I recently purchased an Epson R2880 printer. I am having a lot of trouble getting good color when printing from Photoshop CS3. I am running OS 10.4 on a G4 Mac. I have a high-quality monitor and an EyeOne calibrator. I have spent a total of a few hours on the phone with tech support from the store where I bought the monitor and calibrator, and with Epson. To try and keep it simple, I am using all Epson products (ink, paper, their ICC profiles downloaded from their site). I have calibrated my monitor to brightness: 80, white point: 5000 K, Gamma 2.2.
All that tech support has brought me to the point where prints I get on Epson Velvet Fine Art paper and almost where they match what I see on the monitor, though they still could use a touch more red. I’ve tried making a slight curves adjustment to the red channel but I still don’t quite have it. But it’s basically acceptable.
So then I tried Epson Premium Presentation Matte paper. After a lengthy session with the Epson tech, we determined that I can get a print that’s almost right by printing out of Preview and letting the printer manage colors. If I make a levels adjustment and brighten it a good bit, I get a very good print. But if I try printing on that paper from CS3 I get something that looks like a washed out black-and-white print with a hint of color in it. The Epson tech (a level 2 tech) told me to use the SPR 2880 Matte Paper-HW profile. Didn’t help. At that point he said that he’d done all he could do and that for further assistance I needed to contact Adobe about "advanced settings in Photoshop." Of course, I’d prefer to print out of Photoshop because it gives more options in terms of placement and size of the print on the paper.
So here are my questions:
– Is this kind of thing par for the course, and will I eventually figure out a system that gives me good results all the time with any Epson paper I choose with a minimum of tinkering with levels and curves?
– Or should I expect more from a printer that costs almost $1,000 and should I return it for, say, a Canon?
– Is there information online about those "advanced settings" the Epson tech was referring to?
– Or would I be advised to purchase a one-on-one phone consultation from Adobe Photoshop tech support to resolve these problems?
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Are you using the correct Profile for your Paper in View/Proof Set-up/Custom/ ?
And are you then Soft-Proofing (Cmd Y) your image before printing it?
Do that; and then create and save a Custom Curve to adjust it so that the Soft Preview looks the way that you actually want your image to print.
You can then use your saved Curve to apply as an Adjustment Layer to subsequent images
I find that Epson’s profiles are a little too "cold" (bluer in the shadows) and a little too dark in the quarter tones for my taste; so my saved Adjustment Curve sets the Blue Curve Input=3 with Output=0; and my Composite Curve sets the Input=57 with Output=63
Also, check with Epson UK that you are using Epson’s latest software because they often have newer Drivers than those posted on Epson USA.
To get a print (that looks correct on the monitor) to print the way you want it by eyeball curve settings and guess work printer adjustments is a bad habit to get into.
Proper color management, and custom paper profiles is the way to go. With the low cost of today’s profiling packages there is not much excuse for not doing this.
Of course if you’re just printing your own personal stuff for yourself then it is probably not that important.
If you are printing to your own printers there is absolutely no reason for not using an Adjustment Layer to adjust the Soft Proof to give you the results that you want in your actual Print (which in the case of the Epson ICC Profiles is a spot-on indication of how the file will print on that particular stock from that particular printer) .
The PROFILE is already accurate (and the image will print EXACTLY as Profiled in the Soft Proof).
I just happen to want a different output on Epson’s somewhat bluish glossy paper and an Adjustment Curve is a non-destructive way to achieve exactly that.
Soft Proof shows me exactly the way that my curve has modified the image and the final print comes out right the first time and every time!
Neither do I wish to change the Master file because it is exactly as I need it for other purposes such as Press output or as a basis for Web site purposes.
For that reason, I remove the Adjustment Layer again from my Master files after making an Epson print.
even canned OEM Epson profiles/papers should work for most users (if the workflow is set up properly) they work for me
just be sure your own monitor profile and files aren’t the problem…
To check monitor-to-print workflow, I like a combination of the Adobe RGB PDI file and a box of letter size Epson Ultra Premium Photo Paper Luster (available locally) using the Epson profile for that paper…
I can’t say enough about having a (a known good file) reference file to print or view on you monitor. It makes it so much easier to find where the broken links are in your color management chain.
The point that I seem unable to get through to you is that my MASTER files (ProPhoto 16-bit and minus my Customized Adjustment Curve) ARE previewing on the monitor in Soft Preview (View/Proof Colors) as an EXACT match to the way that they print on Epson’s Premium Glossy Paper.
