Epson 3800 Shadow problems

[reactivesource]

Just bought an Epson 3800 to replace my 2200.  Calibrated my screen and received profiles from Chromix.  Shadows lose detail and blacks do not look as black as my 2200 prints.  The blacks on the 3800 seem to look not as contrasty.  I have tried rasing the density but then details are lost and the picture over saturated.  I am printing on Epson Enhanced Matte paper. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[jcote]

It is difficult to say what is wrong from what you have related, but the first thing I would try might be to use the included Epson (Epson Enhanced Matt) profile. I print on this paper with my 3800 and this profile and the paper has a great range for a matt paper with a very dense black. It sounds to me as though your profile is not taking advantage of all of the Black/gray inks in the machine.

[madmanchan]

Matte prints from the 3800 do not have as deep a black as they do with the 2200. It is one of the rare cases where the 3800 does not do as well as the older 2200, unfortunately.

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

Having recently gone through the very same upgrade from 2200 to 3800, I'll echo what John says. I've been getting much better results on EEM using Epson's profiles than I ever got on my 2200. I also recommend reading carefully Eric Chan's notes on using the 3800, here. 

His workflows work very well for me, and his ABW profiles are excellent for black-and-white printing.

[jasonrandolph]

Have you checked to see whether the Epson driver is controlling printing vice PS or LR?  This threw me off a bit when I got my 3800.  Make sure you turn color control off (unless using Advanced B&W), and make sure the darkness is set to Normal.  The Epson driver by default controls color and I believe Dark is the default darkness setting.  I get best results using Normal.  Hope this helps.

[Doombrain]

just make sure you're using the MK ink, not PK. should read 'Matte' on the display.

[neil snape]

Matte prints from the 3800 do not have as deep a black as they do with the 2200. It is one of the rare cases where the 3800 does not do as well as the older 2200, unfortunately.

One of the complaints with earlier Epson printers were blocked up blacks. Could it be that the color maps were adjusted for the 3800 etc to have a better tone repro in the deep shadows?

An eternal compromise is always black point, composite black point, vs. tonal steps. When the color maps for the Z3100 were being made the earliest versions were very dark but  tonal separation was not ideal. Is the black range with say Colorburst or ImagePRint better than the driver?