Dodgy reds again

[Harry Carpenter]

I am once again fighting with my z3100.
It runs like a dream and never clogs. It is very frugal with the inks but it just cannot print reds.
I have calibrated my screen and printer and updated all firmware and drivers. I have created and downloaded profiles and "learned" how to colour manage the whole workflow, but!

I photograph weddings which always involves flowers, especially roses and the z3100 just will not even come close on printing anything red.
In every other repect the colours in the final print are pretty close to what I see on screen, but not anything with red.

I am printing on Kodak lustre which I have used long before the z3100 arrived.

My workflow is as follows
I start with raw using Lightroom then export to photoshop, both using pro-photo 16bit.
Before printing I convert to Adobe rgb and print with preview with app managed colours and relative colourmetric selected and using the correct profile for the paper.

The poor reds are also evident in the softproof so it must be a profile issue but scrolling through ALL the available profiles it kills the red content in all but the pro satin and gloss profiles.

I have tried converting to smaller colour spaces but the result is the same, crap reds.

If it wasnt for this it would be a great printer but it means I still have to send prints away to be printed in order to get a decent red which is pretty galling considering the great reviews I read and relied on.

Rant over.

I hope it is something I am doing wrong but currently I have run out of options.

[rdonson]

Harry,

When you created the profile for the Kodak Lustre what paper type did you use?  That's often the source of poor red performance.

[Harry Carpenter]

I don't remember what the original profile was but I then found that HP had prepared a profile for the Kodak lustre on their site. That is the one I am currently using. What irritates me is that when I print the colour chart for profiling or calibrating, the colours I see are perfectly good but when I print from an image it is pretty much unuseable if a rich red is involved.
I can get away with it for the most part but I shouldnt have to compromise to that degree on a new printer. I am tempted to try it as pro satin as in softproof that was one of two profiles that didnt screw up the reds as badly as the others, but I am sure there will some hidden issues with that.

[Christopher]

I don't remember what the original profile was but I then found that HP had prepared a profile for the Kodak lustre on their site. That is the one I am currently using. What irritates me is that when I print the colour chart for profiling or calibrating, the colours I see are perfectly good but when I print from an image it is pretty much unuseable if a rich red is involved.
I can get away with it for the most part but I shouldnt have to compromise to that degree on a new printer. I am tempted to try it as pro satin as in softproof that was one of two profiles that didnt screw up the reds as badly as the others, but I am sure there will some hidden issues with that.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=138293\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I really has nothing to do with the calibration, yes it can get a little better through it but in the End the red gamut just sucks.... But as long as you don't need excat or strong reds it does not matter for most people.

I'm myself is really considering switching back to Epson again.

[rdonson]

I don't remember what the original profile was but I then found that HP had prepared a profile for the Kodak lustre on their site. That is the one I am currently using. What irritates me is that when I print the colour chart for profiling or calibrating, the colours I see are perfectly good but when I print from an image it is pretty much unuseable if a rich red is involved.
I can get away with it for the most part but I shouldnt have to compromise to that degree on a new printer. I am tempted to try it as pro satin as in softproof that was one of two profiles that didnt screw up the reds as badly as the others, but I am sure there will some hidden issues with that.
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Harry, the paper type is a critical element of getting good color with non-HP papers.  In the current firmware the paper type controls the ink limiting.    

If you got the ICC profile from [a href=\"https://h41186.www4.hp.com/hpp/country/us/en/iccmedia.html?profile_type=MEDIA&pageseq=89706]here[/url] you'll notice there is also a recommendation for the paper type to use.

[smthopr]

The poor reds are also evident in the soft-proof so it must be a profile issue but scrolling through ALL the available profiles it kills the red content in all but the pro satin and gloss profiles.

I have tried converting to smaller colour spaces but the result is the same, crap reds.

[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=138263\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I just printed some glossy images on an old paper sample that I have no profile for using my Epson 3800. So I just picked "Premium Glossy Photo Paper" profile and paper setting/profile and printed. The result was a really close match to the soft proof in photoshop.

So, I'm thinking, why not just try the paper setting and profile for the profiles that you have that soft proof well and see what happens? Or, of course you could buy the paper that the profile is made for as well...

What I have noticed since I've had this printer (the first one I've had with multiple grey inks) is that when experimenting with different glossy/luster type papers that they all print very close to each other using the same profile/media settings. Whether the paper is 6 year old kodak paper made for dye inks (takes a day to dry!) or other paper samples I've had sitting around for years. This was certainly not the case for my Epson 1280 six ink dye ink printer where neutrals are mixed with CMY inks.