Most people would be perfectly happy with the result but I prefer less blue in my blacks and more detail in the quarter tones when printing on that particular stock.
I just CHOOSE to print them with my Saved Adjustment Curve because I PREFER the rendering that I get with that Curve on that stock. With the Curve attached. I then see EXACTLY the result that I will get when the printed sheet emerges from my Epson.
I have absolutely no need to pay for someone else to make me a Profile (which would almost certainly not match the way that I personally want my print to turn out anyway) when I can nail a perfect print the first time, every time.
The same file (minus the Epson Correction Curve) is used to generate CMYK PDFs for web offset Press output (and the always Ads. print correctly) and to generate JPEGs (with embedded sRGB profiles) for on-screen presentations and web site work.
Perhaps I do have the slight advantage that I have been personally printing color photographs for the past half century (using various media and technologies) so might just happen to know what I am doing?!
To address Gary’s points: A known good file (like PDI image) displays absolutely and technically correctly on my calibrated and profiled NEC 2690 monitor with natural skin tones neutral grays etc. and the output print from a my R1900 matches the screen exactly too.
BUT
A print made with the addition of my adjustment Layer is a LOT more pleasing.
Art triumphs over cold-blooded "technology" in my book and interestingly people are raving about the quality of my prints
There is no question in my mind that Ann is right, if I’m understanding her correctly.
Whenever I preview a finished image in soft preview, the image "dies" in order to mimic the predicted result on that particular paper. I always use a final curves adjustment layer to neutralize or counteract this effect.
If you’ve never done this experiment I’m about to suggest, it might be an eye opener for you.
What I’ve suggested here before is to create a brand new document with a white background and nothing but a neutral gray circle in the middle, no larger than, say, one fifth the size of the document.
Now try soft proofing it through different paper profiles. You will see how some (even many) of those profiles immediately throw a bluish cast on the image, and virtually all of them will darken the image.
There’s no way I’ve ever consider printing without soft proofing first. The lack of soft proofing capabilities in Lightroom puts that application out of contention as far as I’m concerned. That is of course not relevant to those concerned only with web images, but I’m not concerned with those, only with printed images.
And if your PDF is headed for the Press, you had better soft-proof that file for the very yellow-toned wood-pulp coated stock on which many magazines are printed; if you don’t want furious clients wanting to know why the blues have gone gray; and the flesh-tones orange; and why the blazes the published Ad. fails to match the Proof which you provided!
So what you are all saying is that if you are set up correctly, colour management works and if you don’t like the default appearance, you can change it….
Soft Proofing, when both "Use Black Compensation" and "Simulate Paper Color" are activated, can give a very accurate preview of what the actual paper-tone will do to your image.
Accept it or adjust it. Your choice.
I choose to adjust my image so that it will reproduce the way that I wish even on the designated paper stock.
I also make a Proof print so that the client is prepared for the version that comes off the Press and is not in for unwelcome surprises.
There is another chapter to this, when the job gets to the pressman, he can (must) adjust for current conditions and he is expected to match the proof with due allowance for difference between proof stock and press stock. If you don’t press check you are accepting the pressman’s opinion as much as anything.
If you don’t press check you are accepting the pressman’s opinion as much as anything.
But for Ads than run in the Press, the printer may be multi-thousand miles away, or in a different country, so there is no way that an art director can be on press for every publication in which an Ad will run.
Soft proofing the RGB image for a targeted paper stock; then adjusting the file "to taste" with an overlying adjustment layer; before converting to CMYK and saving as a PDF; then making an inkjet "Proof" (using the Adobe "Print Proof with Simulated Paper Color" routine); actually works amazingly well.
I just received the current issue of a large-circulation magazine in which we are running a new Ad. and the printed color is almost a dead-ringer to the proof print which our client had previously approved. (So he’s happy!)
I can assure you that the supplied PDF would have gone straight to Press and was printed R.O.P.. No further pre-press work is done on supplied PDFs by that publication they are just slotted into their page layout program (which just happens to be InDesign CS3 at that particular publishing house).
Even if I had flown 3,000 miles to be "on Press", it would not have made an iota of difference to the way that Press was going to be run!
Sheet-fed short-run production of a single sheet can be a different matter; but for high-volume web-offset printing, what you submit IS what you get so it’s up to you to get it right or face the consequences!
I wasn’t suggesting that you press-check every job, the point I was making was that it is imperative to supply a good printout or to see a contract proof.
Otherwise the pressman WILL make a decision on your behalf.
