Delighted with my Epson 3800

[Edalongthepacific]

Just thought I would give credit where credit was due. I haven't printed in about three months so I thought I would dust off the 3800 and take it for a "ride." I had some photos taken with a Canon Mark ll using a very nice Canon variable 24 - 70 lens. I did some adjusting in Lightroom 3 to add black, reduce some color noise, adjust exposure and brighten somewhat in "Luminescence." Used Photoshop CS5 just to brighten again using curves and to sharpen. I sharpen at least twice. The picture, I believe, should look like it is at the brink of over sharpening in the printer's preview. Well the 3800 printed a couple of 13 X 19 that were to die for. Colors were wonderful and detail amazing. I use "Photoshop Manages Colors" and "Relative Chromatic" with "Black Point Compensation." I didn't use "Finest Detail" as per LL suggestions and I believe this helped. CS5's 3800 Proof is spot on. My Spyder2PRO works fine in Windows 7. I don't pay much attention to sending just the right number of pixels or just the right size to the printer. I can't imagine how any photo could get better. It was just like being there, in the museum, staring at my favorite Greek vase and going wow! its over 2,000 years old. Slap me silly...sometines all the technology really does work and work well!

[Aristoc]

This is why it is sometimes a good idea to wait a few months before you edit and print your photos. A fresh look at  them can help a lot. Going back to some of your other photos from long ago may be an eye opener too.

[Ken Bennett]

I, too, am thrilled every time I send a photo to my 3800 and get a terrific print. It may not have the same feel of watching the image come up in the developer in the old analog darkroom, but it's a great feeling nonetheless.

[Jeremy Roussak]

I, too, am thrilled every time I send a photo to my 3800 and get a terrific print. It may not have the same feel of watching the image come up in the developer in the old analog darkroom, but it's a great feeling nonetheless.

I agree entirely. I still miss the darkroom experience, though.

Jeremy

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

I, too, love my 3800, especially compared to the 2200 that preceded it. Sturdy, reliable, gives great results!

As for bringing the darkroom ambiance into the digital era, here are my suggestions:
1.   Keep a tray of fixer near the printer so you can smell the good, nostalgic, toxic aromas, and
2.   Dim the room lights while printing, and slowly turn them up after the print is finished, so you can pretend you're watching it come up in the developer. Tilting an empty tray back and forth a bit while bringing the lights up might add to the illusion.

Eric

[RFPhotography]

Glad to hear a 3800 is getting 'dusted off'.  It's a very good printer, no question.  While the new UC inks in the x900 models are stunning, the 'old' K3 inks are pretty damned good.  FWIW, I never worry about Finest Detail either.  Never been a problem.  Enjoy it.  And use it more!

[Jeremy Roussak]

I, too, love my 3800, especially compared to the 2200 that preceded it. Sturdy, reliable, gives great results!

As for bringing the darkroom ambiance into the digital era, here are my suggestions:
1.   Keep a tray of fixer near the printer so you can smell the good, nostalgic, toxic aromas, and
2.   Dim the room lights while printing, and slowly turn them up after the print is finished, so you can pretend you're watching it come up in the developer. Tilting an empty tray back and forth a bit while bringing the lights up might add to the illusion.

Eric

Now you mention it, I think I still have a red darkroom light lying around somewhere. Possibly some fix as well: it'll be very old but I gather the bouquet just improves with time.

Jeremy

[RHPS]

Not sure about the fix, but I do appreciate the bouquet of the Harman FB Al. The first time I opened a box I had a brief moment of panic because it smelled exactly like the Ilford MG Fibre that I used to use in the darkroom. Really nice that you can't fog this modern stuff!

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

Really nice that you can't fog this modern stuff!

You mean I don't need to open inkjet papers under a dark amber safelight???

[teddillard]

This thread made me really, really happy!   

Sometimes its easy to forget how good we have it today, in spite of the long, painful trip... 

[Eric Myrvaagnes]

This thread made me really, really happy!   

Sometimes its easy to forget how good we have it today, in spite of the long, painful trip... 

+10!

[Rhossydd]

Yes, it's easy to forget just for far colour photography has progressed in the last 15 years.

Those people whinging about how difficult colour management is ought to be taken back to 1990 and told to try and make a colour print in a darkroom.

[Mark D Segal]

I also truly like the results I get from my Epson 3800; as well, it is definitely the best behaved Epson printer I've owned since I started buying archival printers (the Epson 2000P) in 1999. In 10 short years the quality improvement in every respect is nothing short of breath-taking, notwithstanding the recent pot-holes with colour management processes described elsewhere in these forums.

[Rhossydd]

notwithstanding the recent pot-holes with colour management processes described elsewhere in these forums.

The "pot holes" have only effected the minority of users that are using Macs and want to build custom printer profiles.
Most people haven't been bothered by an issues at all. For Windows users it's just got better and better.

[Mark D Segal]

The "pot holes" have only effected the minority of users that are using Macs and want to build custom printer profiles.
Most people haven't been bothered by an issues at all. For Windows users it's just got better and better.

Yes, traditionally the implementation of the Epson driver and the Print interface in Photoshop has been better on Windows. But in respect to printing profiling targets, I think this state of nirvana also changed for Windows users with CS5. And I think one shouldn't under-estimate the number of people on Mac and making their own profiles. It must be a substantial community.

[Rhossydd]

But in respect to printing profiling targets, I think this state of nirvana also changed for Windows users with CS5.

