[**Note that this bug appears to be fixed by the Apple MacOSX 10.6.3 update released on the 29th March 2010**]
In December 2008, I started to encounter problems creating profiles for my Epson Stylus Pro 7900. After some experimentation I thought I had a resolution. However it seems that others may not be having the same negative experiences so I am now having some doubts and hence this post.
When the ESP 7900 arrived I also upgraded to Mac PhotoShop CS4 and this is when my profiling problems started. I wondered if the PhotoShop CS4 ABW problems reported on the Adobe forums and elsewhere might be related in some way. This lead me to devise a test methodology as follows.
- To save paper and ink costs and also time I used just one strip of patches from the i1Match 918 chart and used Enhanced Matte paper for all the comparisons. My reasoning was that I only wanted to compare different software and hardware combinations and printing full charts would be wasteful and unnecessary.
- The test strip consisted of patches A7 to A17 from the i1Match 918 test chart.
- I printed the strip using various versions of PhotoShop on Windows and Mac.
- Colour management was disabled both in PhotoShop and the print driver.
- Each strip printed twice, one with Velvet Fine Art media setting and the other with Water-colour Paper Radiant White media setting.
- Matte black ink was used on the ESP 7900.
- The default printer was set to the ESP 7900.
The following 'Table A' results were different from the 'Table B' results. In particular patches A17, A15 and A11 were visibly and subtly different.
Table A:
(All results correct and identical in this table)
MacOSX 10.6.8 + CS4 + Epson driver v8.64 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync). Intel Mac. (2010-08-09)
MacOSX 10.6.8 + CS4 + Epson driver v6.55 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync). Intel Mac. (2010-08-07)
MacOSX 10.6.4 + CS4 + Epson driver v6.55 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.6.3 + CS4 + Epson driver v6.55 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync). Intel Mac. [Bug appears fixed by the MacOSX 10.6.3 update.]
MacOSX 10.6.4 + CS1 + Epson driver v6.55 (driver Color Matching set to Epson Color Controls). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.6.3 + CS1 + Epson driver v6.55 (driver Color Matching set to Epson Color Controls). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.5.8 + CS1 + Epson Europe driver v6.55 (driver Color Matching set to Epson Color Controls). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.5.6 + CS1 + Epson Europe driver v6.39 (driver Color Matching set to Epson Color Controls). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.5.6 + CS1 + Epson Europe driver v6.39 (driver Color Matching set to Epson Color Controls). PowerMac.
MacOSX 10.5.6 + CS1 + Epson USA driver v6.35 (driver Color Matching set to Epson Color Controls). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.6 + i1Match + Epson driver v6.55. (driver Color Matching set to Epson Color Controls). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.5.6 + i1Match + Epson Europe driver v6.39. PowerMac.
Windows XP + CS2.
Windows XP + CS4.
Table B:
(All results incorrect in this table)
MacOSX 10.6.0 + CS4 + Epson driver v6.55 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync) Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.5.6 + CS4 + Epson Europe driver v6.39 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.5.6 + CS4 + Epson Europe driver v6.39 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync). PowerMac.
MacOSX 10.5.6 + CS4 + Epson USA driver v6.35 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync). Intel Mac.
MacOSX 10.5.6 + CS4 + Epson USA driver v6.35 (driver Color Matching locked to ColorSync). PowerMac.
Colorwiki suggests manually changing the default profile to Generic RGB in the devices section of the Apple ColorSync Utility but this didn't help.
(
http://www.colorwiki.com/wiki/Tech_Support_Grab_Bag )
I then tried manually changing the ColorSync Utility default profile to match the media setting and in both cases the results matched the charts printed from the other versions of OS and PhotoShop.
Note that this problem has only occurred when disabling colour management in both PhotoShop and the print driver in order to print the test charts. Normal printing with colour management enabled in PhotoShop CS4 seems to be ok.
So is this test methodology sound?
And what are other peoples experiences?
Thanks,
Ryan
Edit 1: Added test result for Epson USA driver on Intel Mac and titied up the result tables.
Edit 2: Added two more test results including i1Match. (The 918 charts were modified in the i1Match chart folder so as to just print the single strip in the same way as with PhotoShop.). Fixed some typos.
Edit 3: Added print driver Color Matching settings on MacOSX.
Edit 4: Added more details of the test strip.
Edit 5: Added results for 7900 Mac driver 6.55
Edit 6: Added results for the Apple MacOSX 10.6.3 update released on the 29th March 2010. This bug appears to be finally fixed a whole 15 months after the bug was first discovered!
Edit 7: Added results for the Apple MacOSX 10.6.4
Edit 8: Added results for the Apple MacOSX 10.6.8 with Epson driver 6.55 (2010-08-07)
Edit 9: Added results for the Apple MacOSX 10.6.8 with Epson driver 8.64 (2010-08-09)