problem with printing from cs4

i have recently re-installed cs4 and all of a sudden when printing with my epson 3800 all the colors are 'off'; i have re-installed cs4, re-installed the 3800 driver, re- calibrated my eizo monito (eye-one) and still the colors are off. interestingly enough when i print using 'rgb 1998' as my printer profile, instead of the re-downloaded icc's (for several different types of paper) the color is quite good.

what happened and what do i do so i can go back to using the dedicated (from the companies) icc profiles?

tia

steve

On Wed, 04 Nov 2009 22:10:53 -0800, wrote:

i have recently re-installed cs4 and all of a sudden when printing with my epson 3800 all the colors are 'off'; i have re-installed cs4, re-installed the 3800 driver, re- calibrated my eizo monito (eye-one) and still the colors are off. interestingly enough when i print using 'rgb 1998' as my printer profile, instead of the re-downloaded icc's (for several different types of paper) the color is quite good.
what happened and what do i do so i can go back to using the dedicated (from the companies) icc profiles?

In what way are the colors off - are they too saturated, too red, too light, too dark, etc?

Are you on a Macintosh or Windows? On the Mac, there are recent problems involving Snow Leopard, CS4, and certain Epson printers.

Here's an article by Eric Chan from earlier this year that deals with setting up your model of printer using PS CS2, perhaps it will be of some help.
< http://people.csail.mit.edu/ericchan/dp/Epson3800/printworkf low.html#display_calibration> or
http://preview.tinyurl.com/yfkf44p
--
Mike Russell - http://www.curvemeister.com

Have you overlooked simple things like setting up the color preferences in Photoshop?
Have you turned off color management in the printer driver?

yep did all those things ...

i even re-installed cs3 - same problem ... the prints are great as long as i'm using 'adobe 1998' as my paper driver ...but all other icc's give strange colors ...

i'm resigned to reinstalling everything on the hard drive and keep checking as i reinstall to see if some program is getting in the way :-( ...

steve

On Thu, 5 Nov 2009 16:20:14 -0800, "lebouef"
wrote:

Have you overlooked simple things like setting up the color preferences in Photoshop?
Have you turned off color management in the printer driver?

wrote:

yep did all those things ...

i even re-installed cs3 - same problem ... the prints are great as long as i'm using 'adobe 1998' as my paper driver ...but all other icc's give strange colors ...

That sounds very much like you have 'AdobeRGB' set in the printer driver rather than 'No Color Adjustment'.

--
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

unfortunately it is not that simple and it seems that while i am using windows some mac folks are having the same problem

http://luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/solving.shtml

steve

On Fri, 6 Nov 2009 11:25:33 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

yep did all those things ...

i even re-installed cs3 - same problem ... the prints are great as long as i'm using 'adobe 1998' as my paper driver ...but all other icc's give strange colors ...

That sounds very much like you have 'AdobeRGB' set in the printer driver rather than 'No Color Adjustment'.

wrote:

On Fri, 6 Nov 2009 11:25:33 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

yep did all those things ...

i even re-installed cs3 - same problem ... the prints are great as long as i'm using 'adobe 1998' as my paper driver ...but all other icc's give strange colors ...

That sounds very much like you have 'AdobeRGB' set in the printer driver rather than 'No Color Adjustment'.

unfortunately it is not that simple and it seems that while i am using windows some mac folks are having the same problem

http://luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/solving.shtml

Maybe you find it a consolation that Mac users can have problems too, but your problem bears no resemblance to this. The link you gave is about *making* your own profiles, your problem is about *using* profiles you *didn't* make yourself, if I'm not mistaken.

Always try to analyze a problem step by step: You say that *all* profiles give bad results, *except* when you use AdobeRGB as profile. That means that the printer driver must be doing something with the colors, and that it expects to receive AdobeRGB colors. If it does receive AdobeRGB, all is well. If it doesn't, colors are wrong.

