The darkest black areas in my inkjet prints sometimes come out way too much so. As far as I can tell, the screen image doesn’t look esp. as if the interval is that drastic there. But in the prints, ‘max black’ is so pronounced (and in prints where all other tonal relations are subtle) that it just looks like ink. Not very photographic!
Can anyone tell me 1) what setting(s) (in Photoshop, on the monitor, and/or in the scanner and printer drivers) I am likely to need to change so the problem doesn’t occur or 2) the best Photoshop adjustment workaround to fix image areas individually?
I use Photoshop 5.0.2 on Mac 9.2.1. The images are scanned in from color negative film with a Nikon Coolscan III. My printer is an Epson Photo 1280. I use glossy paper.
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Your problem probably has more to do with the Epson driver and the pixel values in your shadows rather than Photoshop 5. It seems that the Epson drivers have a nasty habit of clipping pretty much everything below about value 12 or so to black and with very little separation in the immediate values above that. If your image has values in the 5-20 RGB range, it’s very possible for shadow detail you easily see on screen to disappear into an inky cavern when printed. Monitor calibration and printer profiles can either minimize or excacerbate the problem.
I have sent you a PDF version. It does, of course, refer to working in Mac OS 8 but you should be able to adapt the instructions for OS 9 quite easily.
[Noted in passing: Making PDFs directly from a simple 7-page Word file is incredibly SLOW! I eventually got tired of waiting for it to finish, pasted the text into InD and made the PDF from there. Hrmphh Microsoft .]
A word of advice: When posting e-mail addresses here, it is a good idea to post them a in spider-proof way such as: plainscoreopsis at aol dot com
Making PDFs directly from a simple 7-page Word file is incredibly SLOW!
What version of Word and what OS? Were you printing to a PS file first and then using Distiller? Or was it the old and buggy PDFWriter?
I just created a PDF out of a 5MB MS Word document in version 2004 using the default PDF creator and was very surprised at the speed and quality (none of the text spacing problems I saw in previous versions of Word in Mac OS 9.2.2).
Unfortunately, even this latest version of MS Word for the Mac is still crippled in comparison to Windows versions in that it’s not possible to create a PDF that retains the live bookmark, index and cross-reference links. The Adobe Acrobat folks inform me that it has something to do with "missing APIs" in the Mac versions of MS Word. Real bummer!
I can’t even bring my 5MB document to a Windows machine because of font unavailability in the Windows world. 🙁
<< What version of Word and what OS? Were you printing to a PS file first and then using Distiller? >>
Which is what I should have done!
But I just clicked the PDF button (which does indeed use the old and buggy PDFWriter) lost my temper with Word 10.1.4 (on Mac OS 10.3.4), and grabbed InDesignwhich makes a PDF before you can blink.
If you want to email me that word document, if it’s not confidential of course, I can time how long it takes MS Word 2004 to create a PDF document using the same method.
It was my understanding that the old PDFWriter Chooser driver was abandoned with Acrobat 5.0. If you wanted to use it you had to go pull it off the Acrobat 4 install CD.
Having practically skipped MS Office X altogether (I got my free Office 2004 upgrade weeks after getting Office X), I don’t know or remember the PDF buttons you mention.
Hitting Command P in Word 2004 brings up the Print dialog box, which at the bottom has a button labeled "Save as PDF". I just produced a 9-page PDF file in less than four seconds using this feature. [ADDED: I imagine a G5 would do it in half the time.]
What I can’t find anywhere in Word 2004 is a Print to PS File command! The Help files say nothing about this and, of course, there is no printed documentation. Interesting…
Then I can either select "Adobe PDF" in the Printer pop-up (and make use of the Setup options) or click the PDF button to "Save As PDF" at the bottom of the palette. It takes under 2 seconds for seven pages of plain texteither way.
The toolbar buttons that I was talking about earlier are the Acrobat PDF Maker buttons (that you can add to the toolbar via Tools/Customize/Toolbars). Don’t botherthey don’t work anyway.
Then I can either select "Adobe PDF" in the Printer pop-up (and make use of the Setup options)
"Adobe PDF" does not show up in the Printer pop-up menu when printing from MS Word 2004 under Panther 10.3.4. Maybe I would need Acrobat 6 for that; I’m on Acrobat 5.0.5.
Also, I went to Tools > Customize > Toolbars and there is no Acrobat PDF Maker, nor any other command containing Acrobat, PDF, Make or Maker. It looks like they realized they were not very useful and just left them out altogether in Office 2004.
I’m still puzzled that I can’t find a way to print a PostScript file from Word 2004. I’m just curious, I don’t really need a PS file –at least not yet.
You have to add Adobe PDF (via the Printer Setup Utility) and although I do have Acrobat 6 Pro I would think that you could add Adobe PDF to your Printers list anyway.
If you do add Adobe PDF as a "Printer", you are then able to apply the various printing options which you can’t do with a straight Save As PDF.
I don’t think that Microsoft programs have ever been particularly PostScript-friendly and it seems that printing to PostScript changed with Mac OSX. But, if you Print directly to PDF, you shouldn’t have need for a PS file and Distiller.
You have to add Adobe PDF (via the Printer Setup Utility) and although I do have Acrobat 6 Pro I would think that you could add Adobe PDF to your Printers list anyway.
Nope, I just checked. No way to add anything remotely resembling Adobe PDF to the list on my machine. Maybe you do need Acrobat 6.
Not that I’m worried, just curious. I’m also baffled (though not concerned) about not being able to print to a PostScript file out of Office 2004.
I added a bit to message #22 on this which you may have missed.
I have just discovered something else which is most curious: if you double click on the saved .ps file, it OPENS as a fully fledged PDF! No Distiller (unless you need to use Job Options) needed!
See if downloading the free Adobe Reader 6 allows you to add Adobe PDF to your Printers List.
See if downloading the free Adobe Reader 6 allows you to add Adobe PDF to your Printers List.
Reader 6 has been installed for some time now, so that’s not it.
It may only work if you actually have a PostScript printer attached (I do) but if you have, you can still Save As File (PS) via the Output Options tab in the Print dialogue’s pop-up that starts with "Copies & Pages.
Doh! I turned on the LW IIg, selected it as printer for the document and I had Print to file suddenly available again. Thanks!
Incidentally, the Format pop-up that gets activated when you check the "Save as File" box gives you two choices: PDF or PostScript. If you choose PostScript and later double click on the .ps file, Preview does launch indeed, but a window with a progress bar indicating that the document "is being converted to PDF" pops up. The document then opens in Preview as a PDF.
Maybe that’s what you saw, except it must have taken a nanosecond on the G5 🙂 :
I have just discovered something else which is most curious: if you double click on the saved .ps file, it OPENS as a fully fledged PDF! No Distiller (unless you need to use Job Options) needed!
Incidentally, attempting to open the .ps file in Adobe Reader 6 results in an error message only.
<< Incidentally, attempting to open the .ps file in Adobe Reader 6 results in an error message only. >> It does here too.
Dragging & dropping the .ps file onto Acrobat Pro automatically opens Distiller which automatically converts it and displays the resulting PDF in Acrobat Pro almost before you can blink.
Double-clicking the .ps file actually opens a PDF in Apple’s Previewnot in Acrobatas you noticed. And it is in a nanosecond on a G5no time for a progress bar to even blink into life!
Learn how to optimize Photoshop for maximum speed, troubleshoot common issues, and keep your projects organized so that you can work faster than ever before!
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