Bronzing/gloss differential on R3000 with IRK4-nano ink

Tin Ho

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Clement04 said:
Thank for the link I'll look at it soon.
An image can be seen here (I can't post any real link or image since I'm a newbie here):
imageshack.us/a/img809/3532/r00148752.jpg

Thanks,
Clment
Yes, that's exactly the kind of bronzing in the dark black area. I could not have missed it had I had a print like that.
 

jtoolman

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All of them! LOL
One the encapsulated their k3 inks, they pretty much solved that problem.
However if you were to see one of my prints printed through the R2000 and then through the R2880 you would immediately pick the R2000 print. Not just because of a color difference since they are pretty much a different ink set, but because of the gorgeous overall surface quality of the Glossy or Luster paper.
The surface quality is even better after my treatment. It is such a change for the better the I simply can not accept anything less.
As long as you do not have anything superior to compare it with, even my IS or OCP prints look great and I bet if your club members saw the difference, they would no longer accept what they perceive as good.
Once the prints go through the GO / 1400 printer, it simply is no longer a fair comparison.

Joe
 

Tin Ho

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Thanks Joe. I remember selecting among printers including R2000 and R2880 last year. I actually chose a R2880 because it used no gloss optimizer. I avoided R2000 because it used older inks including a gloss optimizer. Had I known it actually produces better glossy prints I might have thought about it more. As I said I print mostly matte paper with the R2880. In memory the colors from a R2800 was slightly more saturated than that of a R2000. The store I went to had demo prints of a same picture by all the printers they had on display, including a Canon Pro9000. I am totally novice to the matter of glossy prints except I know I disliked bronzing prints produced by dye inks. I like the feeling of fine art from a large matte print. I should explore the possibilities of glossy prints.
 

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Hi Clment,

I am not very active at this forum any more, as professional duties call... Anyhow: I too have some slight bronzing, but not as heavy as you do. I actually have much better results with the latest IRK4-nano ink. The first version has a very strange and weak magenta causing a drop in gamut and giving a dull appearance. You might try to use Image Specialist photo black instead or OCP K3 photo black instead. OCP K3 ink is satisfactory, though it causes a very strange bronzing on semimatte and pearl/satin paper, which is pretty well visible. Strangely enough this is almost none existing on glossy papers...

The latest IRK4-nano should give you pretty good performance. I am using it in my Epson Pro 3880 and my Epson R3000.
 

Tin Ho

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Had an opportunity to use the club's R2880 last night along with two club members. I was again impressed by the R2880. I wish I had gotten one myself.

The printer was set in using matte black ink for printing on non glossy photo papers. I wanted to print glossy prints so we had to switch it out. When we switched to a photo black cartridge it was rejected by the printer. The printer said the photo black (3rd party refillable ink cartridge) ink level was too low and had to use a new one. This was strange. We plugged in an OEM photo black and the printer accepted it. We tried the refillable photo black and it was accepted this time. We were able to print some glossy prints. The paper used were Costco's Kirkland Professional Glossy photo paper.

The prints were very impressive. I could hardly notice any bronzing or gloss differential had I not had it in mind and specifically looked for it. I did not see anything that suggested a bronzing. Rather, I saw some gloss differential that was barely noticeable if I had not looked for it. Everyone of us was once again impressed by how this printer performed last night. We all used it last year and the memory had escaped us so quickly only a winter of break away from using it. Unlike dye colors from my Pro9000 this printer yields a lot of very saturated reds, greens, yellows and blues by the pigment based inks of this R2880.

I specifically looked for any bronzing, which is supposed to have a metallic yellowing tint in the reflection from a darker area. I did not see any. What I saw was some density differences of reflection of light. I had to tilt the print to an extreme angel to get the light source (a desk lamp) reflected in the middle of the print. Nobody would view a print in that kind of angel. The print looked just like a glossy print is supposed to look. I brought with me a glossy print that was printed by my Pro9000 and did see that it was more glossy than the R2880 print over all. The pro9000 print may be more eye catching because of its higher glossy level but the R2880 print is definitely more impressive by its higher level of color saturation of deep and bold reds, greens, etc. I would pick R2880 over Canon Pro9000 to print my color photos.

We switched back to matte black without problems. The two friends printed some text documents on some plain paper. Again we were all impressed by how sharp and dark black the R2880 produced. The black text is not like that from a Canon using a PGI cartridge that it is much darker and sharper. Unlike Canon the ink does not spread into the paper and cause a loss in sharpness and boldness (darkness).

The only thing that we all were a little disappointed was the printing speed of the R2880. We all felt it was not because of the electronics that is slow. Rather, it has to print slowly to allow ink to settle or dry up on the medium before spraying another layer of ink over. Actually we are now concerned about the refillable cartridges we have now. They don't look pretty after all the abuses by dozens of club members last year. Probably need to get another set for spare.

The other thing is I don't understand why you guys kept on talking about mixed use of different brand of inks to fix problems here there. The Hobbicolors inks for the R2880 seem to work decently. You will have to contact Hobbicolors to order it though. That is a concern to me. I don't know if they have it in stock like they did when I called last year.
 

Clement04

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pharmacist said:
Hi Clment,

I am not very active at this forum any more, as professional duties call... Anyhow: I too have some slight bronzing, but not as heavy as you do. I actually have much better results with the latest IRK4-nano ink. The first version has a very strange and weak magenta causing a drop in gamut and giving a dull appearance. You might try to use Image Specialist photo black instead or OCP K3 photo black instead. OCP K3 ink is satisfactory, though it causes a very strange bronzing on semimatte and pearl/satin paper, which is pretty well visible. Strangely enough this is almost none existing on glossy papers...

The latest IRK4-nano should give you pretty good performance. I am using it in my Epson Pro 3880 and my Epson R3000.
Hi,

I switched to ConeColor PK ink (just this one), and it solved my problem! I don't understand why I have this problem while you don't have it. Very strange...
I think I'll stay with IRK4 inks for everything except PK.

Thanks anyway,
Clment
 
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