No (practical) proof can simulate exact press condition because stock has different absorbency characteristics as do the inks and driers.
Even a single batch of stock will change in its characteristic through the run, so a profile for a particular printing condition is only a partial solution.
But if you supply a good example of what you want to see, the pressman will be able to get as close as possible.
Your file does not do the job for him, it puts the numbers within a close margin and he does the rest. Just remember he is not psychic and there is no magic standard that will make every ink and stock behave the same.
The same can be said for the original scenario that standards go so far and then the artist adjusts the (technically correct) image to their own taste.
But you are describing a Custom job where a single individual is the Customer and the Pressman has to satisfy that customer and attempt to "match" the supplied printed Proof.
With high-volume magazine printing, it wouldn’t matter whether I supplied a hard-copy Proof or not, that PDF goes straight to Press "as is" and no attempt is, or can be, made to adjust Press conditions to suit a single advertiser!
(Actually, I suspect that no-one in Production at the magazine even looks at those Proof prints unless they receive an advertiser’s complaint?!)
My point is simply that Adobe Color Management does work and it works amazingly well considering the number of "unknowns" that each press job faces provided that we take full advantage of the CS4 color management tools and use them judiciously.
Yes, I am agreeing with you but want to make it clear to others that colour management works but is not a ‘means to an end’.
A good print shop will not simply dismiss your supplied proofs either… prepress people will look at the supplied files and materials and address issues as they see fit. (I am talking about a GOOD printer here, I know some don’t). In a high volume magazine shop this time is obviously tight but is ignored at the printer’s peril.
Pressmen do adjust for content due to the ‘stripe’. (For the benefit of those unfamiliar, the ‘stripe’ means the ink consumption of a particular band of the job, parallel to the travel of the sheet or web. eg: If a job has a big magenta solid on one edge, it requires more magenta in that zone and images in the same zone may be affected by that.) If no adjustment was necessary we would not have densitometers and viewing stations beside our presses.
Otherwise the pressman WILL make a decision on your behalf.
I agree with Ann. Sheetfed offset litho is easier to control than web.
While major newsstand publications often demand a contract proof (or at least a good reference PDF) from their advertisers or their agencies, there is no way that their printer will stop the press to correct the color for your ad if everything else on that web is OK. Part is the nature of web offset. Part is cost. Part is time. Publications are under tight, often near-impossible print and distribute deadlines, so that unless something is drastically wrong with the signature being printed or the press, the presses continue until the required impressions are run.
But, if you are not sure of how your job will look when its printed, if you submit your art well before the drop-dead date, you may be able to request (and pay for) a physical proof from the magazine production department.
One value of a proper proof is that if there is a question about the ad: color accuracy, the specific ad provided vs the ad run, the integrity of the ad (e.g., missing content), that proof is your witness.
I don’t know why people think I am disagreeing with anyone regarding web/offset etc… yes they are different, but that is not the point…
I am simply stating that a file that proofs as such and such on a good proofing system may not look like that on press. Further, when it does not, that is no-ones fault, not a printer with little time for adjustment or consideration of supplied proofs, it is simply that printing is not a precise science. Not in any practical printshop.
I’m just saying a perfect file will not produce a completely predictable result on press. A good contract proof from the originator or the printer is a necessity, even if just for the sake of information to all involved when making judgements on quality and appearance.
See, I am agreeing with everyone in this thread, but just wanting to highlight the importance of a hard-copy of some sort to even the busiest printer/prepressman. Then they can never say ‘we didn’t know’…
Some designers supply ‘press-ready’ pdf’s as art and want to decline a proof, I always say that we will not guarantee colour without a proof. I don’t care how good they think their files are, due to the factors mentioned earlier, there is no ideal setting for a press in the same way Ann does not like factory profile defaults (I don’t either), each press/stock/ink has its own characteristics that are technically addressed by profiling but when it comes to a great looking result on web or offset, your pressman can make or break you.
PS, on a web the pressman does not stop to adjust, but will fine tune the duct and pressure settings on the run as the temperature or humidity changes and so on, not the air temp but the cylinders and ink etc all get hotter and colder. Stock changes in density and colour even in a single batch.
So give your pressman a little more credit, he does a lot more than you think.
give your pressman a little more credit, he does a lot more than you think
I KNOW he does.
I have had the pleasure, many times, of working closely in the Press room (sheet-fed on #1 stock too on occasion!) with some outstanding Press men (often in the small hours of the morning) when we have succeeded in getting even BETTER results than the Cromalin Proof.
