Z3100 Matte Red Problem

[Roscolo]

I'm not seeing problems with the reds. I'm printing on HP papers and Innova papers. I do a lot of repros of paintings. Rarely I may have to tweak - and I emphasize tweak - the reds using selective color adjustments or selecting a red area to tweak it. Is Epson better? Nope. I used to do the same sorts of adjustments when I printed with an Epson.

The need to tweak is really rare. So far about 2-3% of my prints of paintings. It's quick and easy when I do have to do it. Haven't had to do this at all with any photographs, most of which are landscapes and some portraits.

[alanmcf]

I have made quite a bit of very slow progress since starting this thread. First it is wonderful having such a caring and knowledgeable group of people supporting me on this forum!

As posted earlier the midtone reds causing sunburn and purple skies is gone after calibrating each paper. I then worked with HP on updating my driver and Easy Care -- what a fiasco -- may post on this later.

So now the printer is properly setup -- I think. Ron sent me a profile for Epson Enhanced Matte created with his APS on 5.0.0.4 using Photo Paper Matte type. Drum roll -- the red strawberries look better. Not as good as on the Epson 2200 which is not as good as the z3100 on Instant Dry Gloss, but much better than I was getting before.

So now I need to start printing some of my landscapes and see if I can get to enjoying this printer!

Again thanks so much all of you, Alan

P.S. There is much in Julian's response to work with and maybe Ernst's too.
P.P.S. More questions to follow

[Mussi_Spectraflow]

Alan,
  Glad to her that your in a better place! Ernst, it was interesting reading your post regarding Wasatch RIP. First I also had similar experience with the Canon IPF9000, only this was with EFI CPXF and Canvas. It's interesting to see how each of the RIPs are working with n-color linearizations and profiling. EFI Colorproof linearizes on top of the HP media sets so you basically treat it as a CMYK device. This is a much more simplistic approach but has yielded good results on proofing media. There are some issues however since the linearization is not really limiting CMYK channels, since the pipeline is RGB to 11 color. While I too was skeptical of what an RGB pipeline could offer when working with an 11 color device, however I have to say that it does a very good job considering. I feel like a lot of the issues at play here are really the complexities of n-color profiles and linearization showing their ugly face. I dont think the average user understands the degree of complexity behind this. Making that process transparent and putting a good RGB path in front of it is really a blessing. Yes there were some initial problems. The new firmware will actually be very similar to the 5.0.0.4 just with more flexibility. The separation tables are more or less locked down, however some papers like the Photorag pearl will get a bit more attention.
       I do find it amusing that some people really think that that hundreds of very very smart engineers with more experience, time and resources at their disposal simply didn’t test the inks that they cooked up first? They think they were busy extracting ink from ball point pens 20min before the product release date, and accidently grabbed the pink pen instead of the red pen?That’s not to say that the end result is always perfect or appreciated. However we are not present to see all of the obstacles in play. and of course it is not a simple matter of not mixing ink correctly!!!! RIPs like Onyx are really very interesting because all the tool for creating a good profile are at ones disposal. You have complete control over each channel, the transition curves between solid and light inks, CGR, profiling variables ...everything you could possible want.
        The question as to weather a RIP can deliver better results than the drivers is usually yes. Better workflow, better speed, better accuracy. However will it yield better photographic output, or bigger gamut...not always. In some cases a RIP will reduce gamut, especially those targeted towards proofing. Of course with complete control you can go for the large gamut. What you will find is that to produce "better" results than those from the driver you will spend many hours and lots of ink and media, and that's in you really know what your doing. Onyx has a PDF for profile creation specifically for the Z3100, it runs around 30 pages. I know my way around the program fairly well and it took me quite some time to get good results. To really produce a first rate job would require a lot of trial and error. RIPs are really about productivity for the most part. In fact sometimes they are hindered since special screening is sometimes only available in the OEM drivers.
        All in all I think this produce should be mature in the next few months. The minor problems that are really problems should be addressed by then. In the end there will be and Epson "look" and and HP "look". I believe Ernst made the anology of film looks. Some people loved Velvia and others loved Kodachrome. And of course there were those who swore that all  Fuji film was inherently green (I'm sure it couldn't have had anything to do with the box)

Julian

[DotProdux]

Onyx has a PDF for profile creation specifically for the Z3100, it runs around 30 pages.
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Hi Julian,

Could you direct me to the Onyx PDF you referenced? I have Postershop V7 and a Z3100 and it seems to me that this PDF might add years to my life.

Thanks,

Taylor

[DotProdux]

As it turns out, the folks over at Onyx were today kind enough to provide this link:

http://www.onyxgfx.com/files/onyx_profilin...b_hpzseries.pdf

which I think will be of at least passing interest to anyone using a Z3100 with a RIP.

Taylor

[rdonson]

Thanks, Taylor.  I've added this info to the wiki.

[Doctor Noise]

Hi.  I'm new to this site, but i wanted to let everyone know that there is a document on HP site that really helped with reds.  In fact, they look excellent - yes on matt paper.  

here is the link.  I follow this always and it has helped all my prints, but really helped on the matt papers.

The document is titled:

Technical Newsletter:
Ability to print saturated red on HP Designjet Z3100 Photo printers

site:

https://h41186.www4.hp.com/Data/printingkno...?pageseq=939257

Good luck!