A little rusty and need some advice

[switters]

Hi everyone,

After a few years hiatus I am again dipping my toe in the water of inkjet printing. I just bought myself a new P600, and am printing from both Photoshop and Lightroom and using an iMac 5k monitor.

I have a couple of questions:

1) I'm somewhat bewildered by all of the new paper options. Can someone recommend a good Bartya/fiber paper, and one matte paper? I have a feeling I'd benefit from choosing just a couple and sticking with them while I get back into the swing of things. You know, limit the variables.

2) I read Ctein's post suggesting that printer profiles are "obsolete", as well as the thread here discussing it. I'm quite confused. I'm not very experienced, and realistically I don't have a ton of time to devote to this. Would it be better for me to stick with Epson papers and use "Printer manages colors". If I do use "Printer manages colors", do I need to limit myself to Epson papers, or can I use other papers and then just choose the closest Epson paper?

3) Do I need to profile the iMac 5k monitor, and is it even possible?

Thanks for your help!

[hugowolf]

Just get sample packs from Canson and/or Hahnemuhle and try the papers for yourself. Paper is personal. If you get twenty replies, you will get twenty different suggestions.

No, you don't have to stick to Epson papers. Download the profiles to go with the sample papers.

Yes, you should calibrate your monitor, or the profiles would be almost as good as obsolete.

Brian A

[switters]

Will do on sample pack.

Re: calibration. Lloyd Chambers wrote an article a while back (don't have the URL) where he argued that it is not possible to truly calibrate an iMac 5k.

I used to have a Mac Pro tower (before the new design) and NEC monitor, and calibrated that with SpectraView. But from what I gather calibration may not be possible with the iMac?

[JakeD]

Hi switters.  I too have the iMac 5k screen. It does need profiling, if only for peace of mind, but more than that. I try and do mine about once every two weeks, but I have to be honest; I sometimes lapse. Get yourself a Colormunki Photo, which is probably one of the most cost effective profiling tools available. That way you can profile both your screen(s) and printer with one tool. As regards paper, a good start could be Canson Infiniti baryta and Ilford Gold Fibre Silk. I like both of those. For matte, I like MOAB Entrada. I appreciate that this is down to the individual. Hope that helps.

[switters]

I still have the NEC SpectraView device. I did some research and found that the BasICColor Display software can calibrate the iMac using this device, so I'm going to try that.

But, I did find the article by Lloyd Chambers which claims that any calibration of the iMac is not true calibration.

[JeanMichel]

Yes, do calibrate you new iMac. I just purchased one and it did need calibration. I purchased a Spyder5Pro as I was happy with the spyder2 that I used for my MacPro and 30" Cinema Display. The iMac was a tiny bit greenish before calibration. For paper, my preferred paper is Canson baryta photographiquel. The are Amy papers out there and you may want to get some sample packs to experiment with and find the one(s) you prefer.
Jean-Michel

[pluton]

2) I read Ctein's post suggesting that printer profiles are "obsolete", as well as the thread here discussing it. I'm quite confused. I'm not very experienced, and realistically I don't have a ton of time to devote to this. Would it be better for me to stick with Epson papers and use "Printer manages colors". If I do use "Printer manages colors", do I need to limit myself to Epson papers, or can I use other papers and then just choose the closest Epson paper?

Yeah, I read that too.  As far as I can tell, it only applies if you are
1) making a tiff or jpeg(with embedded Argb profile) and then
2) printing from that. 
This is the old, Rube Goldberg workflow from the pre-Lightroom/Aperture days.
For those...like me... that print directly from Lightroom, it has no relevance.