There are Print companies and Pressmen like that, but sadly a lot less of them than there used to be.
The behemoth companies have taken-over the Print industry in many places; and mass-circulation web-offset printing is increasingly in their hands.
So give your pressman a little more credit, he does a lot more than you think.
I never said he doesn’t earn his keep. I’m merely pointing out some of the pitfalls. And, as we all know, there are a lot of designers who are clueless about any aspect of print production. They figure that if it looks good on screen, it’s good to go.
I have read the various suggestions and thank everyone who offered them but I am still at an impasse here.
First off, I am using an Eizo ColorEdge CE210W monitor, calibrated with an EyeOne calibrator. As suggested above, I re-calibrated with a 6500K profile and downloaded the gballard.net PDI profile. I had calibrated it at 5000K at the suggestion of the printing industry tech support guy where I bought the monitor and calibrator, but I’m willing to try anything.
I checked my monitor at gballard.net where there’s a gray scale test and the monitor is fine. I don’t think the color management problem is with the monitor, I think it’s in Photoshop.
I did another test suggested by gballard.net and compared the PDI displayed by Photoshop with a stripped-of-profile version displayed in Safari. Safari’s version is more saturated. This is particularly noticeable in the browns and the skin tones of the African-American people.
I tried soft proofing in Photoshop using the Velvet Fine Art Paper profile, then printed it on Velvet Fine Art paper. There is a definite mismatch here, more striking than the difference between the Photoshop and Safari screen versions discussed above. Photoshop soft proofing shows a much grayer image than the print. The print is definitely more saturated throughout, and warmer in the sense of yellower. All the grays on the print have a yellow cast compared to the soft proof. If "simulate paper color" is turned out, it’s even more useless, because it just washes out the screen version further.
Just to correct a typo above, it should read "If simulate paper color is turned ON, it’s even more useless, because it just washes out the screen version further."
DYP: The last tech support call I made to Epson we checked for the latest drivers and tested them by printing a PDF file from Preview, so I have those.
In ColorSyncUtility, my printer was there. I also ran Profile First Aid and discovered that all the profiles for the SP R2880 were "bad profiles" — the message given was that for Tag DEVD and Tag DEVS "Tag reserved field is not zero." So I clicked "Repair" and then Verify. Those were all fixed. Printed PDI file again. Didn’t make a bit of difference in the result.
I downloaded the Epson Print Plug-In 1.01 from the URL you provided. The installation wizard indicated it had been successfully installed, and when I go to but I can’t find it anywhere in Photoshop — or at least not in the usual places such as Filters, Open, Import/Export, Print. However, if I look for it in Photoshop: About Plug-In I see it in the list. Why did you recommend I use it, what does it do (the description on Epson’s web site doesn’t explain), and how do I use it?
DYP: The last tech support call I made to Epson we checked for the latest drivers and tested them by printing a PDF file from Preview, so I have those.
In ColorSyncUtility, my printer was there. I also ran Profile First Aid and discovered that all the profiles for the SP R2880 were "bad profiles" — the message given was that for Tag DEVD and Tag DEVS "Tag reserved field is not zero." So I clicked "Repair" and then Verify. Those were all fixed. Printed PDI file again. Didn’t make a bit of difference in the result.
I downloaded the Epson Print Plug-In 1.01 from the URL you provided. The installation wizard indicated it had been successfully installed, but I can’t find it anywhere in Photoshop — or at least not in the usual places such as Filters, Open, Import/Export, Print. However, if I look for it in Photoshop: About Plug-In I see it in the list. Why did you recommend I use it, what does it do (the description on Epson’s web site doesn’t explain), and how do I use it?
Reinstalled driver? The latest version? What version is it exactly, 6.20
or 6.38?
6.20
Latest version of PSCS3 10.0.1?
Yes.
Driver set to No Color Adjustment when choosing PS Manages Color? What
profile in PS print dialog? What exact setting are you choosing in the driver?
Profile: SPR2880 VelvtFneArt Photo.icc. Print Settings: Advanced with "high speed" unchecked. Color Management: Off.
I have been over and over the choosing of the profile and all the settings in the print dialog boxes with the Epson techs — several times. I know they are all correct.
I have lots of experience printing with ICC profiles from Photoshop. Have used an Epson 2200 with the ImagePrint RIP for years with excellent monitor to print match.
I upgraded to the R2880 2 days ago
Print on the R2880 from Photoshop CS3 letting the printer manage colors (Mode: automatic – Epson standard (sRGB) or Adobe RGB to match colour space of file printed)-very good match to my calibrated monitor.
