Photoshop CS4 - Printing.

[Dinarius]

Vista x64

Monitor Calibration:

White Point: D50
Tonal Response Curve: L*
Luminance: White 130 cd/m2, Black Min. Neutral.

Calibration is done using an Eye One Display2 and basICColor Display 4.1.9


Much has been written about problems printing from CS4, but I have found anything definitive. A search on this forum hasn't yielded anything either - though I accept that my search criteria may have been incorrect.

I had no problems printing from CS3 and the settings in CS4 are identical, but the prints are always dark. I'm PC, but from what I read Mac users are experiencing problems too.

Settings are as follows:

1. My Epson R2400 is set as the Default Printer.
2. Printer dialog settings are:

a. Document (Profile: Adobe RGB 1998
b. Photoshop Manages Colors. (In Printing Preferences, Best Photo is ticked and in Advance, ICM and Off (No Color Management) are both selected.
c. Printer Profile: I use Perma Jet Oyster for a lot of my work and I have Perma Jet's profile (which I downloaded) selected.
d. Rendering Intent: In CS3 I used Perceptual with Black Point Compensation ticked, but it's even darker than Absolute Colorimetric now, so I'm using that in CS4.

That's pretty much it, I think.

Would be interested in a definitive exchange of views so that those with similar problems can get to the bottom of this.

Many thanks.

D.

[howseth]

Luminance 130.

you can try calibrating with a lower screen luminance? Say about 100. If I understand your screen luminance correctly - your level is about 30% higher than where I set mine (Photoshop CS3) on my Mac. (I use an Eye One Display 2 calibrator, as well) If I set my calibration at 130 the prints would also be too dark on my Z3100.

Howard

[Wayne Fox]

Luminance 130.

you can try calibrating with a lower screen luminance? Say about 100. If I understand your screen luminance correctly - your level is about 30% higher than where I set mine (Photoshop CS3) on my Mac. (I use an Eye One Display 2 calibrator, as well) If I set my calibration at 130 the prints would also be too dark on my Z3100.

Howard

Luminance should vary by user, since the criteria for setting it should be based on the brightness of the viewing conditions.  Since the OP stated prints from CS3 look OK and from CS4 are darker (which shouldn't be the case) fixing this by adjusting the monitor luminance and then the file density doesn't seem like a good idea.

As to the OP problem, this seems to be popping up somewhat frequently but certainly isn't affecting the majority of those that have switched to CS4.  There are a few threads here in LL that seem somewhat related, have you checked them out?  Are you printing in 8 bit from both CS3 and CS4?  (I have seen some weirdness when enabling the 16bit mode in the Epson driver using OS X 10.5.6/CS4)

[Dinarius]

Howard,

Thanks for that.

The reason I have luminance at 130 is that I have selected the "Pre-Press" default option in basICColor's menu.

If instead I chose the"Photography" default option, it will calibrate the monitor to Max luminance. This usually clocks in at about 243!

I will try calibrating at 100 and see what it's like.

D.

[Dinarius]

Wayne,

I'm not sure what you're referring to by bit mode. If you're referring to files, then everything is 16 bit. But, I assume you're not, so how do I know what bit mode I'm printing in?

I'm PC, by the way.

Thanks.

D.

ps. As I wrote above I did do a seach, so if you have links to threads that suggest solutions, I'd be very grateful.

[Wayne Fox]

Wayne,

I'm not sure what you're referring to by bit mode. If you're referring to files, then everything is 16 bit. But, I assume you're not, so how do I know what bit mode I'm printing in?

I'm PC, by the way.

Thanks.

D.

ps. As I wrote above I did do a seach, so if you have links to threads that suggest solutions, I'd be very grateful.

In the latest drivers on the Mac, there is a checkbox in the printer dialog, labeled something like Enable 16bit printing.  I'm not familiar with Windows so I'm not sure how it works.

One thing you might try is get the latest driver installer, have it uninstall the driver, reboot, and then reinstall.  I know Mac users had trouble with 10.5 was released until Epson released Leopard compatible drivers .. you may have a similar problem with Vista64 and something from the previous driver is interfering.

[howseth]

Dinarius,

Wayne is right about how viewing conditions, of the computer monitor, will affect the match with your printer - at night the same 100 luminance looks brighter than during the day; and the print may look a little darker than the screen. I just found that on average "100" was a reasonable compromise for my set-up - with various print viewing lighting conditions. The print itself will likely end up being viewed in different levels of light than that your computer/printer room. So it is always a compromise - on luminosity - whether your monitor or your print - how bright/dark to make it.

If you make a few test prints with Photoshop CS4 - at different monitor luminance levels - at what luminance number do you get the best match - for your typical viewing light?

Howard

[Dinarius]

Many thanks for the feedback.

