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Author Topic: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour  (Read 4100 times)

finbred

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Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« on: February 09, 2012, 04:41:38 am »

Hello, this is my first post here.

Last October I got a very good deal for a new SP 4900. It was a huge step up from the old R2400, but 1500 euros (+ tax) with full 200 ml cartridges had me dump my thoughts of the smaller models. And I have big plans, I run a company I own with my brother, who is an artist and making a name for himself. So giglee printing is the main reason for the purchase. But I am an avid photographer, too.

I'm getting fantastic results – and haven't had any clogging issues even though the printer has been seen several weeks of nothing to do since initial prints. But there is something else and I thought I'd ask the good people here before contacting Epson.

I use a Mac Pro/Photoshop CS5 for images and printing. Regarding color management there are 3 possibilities: All printer, printer/Color sync or all Photoshop. If I use the first one, I get pretty good but not quite accurate colors (the system is calibrated but not with top notch equipment/software). The second one mutes colors drastically, I'm not sure why. The third and preferable one gives the best color accuracy but also a problem. When the printer manages color, it prints the job and pushes the paper out after the last drop has reached the paper. But with all work managed by Photoshop the printer works through the whole sheet giving it a very subtle cyan shading OUTSIDE the image printed. From margin to margin. Say I have a watercolor painting on white surface sized A4. Lots of completely white (no color) in it, around the painted subject. When I print it on an A3 sheet, the white stays white within the image area, but the printer sprays cyan on the remaining area. It's very subtle, I can only see it in good light and at an angle – and the drops with a magnifying eye peace of course.

This happens only when Photoshop manages color. I've tried to figure out why and fiddled with setting, but it's always there. But I also never have problems with paper feeding, even when using thicker fine art paper (I prefer cold press natural) which on the other hand happens ALL the time when the printer manages color. Either the printer stops printing half way and reports a jam or simply pushes the paper through without printing anything (and goes back to "Ready" as if nothing strange happened). This happens with all manual feeds available and imaginable (like feeding from the rear opening below the roll paper assembly).

No, neither do I [see any logic in this]. I'll stop here for any of your insights.

Johan B, Finland
« Last Edit: February 09, 2012, 04:50:26 am by finbred »
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Mark D Segal

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #1 on: February 09, 2012, 09:17:01 am »

Two things:

For the best advice on a colour managed workflow I recommend you buy the Reichmann-Schewe Camera to Print video available on this website. It;s great value for money, indeed the best instruction you can find for this issue.

Secondly, the blue fringing, I believe is known as the "scum-dot" issue, and there is already quite a literature - I think somewhere in this discussion forum - about the cause and the remedy. Iif I remember correctly Andrew Rodney has written a fair amount about it.
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Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
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langier

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #2 on: February 09, 2012, 09:59:01 am »

The scum dot problem is caused from custom profiling using v. 4 profiles and for me I have the for the Colormunki and updated software. Rerun your custom profiles as a version 2 profile and the problem is solved.

An easy workaround is to also sieve your output sheet to the size of the sheet with white around the image, wide borders, and print away.  The version 4 saved profiles don't seem quite ready for prime tome and version 2 profiles are totally fine to use.
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finbred

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #3 on: February 10, 2012, 04:47:59 am »

Thank You gentlemen. However, I have no idea what version 4 and 2 profiles mean. Sorry, I just use these machines  :P

I take a photograph of the artwork (Adobe RGB), open it (RAW) in Bridge/Photoshop (don't have LR), clean it up and print it, still in Adobe RGB. I set the Epson Cold Press Natural (straight from their download page) as Printer Profile, Perceptual as intent and BPC on. And that's it. Colors are close enough to what I see on the monitor (8 year old 23" Apple Cinema Display), I'm not very picky. And I get scum dots. So what should I change, exactly? Fiddling with margins seems troublesome and honestly I don't see how that is even done. Or do you mean blowing up the canvas to the size of the sheet? How would that work with roll paper? I have 50 feet of CPN and it seems the printer would scum dot it all the way if I didn't cancel the job...

Humbly,

Johan B
« Last Edit: February 10, 2012, 05:00:18 am by finbred »
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Wayne Fox

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #4 on: February 10, 2012, 05:47:48 pm »

Thank You gentlemen. However, I have no idea what version 4 and 2 profiles mean. Sorry, I just use these machines  :P


When you build a profile with the software, it will create either a version 2 or a version 4 profile.  It is either a setting you will see, or for example with the color munki I believe it's a setting in the programs preferences.  When you build your profile just find where in your software you set it.  Unfortunately some default to version 4, but they all can make a version 2 profile as well.