--
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

just for fun i took a new hard drive and put just windows xp pro and photoshop cs3, with no updates to either program ....still having the problem

and today created a new image in cs4 and can't even get a good print using adobe 1998 as the printer driver ...

well this is saving me some paper (as i've stopped printing) but i'm an unhappy camper ...

steve

On Sun, 8 Nov 2009 11:42:57 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

On Fri, 6 Nov 2009 11:25:33 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

yep did all those things ...

i even re-installed cs3 - same problem ... the prints are great as long as i'm using 'adobe 1998' as my paper driver ...but all other icc's give strange colors ...

That sounds very much like you have 'AdobeRGB' set in the printer driver rather than 'No Color Adjustment'.

unfortunately it is not that simple and it seems that while i am using windows some mac folks are having the same problem

http://luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/solving.shtml

Maybe you find it a consolation that Mac users can have problems too, but your problem bears no resemblance to this. The link you gave is about *making* your own profiles, your problem is about *using* profiles you *didn't* make yourself, if I'm not mistaken.

Always try to analyze a problem step by step: You say that *all* profiles give bad results, *except* when you use AdobeRGB as profile. That means that the printer driver must be doing something with the colors, and that it expects to receive AdobeRGB colors. If it does receive AdobeRGB, all is well. If it doesn't, colors are wrong.

Steve, I've been following this conversation, and I think the eventual solution will be in line with what Johan has been suggesting. You're obviously going to a large amount of effort to solve this problem. You may prefer to approach the problem in your own way, but what is missing from the conversation, and what IMHO would help us to solve your problem more effectively would be something along these lines:

1) Can you describe in what way are the prints "not good" are they too dark, too light, lacking in color, too much of a particular color, too much color all around?

2) Can you print from other programs, such as Explorer or FireFox, and do the colors look OK?
--
Mike Russell - http://www.curvemeister.com

On Sun, 08 Nov 2009 22:24:10 -0800, wrote:

just for fun i took a new hard drive and put just windows xp pro and photoshop cs3, with no updates to either program ....still having the problem

and today created a new image in cs4 and can't even get a good print using adobe 1998 as the printer driver ...

well this is saving me some paper (as i've stopped printing) but i'm an unhappy camper ...

steve

On Sun, 8 Nov 2009 11:42:57 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

On Fri, 6 Nov 2009 11:25:33 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

yep did all those things ...

i even re-installed cs3 - same problem ... the prints are great as long as i'm using 'adobe 1998' as my paper driver ...but all other icc's give strange colors ...

That sounds very much like you have 'AdobeRGB' set in the printer

driver

rather than 'No Color Adjustment'.

unfortunately it is not that simple and it seems that while i am using windows some mac folks are having the same problem

http://luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/solving.shtml

Maybe you find it a consolation that Mac users can have problems too, but your problem bears no resemblance to this. The link you gave is about *making* your own profiles, your problem is about *using* profiles you *didn't* make yourself, if I'm not mistaken.

Always try to analyze a problem step by step: You say that *all* profiles give bad results, *except* when you use AdobeRGB as profile. That means that the printer driver must be doing something with the colors, and that it expects to receive AdobeRGB colors. If it does receive AdobeRGB, all is well. If it doesn't, colors are wrong.

hi all ...

i finally did the following:

1) took a virgin hard drive and installed just windows xp, the epson 3800 printer driver and cs3 - nothing else, no updates on anything

still problems in the sense that dark reds became orange, dark greens became light greens

2) called epson and they had me use the epson to control the printing and set my icc's by setting the 'mode' to custom, drop down box to "icm" and then clicking on advanced and then clicking on 'show all profiles' and finally picking the paper profile in the box "printer profile" ...whew!

what this means is ...the epson controls the printing and i get to pick the paper profile for the epson controlled printing instead of photoshop controls the printing...

bingo! essentially perfect ....

so ....the problem is with photoshop ... now ...i'm hoping someone from photoshop will call me back - i called the script kiddies in india last week "we'll get back to you" ...

if anyone has any contacts at adobe ....

steve emmet

On Mon, 9 Nov 2009 00:30:53 -0800, Mike Russell
wrote:

Steve, I've been following this conversation, and I think the eventual solution will be in line with what Johan has been suggesting. You're obviously going to a large amount of effort to solve this problem. You may prefer to approach the problem in your own way, but what is missing from the conversation, and what IMHO would help us to solve your problem more effectively would be something along these lines:

1) Can you describe in what way are the prints "not good" are they too dark, too light, lacking in color, too much of a particular color, too much color all around?

