Epson Ink Color Reflectivity

[guerillary]

Noticing distinct, magenta surface reflections off cyan ranges.  The rest of the gamut reflects white, as normally expected.  This is apparent in the skies of two different landscape images, tested on both the Epson 3800 & 3880 (stock inks) on both Gold Fiber Silk and Photo Rag Pearl.  Using each manufacturers' supplied drivers and recommended print settings from CS3.  Does this sound familiar to anyone?

[keith_cooper]

3880?? -- An all new printer or did you mean 4880 ;-)

I'm doing some tests on a 4880 at the moment and have noticed that this effect is very dependent on ink loading for some papers.

It's one of the parameters I'll consider when deciding on the best media setting for profiling.

Unfortunately the paper manufacturers suggested media settings are not always as carefully researched as you might like to think. If you consider the number of printers available from Epson/HP/Canon et al., it's unlikely they will have every one to test.

Also, I know that they usually farm out the profile making, and there you are reliant on the skill/expertise/thoroughness of whoever makes the profiles (this varies ;-)  I've now asked several paper suppliers (the people who's name is on the box) how they decided on their suggestions and the info rarely seems to traceable back to any detailed testing ;-)

I've found that several papers genuinely benefited from different settings to those suggested, however that assumes you are making your own profiles to go with these settings and don't mind lots of test prints...

[Doombrain]

Epson, HP and canon won't be the people telling you which settings to use for a 3rd party paper.
Micro spacing, ink limit etc for a 3rd party paper will have to be done by the manufacture of the paper.
The problem lies in from the printer driver you don't really have the control you need to make these settings and have to rely on the "next best setting" i.e. the percentage of ink per channel, which micro weave to use, amount of paper fed per head pass etc.

For the Pro3800 & 4880 you have a software tool called LFP Remote Panel which you can use to fine tune these settings on a 3rd party paper and send the settings to the printer, then the printer will only use these settings and all you have to do is apply your ICC.
However doing this will use some of your paper up and the printer will be locked to the paper you're using until you change the setting or turn off the setting (it shows on the printer as a number, 1 to 10).

I've used it a few times for high profile customers using 3rd party papers and it works well, after that the next step is using a RIP and building the media handling profile up from the ground.

[Ernst Dinkla]

Epson, HP and canon won't be the people telling you which settings to use for a 3rd party paper.

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That used to be true till HP published some documents with advice on what Z3100 media presets to select for third party papers with data about the ink limits etc used in the media presets. The Printer Utility software also allows the user to save custom paper media presets that are a bit more adapted (ink limit, drying time, etc) to the third paper and the calibration on that paper is the next step to add a third party paper in the driver choices. On top of that calibration a dedicated profile can be made. All the media presets, profiles etc, oem and custom, can be loaded to the printer and shared by more systems on the network.

You are right about Canon and Epson.


Ernst Dinkla

Try: [a href=\"http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/]http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/[/url]

[Doombrain]

I'm aware of the Z3100, I have one. What I was trying to say it no company will take the time of including the settings, which is why the z3100 is great for out of the box 3rd party media prints.
It's just a shame the printer's not very good over all.

[Ernst Dinkla]

I'm aware of the Z3100, I have one. What I was trying to say it no company will take the time of including the settings, which is why the z3100 is great for out of the box 3rd party media prints.
It's just a shame the printer's not very good over all.
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Opinions differ.


Ernst Dinkla

Try: [a href=\"http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/]http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/[/url]

[Scott Martin]

Unfortunately the paper manufacturers suggested media settings are not always as carefully researched as you might like to think. If you consider the number of printers available from Epson/HP/Canon et al., it's unlikely they will have every one to test.

No kidding! They try but don't always nail it. FWIW, I have a media evaluation image designed for determining what the ideal media selection is and I have a brief article about using it at: http://www.on-sight.com/2008/04/04/how-to-...-for-any-paper/

Epson, HP and canon won't be the people telling you which settings to use for a 3rd party paper.[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=197467\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

At least Canon provides their Special 1-10 media selections with increasing total ink limits for testing purposes.

[keith_cooper]

No kidding! They try but don't always nail it. FWIW, I have a media evaluation image designed for determining what the ideal media selection is and I have a brief article about using it at: http://www.on-sight.com/2008/04/04/how-to-...-for-any-paper/

I also use one based on the one that comes with the Spyder3print. I've got it (and a link to the useful onsight one ;-) at
http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article...est_images.html

There are some examples of using it at
http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article...a_settings.html

Quite tricky to decide the best setting sometimes, but usually well worth the effort :-)

[neoprinter]

guerillary, the dichroic bronzing you're seeing is one of the reasons I'm printing my fine art color images with an Epson 1400 and Claria ink, the other being differential reflection.  Very light areas appear dull relative to other parts of images that have more ink, thus more gloss optimiser.  After trying many different papers I gave up printing color photos with pigment inks, it just doesn't work (Epson 9800, PK).