And I got a nice smile from your typo ... whenever I hear someone describe the term as giclee I "giglee".  Can't help but chuckle ... to avoid using the work inkjet we say this word.  I think in photographer circles it is finally beginning to die (I describe my work as pigment ink on fine art paper) , but art circles it seems to be a little more ingrained.  Can't blame artists that use it if that's the going term for it.
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Mark D Segal

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #5 on: February 10, 2012, 05:53:14 pm »

I think if more people understood what the world means in French they may be slightly less prone to use it. But than again, these days.........:-)
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Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
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Pete Berry

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #6 on: February 10, 2012, 06:17:19 pm »

Thank You gentlemen. However, I have no idea what version 4 and 2 profiles mean. Sorry, I just use these machines  :P

I take a photograph of the artwork (Adobe RGB), open it (RAW) in Bridge/Photoshop (don't have LR), clean it up and print it, still in Adobe RGB. I set the Epson Cold Press Natural (straight from their download page) as Printer Profile, Perceptual as intent and BPC on. And that's it. Colors are close enough to what I see on the monitor (8 year old 23" Apple Cinema Display), I'm not very picky. And I get scum dots. So what should I change, exactly? Fiddling with margins seems troublesome and honestly I don't see how that is even done. Or do you mean blowing up the canvas to the size of the sheet? How would that work with roll paper? I have 50 feet of CPN and it seems the printer would scum dot it all the way if I didn't cancel the job...

Humbly,

Johan B

Setting the canvas size couldn't be more simple. Go to "Image" on the CS5 top bar and drop down to "canvas size". Specify height and width identical to your paper size, and canvas extension color as "white" for no printing on it - or any other color if you want to get creative. That's it. Your image will then display with the white borders, and print without the scum dots.

Pete
« Last Edit: February 10, 2012, 06:23:44 pm by Pete Berry »
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finbred

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #7 on: February 11, 2012, 11:20:32 am »

Thanks, Pete. The files I print are 600 to 1200 dpi. If I blow up the canvas to 17" by 50' even my Mac Pro will fall on it's knees and die. But I know you didn't mean that, nor did you know that I've worked with PS for a living since version 4.0, so I know a few of its tricks  ;)

Wayne, like I wrote, I use Epson's own paper profiles, but I guess they can be just as buggy. Or bucky? Or do my monitor profiles affect printing? I have a Pantone Eye-One for that, though my monitor doesn't give me a lot to play with. But it seems to work, prints are very close.

And yes, the joys of typos. English being my third language doesn't explain this one, giclee just seems to fall, for me, in the category of words the spelling of which I just never seem to remember. S and C give me lots of trouble, when to use which. In Finnish there is only one way to pronounce each letter, the only exception I remeber being that N is pronounced NG in front of a K.

I would gladly call our prints prints, but it would be bad for business. Yes, a fancy name gets you twice the price, so I call them giclees. And yes, I too would find it strange to call photographic prints giclees.
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Pete Berry

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #8 on: February 11, 2012, 07:51:16 pm »

Thanks, Pete. The files I print are 600 to 1200 dpi. If I blow up the canvas to 17" by 50' even my Mac Pro will fall on it's knees and die. But I know you didn't mean that, nor did you know that I've worked with PS for a living since version 4.0, so I know a few of its tricks  ;)


Finbred, I'm wondering if, as your native language is Finnish, what the equivalent of "Canvas Size" is in your Photoshop version. "Canvas", in English language Photoshop, doesn't refer to the woven cotton material, but simply to any medium the image is printed on - a confusing choice when one first encounters it, for sure. "Media Size" would be more appropriate. Are you actually printing on canvas?

So I assume you are specifying a paper (media) size for your roll print - let's say 17x25", with an image size of 15x23", leaving a 1" margin all 'round to be scum-dotted. To avoid this, in the "Canvas Size" dialog, or whatever it's called in the language of your PS version, simply make the size 17x25 (white) - same as media size - to ensure clear margins.

Pete

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finbred

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #9 on: February 12, 2012, 06:47:56 am »

Pete, Adobe doesn't bother with Finnish anymore, and I can understand it wouldn't make any sense economically. There are less than 6 million of Finnish speakers worldwide and not quite all of us use Photoshop. Some prefer Gimp, I guess.

So you can trust me to know the terms used. The thing is, I would want to use CPN on roll for test printing as it's plenty cheaper than sheets, which are of higher weight. Most images we use are small, from 10 to 20 cm (4 to 8 inches) in length and width. I digitise and test print a dozen or so images at a time. To get the colors right I need to print each image 2 to 6 times. This would be fast and easy without the scum dot problem as I could print on the same sheet (I now cut sheets from the roll - very curly ones) up to 20 times by simply repositioning the artwork in the print dialog's layout view to an unused spot. And the printer would stop printing and eject the sheet right after the last drop of ink for the actual image. Yes, I can do the same when I've set the canvas size to match the media size with the image on a layer. I could even place several images on their own layers in a single file and use show/hide to print what I want. BUT. At 600 to 1200 dpi the file size will go through the roof because even white space counts. That sloooows things down a LOT. Slower is badder. But if there really is no other way...
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Pete Berry

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #10 on: February 12, 2012, 01:22:01 pm »

Pete, Adobe doesn't bother with Finnish anymore, and I can understand it wouldn't make any sense economically. There are less than 6 million of Finnish speakers worldwide and not quite all of us use Photoshop. Some prefer Gimp, I guess.

