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Author Topic: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up  (Read 32176 times)

NickCroken

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Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« on: August 12, 2011, 10:10:22 pm »

Hey Everyone,
I just ran into and issue that I have never seen before when printing.   My cyans/blues are blocking up and posterizing out of nowhere.  I have printed the same file (twice the size) before with no issues.  My substrate has remained the same and I've tried creating a new profile for the substrate as that was suggested by a friend.  That did not work.  I've tried shaking the cyan cartridge and tried more test prints.  I have changed the cyan cartridge recently, is it possible that a bad cartridge could cause an issue like this?  The issue was also apparent when I tried printing on a gloss paper instead of the canvas.

I have a ton of printing that needs to be finished by this weekend and this is really killing me!  Please help if possible!

Thank you very much,
Nick
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cybis

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #1 on: August 12, 2011, 10:23:34 pm »

Some thoughts:

Noozle check.
Driver media type selection.
Paper config>color density
proper icc workflow.
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NickCroken

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #2 on: August 12, 2011, 10:30:08 pm »

Hi Cybis, thank you for your reply.  I suppose I should have mentioned that the nozzle check turned out perfectly.  I tried that a couple of times before reprofiling the substrate.  Everything else is printing well except for the cyans. 
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ErikKaffehr

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #3 on: August 13, 2011, 03:18:28 am »

Hi!

Seems to be posterisation? Are you using printer profiles? If so do you have the correct profile, and have you shut down color management in the printer driver?

Sorry, no better ideas here!

Best regards
Erik

Hey Everyone,
I just ran into and issue that I have never seen before when printing.   My cyans/blues are blocking up and posterizing out of nowhere.  I have printed the same file (twice the size) before with no issues.  My substrate has remained the same and I've tried creating a new profile for the substrate as that was suggested by a friend.  That did not work.  I've tried shaking the cyan cartridge and tried more test prints.  I have changed the cyan cartridge recently, is it possible that a bad cartridge could cause an issue like this?  The issue was also apparent when I tried printing on a gloss paper instead of the canvas.

I have a ton of printing that needs to be finished by this weekend and this is really killing me!  Please help if possible!

Thank you very much,
Nick
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Erik Kaffehr
 

Farmer

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #4 on: August 13, 2011, 03:38:30 am »

We need to see all your driver settings.  Also, have you tried using a canned profile (even if it's not an exact match for the media that you're using)?
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Phil Brown

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #5 on: August 13, 2011, 04:06:08 am »

Agree with the others, this does not appear to be a problem with the printer, but seems to be something you inadvertently changed in your workflow.  I know you stated you checked it, but if it was the printer, you should see all kinds of problems with all kinds of prints.
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NickCroken

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #6 on: August 13, 2011, 10:12:46 am »

I have tried using an older profile and the results were the same. Which driver settings would you like to see?
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NickCroken

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #7 on: August 13, 2011, 10:25:30 am »

Here are the settings that I have been using for printing.  Nothing has changed in the last few months.  The only thing that I've changed was a new cyan cartridge recently.  I believe I may have a faulty cartridge due to it only be the blues and cyans that are affected by this problem.  I did a large print with quite a bit of blue in it two days ago and it was fine.  Could it be possible that the old, good cyan ink, was still in the lines and now that that ink has been used up the faulty ink is coming through. 
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cybis

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #8 on: August 13, 2011, 01:02:46 pm »

Are you 100% sure all nozzles are firing correctly? The nozzle test pattern may appear fine except the cyan on the far left of the pattern is  missing completely and goes unnoticed. (far fetched, I know...)
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davidh202

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #9 on: August 13, 2011, 01:05:10 pm »

This may not make a big difference, but if you are using Epson Canvas you should have the drive set to Watercolor paper Radient white,
not the generic 'canvas'

   I  Also believe that 'posterization' is a file or workflow issue, not a printer issue.
« Last Edit: August 13, 2011, 01:10:09 pm by davidh202 »
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NickCroken

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #10 on: August 13, 2011, 01:08:30 pm »

Hi Cybis,
The nozzle check appears to be ok.  Also, David, I will reprofile my canvas with the correct setting once I get this issue resolved.  I do not think that setting pertains to this issue as it behaves the same whether printed on canvas or paper :S.
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cybis

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #11 on: August 13, 2011, 01:50:52 pm »

Hi Cybis,
The nozzle check appears to be ok.  Also, David, I will reprofile my canvas with the correct setting once I get this issue resolved.  I do not think that setting pertains to this issue as it behaves the same whether printed on canvas or paper :S.

Arg, my far fetched theory didn't even apply to the 9880. Do you see the same issue when printing on epson paper with canned epson profile and the correct media type selection? same issue printing from qimage, LR, PS?
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davidh202

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #12 on: August 13, 2011, 05:49:39 pm »

Nick, as I said I really didn't think the canvas setting was the root cause of your problem.
I have been rechecking my my library of printing and CS5 books and can only come up with lower bit depth in the file, and abrupt changes in curves adjustments in edits, as  two possible reasons for posterization.I still think it is a file issue especially if different file prints ok.If it was the printer, I'd believe you'd be experiencing problems with other files also. Someone else asked if you tried printing outside of Qimage itself?