As a longtime exhibition printer going way back into analog days, I agree with Crawford's observation in Keepers of Light that color dyes are the "syntax" of color photographic prints, with dye transfer being the gold standard.  Claria inks are the answer for inkjet printing, and they even last longer than pigment inks according to Wilhelm.  

Unfortunately, I'm stuck at 13" maximum width, hoping like hell Epson does the intelligent thing and markets a larger printer for Claria ink, even 17", but Epson seems to be cramming pigment printers down our throats to sell more ink, which is how they make most of their money.  OTOH, pigment inks work well for black and white prints, as their syntax is from particles of silver, much like pigment particles.  They just don't look good in color.  I've confined my pigment ink printing to fine art reproduction.

[mmurph]

Unfortunately, I'm stuck at 13" maximum width, hoping like hell Epson does the intelligent thing and markets a larger printer for Claria ink, even 17",

Why not take the ink out of the smaller carts and load it into a larger machine?

You could run it in most Epson printers with 3rd party carts.  A little pricy to start out with the small carts, but if it is for final prints/exhibition prints only ...

[neil snape]

guerillary, the dichroic bronzing you're seeing is one of the reasons I'm printing my fine art color images with an Epson 1400 and Claria ink, the other being differential reflection.  Very light areas appear dull relative to other parts of images that have more ink, thus more gloss optimiser.  After trying many different papers I gave up printing color photos with pigment inks, it just doesn't work (Epson 9800, PK).

As a longtime exhibition printer going way back into analog days, I agree with Crawford's observation in Keepers of Light that color dyes are the "syntax" of color photographic prints, with dye transfer being the gold standard.  Claria inks are the answer for inkjet printing, and they even last longer than pigment inks according to Wilhelm. 

Unfortunately, I'm stuck at 13" maximum width, hoping like hell Epson does the intelligent thing and markets a larger printer for Claria ink, even 17", but Epson seems to be cramming pigment printers down our throats to sell more ink, which is how they make most of their money.  OTOH, pigment inks work well for black and white prints, as their syntax is from particles of silver, much like pigment particles.  They just don't look good in color.  I've confined my pigment ink printing to fine art reproduction.
[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=200091\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

If it weren't Epson pushing pigments neither Canon nor HP would have taken the plunge for putting pigments in front of dyes.

Neither are perfect though , both have advantages and disadvantages.
Since you are concerned with A3+ printers why didn't you try the R1900?
The problems of gloss uniformity are unique to photo surfaces especially glossy. Epson eliminate this problem with Gloss Optimiser. Pigments in general are permanent on many more surfaces than dyes.
HP eliminate gloss diff on the Z 3100 with Gloss Enhancer which is done in a different way than Epson. It does introduce it's own bronzing or perhaps more correctly as you say dichroic or polarized reflections, turning so slightly magenta. They have the Z3100 in both 24 and 44" models which have approx. doubled color lightfastness references for inkjets.
After all three have announced multiple primaries to round out the gamut of pigments, the overall imaging ability is actually very very similar between dye and pigment.

[Ernst Dinkla]

Claria inks are the answer for inkjet printing, and they even last longer than pigment inks according to Wilhelm. 

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Check the ozone resistance in Wilhelm's test (one sample only if I recall it correctly) and you will see that Claria isn't at the same level of the best pigment inks. There's also an odd difference in fading results without UV light.

There's no hard boundary on what a pigment ink separates from a dye ink, it is more a gliding scale. Epson's own documentation on Claria confirms that.

[a href=\"http://www.epson.co.jp/e/newsroom/tech_news/tnl0611single.pdf]http://www.epson.co.jp/e/newsroom/tech_new...l0611single.pdf[/url]

The line below the molecule structure pictures says:  Epson’s newly developed Claria ink is much more resistant to light and ozone thanks to its tightly clustered pigment molecules.
The dividing line between dye and pigment isn't drawn by Epson either.

Then there are reports mentioning a lower Dmax on matte papers than possible with pigment inks. Usually dye inks are the best in Dmax on matte papers. See the archive of the Digital B&W list.

People expected the use of Claria in wide formats after the introduction of the 1400. Several wide formats and pro desktop models appeared after that but none with the Claria inkset

Ernst Dinkla

Try: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Wide_Inkjet_Printers/