So you can trust me to know the terms used. The thing is, I would want to use CPN on roll for test printing as it's plenty cheaper than sheets, which are of higher weight. Most images we use are small, from 10 to 20 cm (4 to 8 inches) in length and width. I digitise and test print a dozen or so images at a time. To get the colors right I need to print each image 2 to 6 times. This would be fast and easy without the scum dot problem as I could print on the same sheet (I now cut sheets from the roll - very curly ones) up to 20 times by simply repositioning the artwork in the print dialog's layout view to an unused spot. And the printer would stop printing and eject the sheet right after the last drop of ink for the actual image. Yes, I can do the same when I've set the canvas size to match the media size with the image on a layer. I could even place several images on their own layers in a single file and use show/hide to print what I want. BUT. At 600 to 1200 dpi the file size will go through the roof because even white space counts. That sloooows things down a LOT. Slower is badder. But if there really is no other way...


Ahhh, the problem is finally clarified - printing multiple very high-res small images with different positioning, and multiple passes, on a large sheet giving an impractibly huge canvas at the sam res.

It looks like you need to get up to speed on the paper profile version issue with Macs noted above to solve the problem. I'm a Windows Vista user, and the profile version appears in the PS print screen at the end of the "Printer Profile" choice you selected from the dropdown - either V2 or V4 when printer chosen to manage colors. If yours is a V4, then this probably the problem, and no doubt is a custom profile. Do you create your own paper profiles or have them created?

Pete
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finbred

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #11 on: February 12, 2012, 02:26:42 pm »

I use Epson's own paper profiles, but I guess they can be just as buggy. Or bucky? Or do my monitor profiles affect printing? I have a Pantone Eye-One for that, though my monitor doesn't give me a lot to play with. But it seems to work, prints are very close.
I've downloaded printer and paper specific profiles from Epson's website. I'm at home on an iPad, but I'll do some research on the profiles tomorrow at work.
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finbred

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #12 on: February 13, 2012, 12:11:38 pm »

Here is the info on the paper profile I use:
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Pete Berry

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #13 on: February 14, 2012, 02:14:05 pm »

Here is the info on the paper profile I use:


I would assume from that it's a V2 (2.4). Here's a link to a past thread that discusses the very confusing Mac/scum dot problem, which seems to apply to only some V4 profile generators:

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/forum/index.php?topic=48860.0

Good luck!

Pete
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elolaugesen

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #14 on: February 14, 2012, 04:05:00 pm »

I use a 3800   and  had the same problem with the greyish/cyan all around the image.  
I tested and tested and came up with two workarounds.  (posts here on this site and on apple forums)

1.  stopped using all 2.4 profiles generated by xrite software.
          then bought Data color's spyder3prnt using 2.0 profiles and have never had a problem since

2.  Noted the 2.4 profiles worked perfectly with Lightroom and wondered why??   guess what lightroom changes the border of the paper to the size of the image and the problem does not occur
      I then changed my paper border to the image size and no more problems with PSE or CS5.    Likewise using the canvas option the problem also disappeared.

finally I did get some 2.0 profiles generated by colorvision software and guess what???   no problems....  also red river paper uses 2.0   etc.......

Now the really interesting thing is that all the 2.4 profiles supplied as standard by Epson   work perfectly.   but they do not work with my papers......

The company providing me with my profiles and paper happened to leave on their site an old profiles for one of my papers.  2.0 and it also worked perfectly as soon as they went to 2.4 problems....


cheers elo  
« Last Edit: February 14, 2012, 04:07:11 pm by elolaugesen »
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finbred

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Re: Epson 4900 - strange behaviour
« Reply #15 on: February 15, 2012, 04:34:07 am »

Here's a link to a past thread that discusses the very confusing Mac/scum dot problem, which seems to apply to only some V4 profile generators:
Good luck!
Pete

Thank you for the link. And for the wishes. It now indeed seems to come down to luck and I'm not having much. I've tested using other Epson profiles, like ones for Velvet Fine Art and Watercolor BW – no scum dot, although the print head goes through the whole sheet. But with the profile for my choice of paper, the CPN, the pain continues. Tried the CPB profile, same problem.

I have Eye-one Match3, but only for monitor calibration, so I guess I'm stuck without further investment or I need to see if using a no-scum-producing profile works well enough.
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