2) Can you print from other programs, such as Explorer or FireFox, and do the colors look OK?

Hi Steve,

Glad to see that you solved the problem, finally, and thanks for sharing the solution with us. At this point, you certainly owe your self a while you print away to your hearts content.

If, at some point, you want to experiment further, you should be able to get the same result by turning off color management in the Epson driver, having Photoshop manage the colors, and having Photoshop print using the Epson paper profile.

--
Mike Russell - http://www.curvemeister.com

On Mon, 09 Nov 2009 22:32:32 -0800, wrote:

hi all ...

i finally did the following:

1) took a virgin hard drive and installed just windows xp, the epson 3800 printer driver and cs3 - nothing else, no updates on anything
still problems in the sense that dark reds became orange, dark greens became light greens

2) called epson and they had me use the epson to control the printing and set my icc's by setting the 'mode' to custom, drop down box to "icm" and then clicking on advanced and then clicking on 'show all profiles' and finally picking the paper profile in the box "printer profile" ...whew!

what this means is ...the epson controls the printing and i get to pick the paper profile for the epson controlled printing instead of photoshop controls the printing...

bingo! essentially perfect ....

so ....the problem is with photoshop ... now ...i'm hoping someone from photoshop will call me back - i called the script kiddies in india last week "we'll get back to you" ...

if anyone has any contacts at adobe ....

steve emmet

On Mon, 9 Nov 2009 00:30:53 -0800, Mike Russell
wrote:

Steve, I've been following this conversation, and I think the eventual solution will be in line with what Johan has been suggesting. You're obviously going to a large amount of effort to solve this problem. You

may

prefer to approach the problem in your own way, but what is missing from the conversation, and what IMHO would help us to solve your problem more effectively would be something along these lines:

1) Can you describe in what way are the prints "not good" are they too dark, too light, lacking in color, too much of a particular color, too

much

color all around?

2) Can you print from other programs, such as Explorer or FireFox, and do the colors look OK?

wrote:

hi all ...

i finally did the following:

1) took a virgin hard drive and installed just windows xp, the epson 3800 printer driver and cs3 - nothing else, no updates on anything
still problems in the sense that dark reds became orange, dark greens became light greens

2) called epson and they had me use the epson to control the printing and set my icc's by setting the 'mode' to custom, drop down box to "icm" and then clicking on advanced and then clicking on 'show all profiles' and finally picking the paper profile in the box "printer profile" ...whew!

what this means is ...the epson controls the printing and i get to pick the paper profile for the epson controlled printing instead of photoshop controls the printing...

bingo! essentially perfect ....

so ....the problem is with photoshop ... now ...i'm hoping someone from photoshop will call me back - i called the script kiddies in india last week "we'll get back to you" ...

if anyone has any contacts at adobe ....

No, I think the problem is NOT with Photoshop. It's in the printer driver, which you clearly demonstrated yourself. If Photoshop does the color management, the printer driver should do NOTHING to the colors. Normally, you can instruct it to do nothing by choosing 'No Color Management' in the Advanced options. If you still have some profile selected in the printer driver (like you just described), any profile, you are using the wrong settings for the 'Photoshop manages color' option. If you did choose 'No Color Management', the printer driver somehow seems to override that choice.

--
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

Johan W. Elzenga wrote:

wrote:

hi all ...

i finally did the following:

1) took a virgin hard drive and installed just windows xp, the epson 3800 printer driver and cs3 - nothing else, no updates on anything
still problems in the sense that dark reds became orange, dark greens became light greens

2) called epson and they had me use the epson to control the printing and set my icc's by setting the 'mode' to custom, drop down box to "icm" and then clicking on advanced and then clicking on 'show all profiles' and finally picking the paper profile in the box "printer profile" ...whew!

what this means is ...the epson controls the printing and i get to pick the paper profile for the epson controlled printing instead of photoshop controls the printing...

bingo! essentially perfect ....

so ....the problem is with photoshop ... now ...i'm hoping someone from photoshop will call me back - i called the script kiddies in india last week "we'll get back to you" ...

if anyone has any contacts at adobe ....

