how to achieve the darkest possible black in an ICC profile.. exampe canon pro1

[MonsterBaby]

hi community.. i am using hps Z3200 and Z6100 for years.. reagardless people trying to talk me into epsons ;-)

now i needed a A3 desktop printer and decided to go for the canon pro10 .. then pro 1..

and i am not satisfied with the black on matte papers.. fe here HM photo rag.

i did some tests.. turning CM of and printing 0/0/0 patches... the darkest reading i got using the "photo rag" setting.. L 16.7 ...

i built a profile on this using the advanced profiling solution of hp, cuz i can never find any advantage of i1 profiler..

now printig with the profile.. i get the darkest black using relative rendering.. bp compensation.. and get L 17.97

so the question is: why is the darkest available black not in my profile ?..  can i maybe use different patches.. different settings in the software i1 profiler to achieve the darkest possible black of the printer?

my 10yo Z6100 which has never been said to be a fineart printer achieves a black of L14.81 .. haha

thnx for professional ideas

[Phil Indeblanc]

I'm not sure of your numbers you're measuring, but the dye inks HP used as Vivera were the richest blacks I'd seen. Also in the Z series, it is a very deep black.

When pigment was introduced, one of the hurdles was getting a deep black, and they(Epson/Canon/Hp) fixed that on the following rounds of the intro pigment printers. I still have a dye HP with super deep black, but I don't care enough to measure it against my z3200. My eye tells me the z is a very deep black also. So I know what you mean.
I think I have seen just as close a black like the HP with Epsons. Maybe someone measured it and it is even darker, I can't say/?
I don't know if I have seen Canon with such a deep black, as my exposure to Canon prints of such is limited.

To your Q....
Your ICC profile maybe limited by the inkset(?)  I don't know the Canon Pro10 or 1. But it could be the ink set/?
Its the second next place I'd look after a few tests like you're doing.
When I see the black come off the HP, I think to myself "that looks like the 'richest' black I've seen".

Not sure if the above is helpful...Others who have solid tests may be much more help to us both, but you may want to prepare yourself for different expectations.

[bill t.]

I'm not familiar with those particular printers, but one thing that helps a lot with d-max is if you adjust whatever controls your media settings offer for a heavy inkload and run new profiles.  If you go too far with that you will risk smearing and you will may long drying times before handling.  You may also compromise overall image subtlety, which I have noticed is sometimes an issue with manufacturer supplied media definitions.  But that's a way to optimize things for deep blacks.

[MonsterBaby]

thank you two for your input.

of course the z3200 and z6 are both pigment printers as well..

what just doesnt come get into my mind is ... that people tell me for years now that hp has lost the battle ... not doing anything in the fineart market.. epson rules.. now the new canon.. top of the line.. blalabl.. and now i have the darnest newest canon printer... and the output is worse than a 10 yo hp dino .. wth ?

i knwo a lot about profiling.. and the ink laid down .. lin.. blabla.. i cannot tweak the settings in the canon.. the one i chose "photo rag" already by itself has the deepest black.

i wish there was a RIP supporting the pro 1..

the thing just is:

why is the black sent to the printer without profile darker then when i send it thru my profile ??

if i could at least get the darkest black within my profile?

[bill t.]

I will speculate it's something like this:

The darker, non-profiled black is being printed out of gamut.  The printer  has cranked up all the nozzles to the max for RGB zero dots.  The profiled black is the darkest black that can be accurately represented by the printer without clipping any of the RGB values, which may invoke less than the maximum ink deposition that is possible with the printer.

Black is sort of a special case, in that it's outside the range where the eye can easily evaluate the precise color shade of black.  I have sometimes wondered if there might be some advantage to relaxing clipping issues in the very darkest colors in printing profiles, such as by cheating super black patches prepared by some other means over the black patches on profiling targets.  That would create non-linearity in the next up shades of not-quite-black, you might need to be very careful when post processing images for such profiles.

[Phil Indeblanc]

thank you two for your input.

of course the z3200 and z6 are both pigment printers as well..

what just doesnt come get into my mind is ... that people tell me for years now that hp has lost the battle ... not doing anything in the fineart market.. epson rules.. now the new canon.. top of the line.. blalabl.. and now i have the darnest newest canon printer... and the output is worse than a 10 yo hp dino .. wth ?

i knwo a lot about profiling.. and the ink laid down .. lin.. blabla.. i cannot tweak the settings in the canon.. the one i chose "photo rag" already by itself has the deepest black.

i wish there was a RIP supporting the pro 1..

the thing just is:

why is the black sent to the printer without profile darker then when i send it thru my profile ??

if i could at least get the darkest black within my profile?

Yes they are, and from the strat HP had the darkest blacks out the box.
There are rips for the Canon, but have no clue about Canon Pro1/10. There are rips for the IPF series.

It isn't a secret that HP blacks are the richest vs the other printers. Tuning it to be as dark or darker maybe possible, I have no experience on trying that on Canon, and never needed to on HP.
I did a print on bond paper last week to give the MK head working again, and it did ...I was impressed with the black coverage and depth. Very deep and solid, on simple office bond paper.

[MonsterBaby]

its so funny.. for years now people here in germany gossip about hp having left the fineart market and loosing the battle against epson because they are not coming up with anything new..

and realizing the old hp stuff is better then the brand new canon (and prob epson) printers.. why come up with something new if the best has already been invented?.. brr