Quite, and who's fault was that ?  
To me it seems pulling NCM from the whole product rather than just the Mac version seems unhelpful to say the least. I'd guess it's down to a lot of development at Adobe being done on Macs still.
Hence the current ACPU debacle of "Well it works as I'd expect on my Mac"
 

And I think one shouldn't under-estimate the number of people on Mac and making their own profiles. It must be a substantial community.

Sure, a greater percentage of Mac users get involved with that in comparison to Windows users, but overall we see substantially more PC users buying custom profiles than Mac users.
Macs have about 10% of the personal computer market overall, but we see 25% of our customers using Macs.

To get back to original subject, not only do we get great results easily now, but the need to have to buy the latest version of programs like Photoshop is diminishing, you can still get great results from older versions or simply cheaper software. We are increasingly seeing our customers not using the latest versions.
That also holds for hardware too, but a lot of people don't always see that.

Paul
www.colourprofiles.com

[Mark D Segal]

Quite, and who's fault was that ?  
To me it seems pulling NCM from the whole product rather than just the Mac version seems unhelpful to say the least. I'd guess it's down to a lot of development at Adobe being done on Macs still.
Hence the current ACPU debacle of "Well it works as I'd expect on my Mac"
 Sure, a greater percentage of Mac users get involved with that in comparison to Windows users, but overall we see substantially more PC users buying custom profiles than Mac users.
Macs have about 10% of the personal computer market overall, but we see 25% of our customers using Macs.

To get back to original subject, not only do we get great results easily now, but the need to have to buy the latest version of programs like Photoshop is diminishing, you can still get great results from older versions or simply cheaper software. We are increasingly seeing our customers not using the latest versions.
That also holds for hardware too, but a lot of people don't always see that.

Paul
www.colourprofiles.com

Paul, increasingly, my sense of all this, and other such CM issues, is that for people like us to identify who is responsible for what part of each train-smash is really very difficult. One needs to be on the inside. The more fundamental issue, I believe, is the inadequacy of technical collaboration amongst the key players in the industry and the inadequacy of resources devoted to testing before systems and products are released. The basic conflict is between cash-flow and technical adequacy; increasingly, the former is determinative. The industry excuse that there is simply too much variety of stuff out there to test everything simply doesn't stand-up to close scrutiny at the higher end of the market where generally speaking customers can be expected to be more demanding. Colour management is wonderful when it works, but until collaboration and testing both improve, there will continue to be an avoidable and unjustifiable level of risk associated with its implementation. If people are not upgrading because they fear this risk, that's fine - it's the best way of delivering to the industry a message they need to hear. Money talks. But it's also unfortunate, because it comes at a cost: the upgrades - particularly of Photoshop - do always have enormously attractive features, which we could only do without when we didn't even know they could exist. :-) And these days, the economy is also probably taking its toll on up-grades, because they are discretionary spending.

[Rhossydd]

Paul, increasingly, my sense of all this, and other such CM issues, is that for people like us to identify who is responsible for what part of each train-smash is really very difficult.

Actually it seems pretty clear to me. Windows colour management systems work as expected and haven't been subject to any disruptive changes. The only recent hiccup is the removal of NCM from PS CS5.
Once Apple had this market almost to themselves and everything worked brilliantly, but now almost every genuine problem* I read with technical colour management difficulties come from Mac users.

The more fundamental issue, I believe, is the inadequacy of technical collaboration amongst the key players in the industry and the inadequacy of resources devoted to testing before systems and products are released.

There seems to be just one key player who has upset the Apple cart here, self inflicted injury from what I see


*Yes, there are basic "I don't understand/how do I learn/can't be bothered to learn" issues that come from beginners, but they're not the difficulties we're discussing here.

[Mark D Segal]

Actually it seems pretty clear to me. Windows colour management systems work as expected and haven't been subject to any disruptive changes. The only recent hiccup is the removal of NCM from PS CS5.
Once Apple had this market almost to themselves and everything worked brilliantly, but now almost every genuine problem* I read with technical colour management difficulties come from Mac users.There seems to be just one key player who has upset the Apple cart here, self inflicted injury from what I see


*Yes, there are basic "I don't understand/how do I learn/can't be bothered to learn" issues that come from beginners, but they're not the difficulties we're discussing here.

I'm very tempted to agree with you, having been a long-time Windows user before I switched to Mac this Fall, and looking at the circumstantial evidence of the sequences of events which have been taking place, as well as who have been the most affected. I strongly suspect that Apple Computer Inc. is at the heart of the much of the difficulties we've been discussing, but of course, being as obtuse and secretive as they are, the details remain unclear, so to say I know for sure, I can't.

[Doyle Yoder]

I'm very tempted to agree with you, having been a long-time Windows user before I switched to Mac this Fall, and looking at the circumstantial evidence of the sequences of events which have been taking place, as well as who have been the most affected. I strongly suspect that Apple Computer Inc. is at the heart of the much of the difficulties we've been discussing, but of course, being as obtuse and secretive as they are, the details remain unclear, so to say I know for sure, I can't.

I suppose you could blame Apple for changing things, moving to a new printing path for 64-bit application. But the real problem is the printer manufactures. They have not updated their drivers or they have not been written correctly. But there is light at the end on the tunnel as now we have examples of drivers (8.x versions) from Epson that do work correctly. Even with CS4 and No Color Management. Lets just hope that light is not the Apple change something again train.

Canon took the approach (at least with the iPF drivers) to use a special casing file that lists the applications that use Apple's new printing path to turn off CM in the driver. That works great until a new application is released that is not listed. ACPU is a prime example. With the older printers iPFx000 and x100, LR 3 and CS5 are not listed. Also when Adobe releases release candidates the put RC in the internal file name which of course in not listed in the special casing file.