Print from Photoshop CS3 using the the Epson "Premium?" ICC Profiles downloaded from the Epson Site for Ultra Premium Presentation Matte (both SPR2880UPrmMttePhoto.icc and SPR2880UPrmMtteSprPhoto.icc) or Velvet Fine Art (SPR2880VelvFneArtPhoto.icc) or Epson Watercolor (WtrClrRdWhtPhoto.icc) and the prints are "fair". Prints are much more yellow than my calibrated monitor.
Is anyone else experiencing a color bias with these "Premium?" profiles?
Is anyone actually achieving excellent results with the "Premium?" ICC profiles?
Don’t you think it just might be a good idea to post in the Photoshop Windows forum rather than here, the Photoshop Macintosh forum? Just a thought, you’re welcome to hang out here to socialize. 🙂
Gee Ramón, I am guessing Mike did a search for Epson R2880/CS3 and noticed that a Mac user was having the same problem he was. If together, maybe Windows users and Mac users can come together and solve the problems of the Epson R2880, maybe we can set a good example for the Republicans and Democrats in Congress :-).
Anyway, since I posted this problem, I have been working on it getting input from a variety of people. The person who finally helped me was Jim, a tech at ColorHQ.com. If you are in the US or Canada and have to buy a monitor and/or calibrator, definitely consider buying it from them, because they offer free tech support to their customers!
So regarding yellowness, one thing that you definitely should look at is how you’re calibrating your monitor. Despite some of the replies above that recommend calibrating to 6500K, ColorHQ, which specializes in solutions for the printing industry, told me that calibrating to 5000K is the print industry standard. (While 6500K is the standard for working on images for the web or for editing video.) 5000K will make the monitor look yellower, so see whether that’s a better match to what you’re printing. I have an Eizo monitor and am running their Color Navigator software. The nice thing about that is something called Color Navigator Agent that allows me to switch between calibration profiles on the fly if I’m doing some web work and then want to work on images for printing.
Calibrating to 5000K was helpful, but not the solution in my case. The ultimate solution to my problem was more of a Mac issue, so I don’t know if this will help you, but I’ll post it in case anyone refers to this discussion in the future: there evidently IS an issue with ColorSync Utility in the Mac interfering with Photoshop managing colors in OS 10.4. In my case, ColorSync was causing the printer to preserve RGB values rather than use the ICC profile. The afore-mentioned Jim suggested that I go to Edit: Convert to Paper Profile, then pick the profile from the list. When printing, in the first Photoshop dialog box choose Color Handling: No color management. All the other settings in the next dialog box are the same as when you don’t want the Epson to manage colors. So what you’re doing is making it so the profile is built into the file, and neither Photoshop nor Epson are managing colors.
The result to this was MUCH better. The soft proof is a little redder than the print, but I can adjust that by creating a curves adjustment layer and pulling down the red curve in the middle a little bit if I want to see what the print will look like. I can live with that.
Also Jim pointed out that those papers that you mentioned are in fact a little warm in tone — put Velvet Fine Art next to a piece of ordinary copy paper from say, Staples, and you’ll see the difference. He suggested that if it’s the matte look I want (it is) that Hahnemuhle makes a couple of papers that are brighter: Photo Rag Baryta and Bright White He also likes Ilford Gold Fiber silk, but that’s a luster satin finish. You can download the Hahnemuhle profiles from Hahnemuhle’s web site and compare them in "Soft Proof" mode in Photoshop with the Epson papers you mentioned and get an idea of the difference with your images. I haven’t actually printed on them yet, but I see what he means.
Good luck, and I’d be interested to know how it goes for you.
While D50 or 5000K is the viewing standard for looking at printed material, simply setting your monitor to that does not provide the best white point match. The reason 6500 K is recommended so often is that it provides a closer visual match on the screen to the reflective 5000K viewing booth. It’s also related to overall screen luminance and your actual best match could be anywhere from 5500K to 6500K. 6500K works exceptionally well for me using a hardware calibrated Sony Artisan and custom profiles for all my inkjet media and offset printing vendors. If you want to get really picky, you can adjust the white point screen calibration to exactly match your paper white as viewed in your viewing booth.
There is also still a bug in ColorSync where you do have to set the default printer to the printer you are printing to, or there will be some strange posterized color issues, particularly with skin tones.
If your soft proof is redder than the print, either your profile or your monitor calibration or your viewing conditions are off.
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