I guess I should invest in a viewing booth to eliminate the vagaries of the viewing conditions of the prints.

Any suggestions on make/model?

Thanks again.

D.

[bill t.]

Do you have the right media type selected under Page Setup->Media Type?  At least with my 9880 that selection has a huge impact on the amount of ink the printer lays down, it has to be correct even when "No Color Adjustment" is selected.

I was dying from the dark print syndrome as well, I finally bought a Spyder3 Print kit and did my own profiles.  That completely solved the problem for me, what a relief.  Even pre-CS4 my prints always felt a little dark for gallery style lighting and normal bright rooms, manufacturer's profiles are often not the best for your particular luck-of-the-draw manufacturing sample.

[digitaldog]

Agree with most of the above (alter luminance of print booth or display to result in a match). My concern is the bit about prints being darker when printed out of CS4 versus CS3. I haven't seen this but some are reporting this issue. We need to get to the bottom of that issue if this is indeed the problem here. IOW, the same RGB numbers sent through CS3 and CS4 should produce the identical results, all things being equal (proper settings etc).

[Dinarius]

Do you have the right media type selected under Page Setup->Media Type?

Yup.

Still the same.

Thanks.

D.

[Doyle Yoder]

Agree with most of the above (alter luminance of print booth or display to result in a match). My concern is the bit about prints being darker when printed out of CS4 versus CS3. I haven't seen this but some are reporting this issue. We need to get to the bottom of that issue if this is indeed the problem here. IOW, the same RGB numbers sent through CS3 and CS4 should produce the identical results, all things being equal (proper settings etc).

I am not so sure any of the players really have a handle on this. It is with much apprehension that I apply updates of late. I do keep three workable partitions for testing this kind of stuff. At least on the Mac as I understand  it, in a effort to move to 64bit processing Apple has implemented a new printing path. That makes two paths for printing. For instance with Adobe, ID, IL, and Acrobat use the old path. PS and LR use the new path. When using the new path with application manages color the printer drivers are supposed to turn off color management. PSCS4 also does this with No Color Management selected, but allows all CM option with printer manages color. For what ever reason PSCS3 did not implement this the same way (nor did LR1.4.1) as PSCS4 and LR2.x. Adobe is no doubt having issues with this as we as have witnessed with LR2.3RC of which you are aware I raised quite a stink about. To Adobe's credit they corrected this problem in the final release of LR2.3. Lets hope that with Adobe's experience with the RC and the changes to the FR they have learned what truly caused this problem. Lets also hope that Adobe is now implementing this correctly in PS and LR no longer have to chase a moving target. That goes for the printer drivers as well.

With the numerous reports of people correcting their problems by reinstalling the printer drivers and even backing up a version and or making sure that the printer is the default printer I have some suspicions. And here lies another issue, where I have seen that setting the default printer in "Printer and Faxes" does not always take. It is good to check in the CUPS interface to make sure or to set the default printer.

My suspicions are.
OS updates are overwriting some files that the printer drivers depend on. Maybe 64bit version when the printer needs 32bit version leading to No CM not really being turned off in the driver. This can easily be seen by changing the profiles in the Colorsync Utility.

Using some part of the default printers software instead of the one your printing to.

Printer driver not correctly updated for Leopard. I have direct experience with this issue.

User error. I have direct experience with this too.

With this new printing path, applications tell the printer driver to do something. If they are not working correctly together then things get messed up. I am inclined to put the most blame on the printer drivers, but Adobe, Apple and the printer drivers all share some responsibility.  Just as an example Canon DPP software does not correctly tell the Canon iPF printer driver to set No Correction (no CM in the driver), even though PSCS4 and LR2.3 do.

Doyle

[digitaldog]

I'm aware the paths are different in various Adobe applications. One hopes that gets rectified some day. What I'm not seeing is any difference in those applications with 10.5 and what I get from the various Epson printers I have (all Leopard updated drivers).

There are bugs (there's one using Advanced B&W using CS4 and No Color Management whereby the print never shows up).

[Doyle Yoder]

I'm aware the paths are different in various Adobe applications. One hopes that gets rectified some day. What I'm not seeing is any difference in those applications with 10.5 and what I get from the various Epson printers I have (all Leopard updated drivers).

There are bugs (there's one using Advanced B&W using CS4 and No Color Management whereby the print never shows up).

I made one mistake in my statement. The printer path being for 64bit applications is not quite correct. The new printer path is necessary for writing applications for Cocoa which is necessary for 64bit.

Which brings up another question. We know LR is written in Cocoa, but are parts of PS as well.

Doyle

[Doyle Yoder]

For those with this double profiling problem, and those of you that don't have this problem.
 
Have you noticed that Epson driver pages now list Epson Common Driver Updater. Have you installed this and has it made any difference with the dark prints, double profiling etc.