I've even opened up the Epson profiles for luster and glossy papers in the colorsync utility and noticed that they are the same profiles for the two papers.

So go ahead and take a shot at it and let us know if comes close to the soft proof.

-bruce

[thierryd]

Harry, the paper type is a critical element of getting good color with non-HP papers.  In the current firmware the paper type controls the ink limiting.   

If you got the ICC profile from here you'll notice there is also a recommendation for the paper type to use.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=138308\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

You must choose the right paper type and make first the calibration for this paper type.

[neil snape]

The Z 3100 isn't the best printer for porous matte media in the reds, but I'm not sure I follow you in the roses' reds on luster. Perhaps the Kodak media doesn't perform well?

I just measured three different red roses with my i1. They easily fit within the gamut of the Z and show no out of colour gamut anywhere close to the reds on an APS Pro Satin profile. Pro Satin is not even as large a gamut as Instant Dry so this should be a fair comparison to a third party unknown satin media.

I've said before on this forum that the soft proofing with HP vivera inks is not 100% reliable compared to the printed output. The reasons are quite complex why they are not, and too many variables to get into that right now as it is a different topic.
 I do see that the reds are out of gamut on monitors however which will compound soft proofing deviance between printer profiles.
I can say that the Canon pigment printers will produce a higher gamut and light red over both HP and Epson. I also know that the Epson is capable of very deep saturated dark reds over both HP and Canon.
Yet I've printed out  a lot of images and needless to say also test charts and cannot find fault with HP reds on Satin papers.
What direction do you see the problems? Saturation, depth, hue, lightness? Do you see this on print outs on HP Satin papers or only Kodak?

[Harry Carpenter]

Thanks for all the repies.
The link shown above is where I got the profile from and loaded using that specific paper type then calibrated. It was much better than the profile generated by the onboard spectro (which raises other questions) but it is still not quite there and with crap red. I still fail to see why a softproof with almost any of the supplied HP profiles, kills the reds  to such a great degree. I am thinking that I should have waited to see what the other manufactureres produced. Anyone know if the IPF6001 is hitting the mark?

[Harry Carpenter]

Okay I have sorted the issue with the reds on Kodak lustre (at least for now).

By selecting HP PRO Satin as the paper loaded and using its profile, the colours have come out almost perfectly, with succulent reds and no obvious loss in other colours. It also only uses an additional 0.4ml extra per sq meter.
This is certainly closer than all of my other efforts so far, but it does raise a few other questions.

I bought the printer in part because it has an onboard spectrometer, which has thus far proved to be a pointless addon, if the profiles it creates cannot even come close to providing true colours.

Choosing the HP recomended profile and paper choice for the Kodak lustre paper produced very poor reds.

smthopr, the final print using the pro satin profile is almost exactly what I am seeing in photoshop and is also better than the softproof which "alters" the reds unsatisfactorily.

Neil, the reds were not out of gamut but printed "mostly" with a cyan blue cast and low contrast, so they looked more grey than red. I say mostly because the transition to other shades then left it looking solarised in some areas. I would say that the issue was with saturation, depth, hue and brightness but only in the reds. If it would be useful I will try and scan the two outputs to illustrate the difference.

Another question raised is regarding soft proofing with the vivera inks. I am gathering that this is the best way of visualising the final output so if it isnt that accurate with the z3100 surely that is something for HP to look at along with the profiling.

Thanks to all for the help. Hopefully I can lay these issues to rest now.

[rdonson]

Okay I have sorted the issue with the reds on Kodak lustre (at least for now).

By selecting HP PRO Satin as the paper loaded and using its profile, the colours have come out almost perfectly, with succulent reds and no obvious loss in other colours. It also only uses an additional 0.4ml extra per sq meter.
This is certainly closer than all of my other efforts so far, but it does raise a few other questions.

I bought the printer in part because it has an onboard spectrometer, which has thus far proved to be a pointless addon, if the profiles it creates cannot even come close to providing true colours.

Choosing the HP recomended profile and paper choice for the Kodak lustre paper produced very poor reds.

smthopr, the final print using the pro satin profile is almost exactly what I am seeing in photoshop and is also better than the softproof which "alters" the reds unsatisfactorily.

Neil, the reds were not out of gamut but printed "mostly" with a cyan blue cast and low contrast, so they looked more grey than red. I say mostly because the transition to other shades then left it looking solarised in some areas. I would say that the issue was with saturation, depth, hue and brightness but only in the reds. If it would be useful I will try and scan the two outputs to illustrate the difference.