No, I think the problem is NOT with Photoshop. It's in the printer driver, which you clearly demonstrated yourself. If Photoshop does the color management, the printer driver should do NOTHING to the colors. Normally, you can instruct it to do nothing by choosing 'No Color Management' in the Advanced options. If you still have some profile selected in the printer driver (like you just described), any profile, you are using the wrong settings for the 'Photoshop manages color' option. If you did choose 'No Color Management', the printer driver somehow seems to override that choice.

Small correction: The option is not called 'No Color Management' in my Epson Stylus Pro 7600 driver, but 'Off (No Color Adjustment)'.

--
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

the problem is ....

i choose let photoshop manage colors
i then choose no color management
i then choose the paper icc

and the colors are now ....off

incidentally i tried the latest epson 3800 driver ... and then just for fun tried the driver that originally came with the printer (on the cd) ...still the same problem ...

so i have a work around ...but it is dissatisfying as i want photoshop to control the printing process ...

and as you can read below ... this happens with a really virgin install so its not the pernicious effect of any other software ...

still hoping for help from adobe :-) ...

if anyone has any moxie there i'd appreciate it ...

steve

On Tue, 10 Nov 2009 15:25:25 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

hi all ...

i finally did the following:

1) took a virgin hard drive and installed just windows xp, the epson 3800 printer driver and cs3 - nothing else, no updates on anything
still problems in the sense that dark reds became orange, dark greens became light greens

2) called epson and they had me use the epson to control the printing and set my icc's by setting the 'mode' to custom, drop down box to "icm" and then clicking on advanced and then clicking on 'show all profiles' and finally picking the paper profile in the box "printer profile" ...whew!

what this means is ...the epson controls the printing and i get to pick the paper profile for the epson controlled printing instead of photoshop controls the printing...

bingo! essentially perfect ....

so ....the problem is with photoshop ... now ...i'm hoping someone from photoshop will call me back - i called the script kiddies in india last week "we'll get back to you" ...

if anyone has any contacts at adobe ....

No, I think the problem is NOT with Photoshop. It's in the printer driver, which you clearly demonstrated yourself. If Photoshop does the color management, the printer driver should do NOTHING to the colors. Normally, you can instruct it to do nothing by choosing 'No Color Management' in the Advanced options. If you still have some profile selected in the printer driver (like you just described), any profile, you are using the wrong settings for the 'Photoshop manages color' option. If you did choose 'No Color Management', the printer driver somehow seems to override that choice.

wrote:

the problem is ....

i choose let photoshop manage colors
i then choose no color management
i then choose the paper icc

and the colors are now ....off

WHERE do you select the paper icc? The order in which you describe things suggest to me that you possibly choose the paper icc in the printer driver rather than in the Photoshop print dialog.

--
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

yes when you are using the printer driver you need to select the icc in the printer driver ....

as i mentioned when i choose "let photoshop manage colors" and choose the icc from the list at the bottom of that page ...

no joy ... the colors are off (and yes when i let photoshop manage colors, on the next page i have chosen 'no color adjustment' ....to no avail ...

strange ...

steve

On Wed, 11 Nov 2009 10:53:47 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

the problem is ....

i choose let photoshop manage colors
i then choose no color management
i then choose the paper icc

and the colors are now ....off

WHERE do you select the paper icc? The order in which you describe things suggest to me that you possibly choose the paper icc in the printer driver rather than in the Photoshop print dialog.

wrote:

yes when you are using the printer driver you need to select the icc in the printer driver ....

as i mentioned when i choose "let photoshop manage colors" and choose the icc from the list at the bottom of that page ...

no joy ... the colors are off (and yes when i let photoshop manage colors, on the next page i have chosen 'no color adjustment' ....to no avail ...

