Epson 1280

[MichaelHarris]

Is anyone using this printer?  I still can't get the results I'm looking for?  Trying Epson paper now and new drivers.

[jake]

What results are you looking for? Are you printing black and white? Or color?

If you are trying to print out >film>scan>Photoshop>print then you should read this site thoroughly. It contains many settings and explanations, both for Photoshop & Epson printers, that help get you set up for (relatively) trouble free printing.

http://www.computer-darkroom.com/home.htm

Depending on the inks you are using, you will find that using papers other than Epson papers will give variable results. Since Epson is in the ink and paper business, you can understand why this is. If you want to use other papers, you need to find the color profiles for those papers, figure out how to load those into Photoshop, and then figure out how to do soft-proofing & printing with those profiles.

However, the basic principle is that you don't want Photoshop to do any color profiling for the printed image - i.e. no color management during the printing by Photoshop. All color management should be done by the printer, especially if you are using Epson Inks, Paper and profiles. Again, the link above will be your best resource for those settings in detail.

Good luck!

[MichaelHarris]

Thank you very much.  I'll read that now and set the printer to do the color management.

[jake]

And this might be the section that will best help you.

http://www.computer-darkroom.com/ps9_print/ps9_print_1.htm

[MichaelHarris]

jake you're a genius, that did it.  They are perfect.  They match what Spyder shows on the monitor now.

I saved what I did in the printer savings and am printing another one to see if I can reproduce the results.

Thanks a ton,
Michael

[jake]

Yeah well, you just got in 2 hours what took me about 6 months worth of scrambling around. I bought my 2100 printer right when it came out while I was living in Prague. I got nothing but purple and blue prints for weeks and nearly threw the g-d thing in the trash. Then I started reading that Computer Darkroom site as he was figuring out both Photoshop's new CS version AND the Epson 2100 which had all sorts of quirks when it first came out. Anyway, sad story, but suffice it to say that Epson owes that Computer Darkroom guy a big check. I think there are a lot of people who would have otherwise returned their printers had he not figured it all out.

If you are printing color and black & white, eventually you may want to dedicate a printer to black & white ONLY using MIS Inksets (http://www.inksupply.com/bwpage.cfm). The 1280-1290 printers are supposedly particularly good with these inks. They advocate using non-Epson workflows with their inks, but I have found the Epson settings for matte paper at least to work much better than any of the non-Epson things with the MIS inks. (I realize now this is unclear so here is some clarification: MIS + standard Epson settings for Matte Paper/Matte Ink as per Computer Darkroom website = best combo. As with anything though, YMMV.)

On the other hand, there are a lot of printers that do color very well without even trying, but the options from Canon & HP might represent better values than some of the Epson printers.

In other words, glad you got these prints figured out. Welcome to the craziness.

[MichaelHarris]

LOL you're right it is craziness.  My prints were looking just as you described.  I never printed my own color because the results were so horrible.  Now  I'm going through my folders and printing like a mad man.

I can use B&W inks with this printer?  I'm definatly going to look into that.

Thanks

[MichaelHarris]

Jake I got the MIS inks today and ran some test prints.  Right out of the box using the Epson settings the results were very good with Epson Matte.  Right now I'm trying a print with Kodak Lustre and one of the curves MIS supplies.

I found this one box left sort of deal, Epson Professional Enhanced Matte.  Not sure if I will like it yet, that Kodak Lustre was always my favorite.  If I can get that working well with the Eson 1280 then all will be good, as for now the Epson glossy works real well.  I downloaded the ICC for the Kodak Lustre paper and we'll see.

[jake]

Oh you are fully hooked now. Yer talkin' curves and ICC profiles and and and...

I am not an organized man, but a friend who lives by his photography has a collection of ICC profiles and curves that must exceed the number that were in Photoshop to begin with. Amazing.