Another question raised is regarding soft proofing with the vivera inks. I am gathering that this is the best way of visualising the final output so if it isnt that accurate with the z3100 surely that is something for HP to look at along with the profiling.

Thanks to all for the help. Hopefully I can lay these issues to rest now.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=138361\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

First, I'm happy that you're getting better results, Harry.

Just to make sure I understand what you did originally let me retrace.
- you're using Kodak Lustre - I'm not sure if that was Kodak Premium Rapid Dry Photo Luster 260gsm or Kodak Professional Photo Paper Luster 255gsm.
- you downloaded an HP paper type for that paper
- you calibrated the printer for that paper type
- you created an Easy ICC profile for the paper with the onboard spectro

This produced poor reds so you
- used the HP Pro Satin paper type and HP Pro Satin profile for the Kodak Lustre paper

Now the reds look acceptable.

You believe that the onboard spectro is pointless.  I think this exercise has demonstrated that getting good color is about more than ICC profiles no matter how many patches in the target.  The paper type and calibration are critical as well.  Using non-HP papers seems to require experimentation despite the recommendations on the HP website for this particular paper.

You also have concerns about softproofing.  Would you share how you're softproofing?  What settings you're using?

[Harry Carpenter]

Not just better results but the great results I have been chasing all this time. Everything has been very slightly dark and slightly blue but it has been the reds that have been a nightmare.

I am using Kodak Premium Rapid Dry Photo Luster 260gsm.

Monitor calibrated using either spyder2 or monaco.

The workflow and softproof has been:

Camera Eos 5D to lightroom as 16 bit pro-photo - adjust -

edit in photoshop as 16 bit pro-photo - ( I was converting to Adobe rgb prior to printing to limit the colour gamut but now I dont need to)

proof setup as HP designjet photo semi gloss/satin (less ink) GE on with relative colourmetric and BPC.

Preserve RGB = OFF

This profile and paper type was from HP and was slightly better than my own profile.

Colours seen here were barely acceptable being slightly dark and cold(blue/cyan) but the reds just turned a light, patchy desaturated magenta colour at best and a dull cyan grey at worst.

Within the proof setup I tried all of the other profiles just to see which ones were least bad and there were only 5 that didnt just destroy all of the colours.

Pro satin being one of these I tried telling photoshop ( and since then qimage ) that this paper was loaded and the results were just superb.

I have been fighting with the colours since I bought this printer and this morning it has finally lived up to my (not unreasonable) expectations.

I am new to colour management but everything I read suggested that the error was not in my workflow.

I have attched a small segment of the images to illustrate the problem.
I will leave you to work out which is which.

[Harry Carpenter]

Not just better results but the great results I have been chasing all this time.
Up untill now everything has been printing very slightly dark and slightly blue/cyan but it has been the reds that have been a nightmare.

I am using Kodak Premium Rapid Dry Photo Luster 260gsm.

Monitor is calibrated using either spyder2 or monaco.

The workflow and softproof has previously been:

Camera Eos 5D (adobe rgb) to lightroom as 16 bit pro-photo -

edit in photoshop as 16 bit pro-photo - ( I was converting to 8 bit Adobe rgb prior to printing to limit the colour gamut but now I dont need to)

proof setup as HP designjet photo semi gloss/satin (less ink) GE on with relative colourmetric and BPC.

Preserve RGB = OFF

This profile and paper type was from HP and was slightly better than my own profile.

Colours seen here were barely acceptable being slightly dark and cold(blue/cyan) but the reds just turned a light, patchy desaturated magenta colour at best and a dull cyan grey at worst.

Within the proof setup I tried all of the other profiles just to see which ones were least bad and there were only 5 that didnt just destroy all of the colours.

Pro satin being one of these, I thought I would try telling photoshop ( and since then qimage ) and the Hp printer driver that this paper was loaded and the results were just superb.

I have been fighting with the colours since I bought this printer and this morning it has finally lived up to my (not unreasonable) expectations.

I am new to colour management but everything I have read suggested that the error was probably not in my workflow.

I have attached a small segment of the images to illustrate the problem.
One is using the pro satin profile.
The other is scanned off a print and I have adjusted the colours to try and match what the print looks like but the reds have been more dull cyan or magenta/pink than this image shows.

[Roscolo]

When you created your initial profile, i.e. when you loaded the Kodak paper, what type of paper did you tell the z3100 you were loading?