OK, final questions before I give up: What is the name of the profile you selected in the Photoshop print dialog? And what did you select as the Rendering Intent? Under 'Color Management', did you choose 'Document' or 'Proof', and if you chose 'Proof', what does the 'Proof Setup' at the bottom say?

--
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

i have tried several profiles, including icc's for epson's pro papers and lexjet papers, using the latest profiles

rendering intent was set to perceptual, management is 'document'

thanks for the interest ...

steve

On Thu, 12 Nov 2009 16:23:07 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

yes when you are using the printer driver you need to select the icc in the printer driver ....

as i mentioned when i choose "let photoshop manage colors" and choose the icc from the list at the bottom of that page ...

no joy ... the colors are off (and yes when i let photoshop manage colors, on the next page i have chosen 'no color adjustment' ....to no avail ...

OK, final questions before I give up: What is the name of the profile you selected in the Photoshop print dialog? And what did you select as the Rendering Intent? Under 'Color Management', did you choose 'Document' or 'Proof', and if you chose 'Proof', what does the 'Proof Setup' at the bottom say?

wrote:

i have tried several profiles, including icc's for epson's pro papers and lexjet papers, using the latest profiles

rendering intent was set to perceptual, management is 'document'

I give up, it sounds like you are doing everything right. That will be your problem if you contact Adobe. They will tell you exactly the same things we did, and tell you things should work fine now. I don't have any other suggestions, except that I still think that the problem is caused by the printer driver somehow, not by Photoshop or by some profile (because it happens with all profiles). Go through all your printer driver settings to see if anything could still be wrong there.

--
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com

and the answer is!

a bad epson 3800 ... bad bad epson :-) ...

and i paid $700 5 months ago for new heads ....which of course are now out of warranty ... sigh ...

thanks all ...

steve

On Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:58:42 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

i have tried several profiles, including icc's for epson's pro papers and lexjet papers, using the latest profiles

rendering intent was set to perceptual, management is 'document'

I give up, it sounds like you are doing everything right. That will be your problem if you contact Adobe. They will tell you exactly the same things we did, and tell you things should work fine now. I don't have any other suggestions, except that I still think that the problem is caused by the printer driver somehow, not by Photoshop or by some profile (because it happens with all profiles). Go through all your printer driver settings to see if anything could still be wrong there.

Disappointing, to say the least. I'm guessing you checked this by swapping in a known good printer.

What does the nozzle check pattern on your old printer look like? Is one of the heads just not working, or installed incorrectly?

One detail still doesn't fit the pattern: that your images printed more correctly when you let the printer driver handle the color profile. Did that turn out not to be the case?

Mike

On Wed, 18 Nov 2009 21:40:57 -0800, wrote:

and the answer is!

a bad epson 3800 ... bad bad epson :-) ...

and i paid $700 5 months ago for new heads ....which of course are now out of warranty ... sigh ...

thanks all ...

steve

On Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:58:42 +0100, (Johan W.
Elzenga) wrote:

wrote:

i have tried several profiles, including icc's for epson's pro papers and lexjet papers, using the latest profiles

rendering intent was set to perceptual, management is 'document'

I give up, it sounds like you are doing everything right. That will be your problem if you contact Adobe. They will tell you exactly the same things we did, and tell you things should work fine now. I don't have any other suggestions, except that I still think that the problem is caused by the printer driver somehow, not by Photoshop or by some profile (because it happens with all profiles). Go through all your printer driver settings to see if anything could still be wrong there.

--
Mike Russell - http://www.curvemeister.com

Mike Russell wrote:

Disappointing, to say the least. I'm guessing you checked this by swapping in a known good printer.

What does the nozzle check pattern on your old printer look like? Is one of the heads just not working, or installed incorrectly?
One detail still doesn't fit the pattern: that your images printed more correctly when you let the printer driver handle the color profile. Did that turn out not to be the case?

I have to agree with Mike. The chance that a bad printer just makes a good print by coincidence (if you use settings which are by itself correct) sounds rather unlikely to me.

--
Johan W. Elzenga johan<<at>>johanfoto.nl Editor / Photographer http://www.johanfoto.com