Derek,
One of the key things in color management& printing is to use only a single conversion from the image ( in its working colorspace ), to the colorspace of the printer. Most of the printing problems seem to come from multiple colorspace conversions by picking the wrong options in the printer driver, and the output space profile.
1. If the print driver is set to "automatic" mode, with the appropriate paper and quality selection, then "Printer Color Management" is probably the best Output space profile. [ Adobe Color Engine "ACE" does the conversion .}
2. If the print driver is set to "ICM" mode, again with the appropriate paper and quality selection, then the generic Printer profile ( furnished by the manufacturer ) is appropriate. [ Windows Color engine does the conversion ]
3. If you have an accurate ink/paper profile for your printer, then the printer driver should be set to "No Color Management" ( if it’s an option ), and the appropriate paper and quality selections made. Then , select the media profile as the output space profile, and all the color conversion is done by the profile.
Option 3 is the best option, but also requires generally more investment in time/money to get accurate profiles. I got pretty good results on my Epson Photo printers using Printer color management, until I spent the $$$ for a profiling package, and now I get somewhat more consistent results using home-made profiles. I’m just an amateur and I can’t say it’s worth the money. I just HAD to do it , to find out how it all worked <G> .
The various essays and tutorials at Ian Lyons’ site , <
http://www.computer-darkroom.com/> cover this material better than I can. Another great site ( for a rainy day with a lot of time ), belongs to Norman Koren, <
http://www.normankoren.com/> .
🙂
Brent