I suspect your initial profile was not good because perhaps you did not tell the printer the proper paper type when your profile was created. You should be able to test this by just re-profiling the Kodak Rapid Dry Lustre and double-checking or changing the paper type.

I have used Kodak Rapid Dry Lustre and Gloss with excellent results. I had sample rolls of these papers when I first received my z3100 and they were the first papers I printed on. The printer needs to know the correct paper type being loaded to build a good profile. Seems I selected either HP Pro Satin or maybe the generic Photo Satin paper type when I loaded the Kodak Rapid Dry Lustre and my prints were spot on from the get go.

Glad you appear to have it sorted out. I have found that the z3100 requires a pretty methodical approach to making sure one has followed all steps correctly. This becomes second-nature as time goes on.

[thierryd]

This profile and paper type was from HP and was slightly better than my own profile.


[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=138433\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

I can't see in your workflow when you calibrate the paper type. You have to calibrate the HP paper type first on your own printer.
Then you can use HP profile or you can make your own profile with the printer, but the paper type can be good with your printer only if you do a specific calibration  on your printer with the paper type and the Kodak paper.

[Harry Carpenter]

Thierryd.
Yes sorry I didnt mention it.
When I first install a paper the very first thing is calibrate. This was done early on with the kodak lustre custom paper setting and self made profile and then later with the HP recommended paper type and profile. I am just very happy that at long last I am seeing prints of a quality that I hoped to get a long time ago.

Roscolo.

When I first loaded the kodak paper I followed the available instructions and installed it through the custom paper menu. This gave me an option to use a satin or lustre type (I forget exactly) so I thought that this was the correct method and that as long as the generic type was correct the profiling would take care of the differences.

I now know very differently.

I used the same method to load a synthetic canvas and the results from that are generally very good but still a bit weak on the reds, but nowhere near as bad as the lustre was.

It is apparrent that if you select a wrong paper type which is very easy to do then no amount of profiling or colour correcting will bring it back.

I wonder if this may be the case for some of the other users complaints about the lack of red gamut and the answer may be as simple as just trying a few other pre-installed profiles and see which fits your paper the best.

Once again thanks for all the help.

[rdonson]

It is apparrent that if you select a wrong paper type which is very easy to do then no amount of profiling or colour correcting will bring it back.

I wonder if this may be the case for some of the other users complaints about the lack of red gamut and the answer may be as simple as just trying a few other pre-installed profiles and see which fits your paper the best.

Once again thanks for all the help.
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

Yes, and HP has tried to address it a couple of ways.  Firmware 5.0.0.4 did improve things and HP has put out a few Technical Newsletters to try to inform us.  The next firmware/driver release should help even more.  Still, we have to get used to doing some experimentation with non-HP papers to figure out which paper types work best.

[a href=\"http://z3100users.wikispaces.com/space/showimage/working_with_nonhp_papers_fw_5_v2.pdf]Tech Newsletter on Reds[/url]

Tech Newsletter on non-HP papers fw 5.0.0.4

[Harry Carpenter]

Yes, and HP has tried to address it a couple of ways.  Firmware 5.0.0.4 did improve things and HP has put out a few Technical Newsletters to try to inform us.  The next firmware/driver release should help even more.  Still, we have to get used to doing some experimentation with non-HP papers to figure out which paper types work best.

Tech Newsletter on Reds

Tech Newsletter on non-HP papers fw 5.0.0.4
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=138495\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

It may just be me but I find it almost impossible to find things on the HP site. I always find a newsletter or a reference but never the article or thing I am looking for. Thank god for LL and the forum posters.

[rdonson]

It may just be me but I find it almost impossible to find things on the HP site. I always find a newsletter or a reference but never the article or thing I am looking for. Thank god for LL and the forum posters.
[{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

It's impossible to find things on the HP site *and* its hard to find a slower website.  Its constantly trying to hook you up with a chat session instead of taking you where you want to go as well.  To add insult to injury you have to sign up for about three different HP websites to see all the info on the Z printers.  I absolutely hate the experience.

The good news is that Sean Puckett started a wiki on the Z printer and I've been trying to help flesh it out.  Wikis depend on many people contributing info so feel free to post things there.

[a href=\"http://z3100users.wikispaces.com/]Z3100 wiki[/url]

[Mark Lindquist]

Harry -
Glad you're getting where you need to be regardless of the difficulty.
I really think experimentation is the way to go.

It's super everyone here is willing to share knowledge and experience.

Anyway - glad you're doing better - I'm having fun with my Z3100 -

Mark