Since it is happening with both your original and custom profile I wonder if your file has been corrupted in some way.
I'd open the file in PS and see what your file attributes are.
A process of elimination is the only answer to get to the heart of the problem and if the printer is giving you ok prints from other files and a good nozzle check I think you can safely rule it out as the cause.
 
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Farmer

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #13 on: August 13, 2011, 07:21:09 pm »

Hmmm - image original resolution is 1920x1170?  Am I reading that right?  That's a 2.2MP image.  What size are you printing to?  I know you've said you've printed it to twice the size previously (twice the current output size, I assume?), but it would still help to know.

Also, have you tried just printing through the Epson driver - say from Photoshop or Acrobat - and remove Qimage from the workflow?

It's a process of elimination, but a the moment I'm focussed on your output size and then it could come down to settings in Qimage for on-the-fly resizing - as I said, that's a pretty small image.
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Phil Brown

davidh202

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #14 on: August 13, 2011, 08:43:14 pm »

I just noticed in the Screen capture -Qimage job properties box  you have  
1-no setting chosen for a printer ICC profile
2- resolution OFF
3- interpolation OFF.
That won't work!
You have to tell Qimage what you want it to do and you have everything turned off ???
I think there lies your problem, if you are trying to print through Qimage!
The Thumbs indicate the 'Blues Test' file is a TiFF, why is it getting changed to a Jpeg?
You could also be suffering from Jpeg compression of the files!

« Last Edit: August 13, 2011, 11:19:15 pm by davidh202 »
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Rhossydd

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #15 on: August 14, 2011, 04:22:20 am »

I just noticed in the Screen capture
There's nothing wrong with those screen captures, do you use Qimage ? if so, you'd know you need to select options via dialogue boxes before they show in the main program panel.
The first screenshot shows a reasonable set of options being chosen, the second one shows those options selected in Qimage and a reasonable set of printer driver options. TIFs files are shown selected into the print queue, so I can't see where you getting the idea that they're being converted to JPGs from.

I don't think there's anything wrong with the settings shown in the screenshots, the problem lies elsewhere.

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Garnick

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #16 on: August 14, 2011, 10:54:27 am »

Hello Nick,

I know this will probably sound rather far fetched, but I had this problem with my 7600 printers a while back. Mostly I'm using the 9900 of course, but occasionally still use one of the 7600s for a specific job. When I have been using the 9900, for convenience sake I set it as the Default Printer. If I change over to the 7600 the prints will always show posterisation. It took me a while to figure that one out at first. Tried everything I could think of accept the obvious and ultimately the easiest. I set the 7600 to be the Default Printer and that immediately solved the problem. Not sure why, nor do I care. However, I now have a notification on the 7600 to remind me to change it before printing and then back again to the 9900 when finished. If you do have printers of different vintages in operation it might be a good idea to make sure the 9880 is your Default Printer when using it. I'm sure you have probably already checked that possibility, but in case you haven't it takes only a few seconds to do so.

Good luck,
Gary     
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Gary N.
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davidh202

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #17 on: August 14, 2011, 12:10:15 pm »

You of course are right on the Jpeg issue I was looking at the screen shot file and had the my view scrolled over and missed the Tif on the very left in the Queue log.
on the other settings in the Job properties box I quote the Qimage help file\....

Section I: The Basics

Example 1: Setting Qimage to Produce Maximum Quality Prints

 Click the "Printer Setup" tool button. Select your photo printer and click "Properties" for the printer, making sure that your printer driver settings are set to the highest quality photo settings and select the appropriate media type/size (photo glossy, etc).
 Click the "Job Properties" tab on the lower right of the main window and  make sure that your "Interp." method is set to "Hybrid".  Also make sure that your first "Res" value (output resolution for prints) is set to "Max" and the second Res value (output resolution for posters) is set to "High".      Still on the "Job Properties" tab, leave "Prtr ICC" set to "OFF" if you do not have a custom printer ICC profile for the printer, paper, and ink you are using. If you have obtained or created an accurate ICC profile for your printer and the type of media you are using, activate that profile in "Prtr ICC". Before activating any profile, make sure you know the proper print driver settings to use with the profile because an ICC profile will only work properly with specific print driver settings. See the Color Management section for more details.
 Finally, on the "Job Properties" tab, make sure that all checkboxes are not checked. This will ensure that no borders or text information are printed with your prints, and will ensure that no global or print filter is active that may affect the appearance of prints.

Nick has all 3  of those boxes set to OFF
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Rhossydd

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #18 on: August 14, 2011, 12:40:30 pm »

Nick has all 3  of those boxes set to OFF
Good spot.
Yes, settings the print res and interpolation to something more useful would be a good diagnosic step. (not sure if the poster setting is improtant, but ti wouldn't harm things to match it with the print res).

As an aside; it's always worth saving a favourite configuration for re-use in Qimage.
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davidh202

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Re: Please help!! Very Urgent! Epson 9880 colours blocking up
« Reply #19 on: August 14, 2011, 03:43:28 pm »

Good spot.
 As an aside; it's always worth saving a favourite configuration for re-use in Qimage.

Not to take this thread OT, but yes ...One of the best features of Qimage is being able to save Printer Configuratons,settings, Templates, Jobs,etc for instant recall.
In the beginning I quite often overlooked making the printer ICC Profile changes for different papers in the Job properties menu boxes.
David

I hope Nick has figured out his problem and was successful in getting the work done.!

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