selected in the Epson driver. IOW, the same reference paper must be used for both printing the profiling target and make the prints with the same profile you will be creating.

(2) WHen you are adjusting your photos for printing, do so with SOFTPROOF ACTIVE. Assuming that your monitor is properly calibrated and profiled, which is extremely important, this is the only way to get a reliable match between what you see on the display and what comes out of the printer. If you are working in a dim environment, setting the calibration to D50 or D65, gamma to L* or 2.2 and Luminance to about 100~110 cd should give you a decent starting point for a useful monitor calibration and profiling.

Once you have the monitor, the profiling and the papers set up consistently and correctly, the amount of wasted paper due to disappointments between your display and your printed output should shrink to no more than about 5%, and to achieve that you should not need to manually intervene on a file for printing once it looks correct under softproof on your display - also depends on the quality of your display. It pays to use one that is well suited for fine photographic purposes.

[MHMG]

I understand you set the printer up initially using USB, but just in case you are now printing wifi and you are also on a Mac, then make sure the Mac OS is actually calling the Epson IP driver not the airprint driver (i.e., check the Mac printer/scanner dialog settings in the Mac system preferences pane). That dumb little glitch tripped me up at first when setting up a P600 and produced color quality symptoms like you have described.

cheers,
Mark
http://www.aardenburg-imaging.com