Pixma Proo-100 Color Issues

[PeterBJ]

Ok well, i think my next move is going to be to grab a new pack of all 8 ink carts and give that a go, since these originals have been used over a year now, it may be time to replace or refresh them anyways. Should i do another print head flush with warm water? Or would just a deep clean nozzle purge be enough?

Your uploaded nozzle check shows no signs of clogged nozzles, only wrong cyan or wrong cyans. When a cartridge is changed the printer does a priming of the cartridges and print head. This will remove most of the wrong ink. One or two regular, not deep print head cleanings will remove the rest of the wrong ink. As the problem is only about wrong cyan there is no reason to change all the cartridges, only the cyan cartridges. You don't need to buy new cartridges, the cyan cartridges can be flushed with distilled/de-mineralized water and dried before refilling with the proper inks.

I once deliberately installed a photo magenta instead of a regular magenta cartridge in an iP4000 to simulate an error. I had no problems of changing from one ink type to another and back. The priming triggered by the cartridge change, followed by two regular print head cleanings removed residues of the ink that was previously installed.

Don't wash the print head with water. Cleaning the print head outside the printer is always risky, and should not be done unless absolutely necessary. Water left where it does not belong, behind the circuit board and the ribbon cable on the backside of the print head, can create leakage currents that can ruin not only the print head but the logic board in the printer as well making the printer a total loss. If a print head has been cleaned with water or other cleaning liquid outside the printer it is important that it is completely dry before reinstalling it. See this.

 

[Sammickk]

OK thanks to everyone I'm back in business!! Greens are correct and I can print again. Embarrassingly, I guess I did mix up the Cyans!!

Now all I have is My original Problem, I still have to Set my "COLOR/MANUAL INTENSITY ADJUSTMENT", under Print preferences, to "Intensity = -25"| "Contrast +15" (see attached picture)

If I don't set it this way, all my prints are what appears to be slightly over saturated and overall darker, Only the colors though. The gray-black scale seems unaffected.
Could this mean that perhaps I have switched the Magenta and photo Magenta?

I'm starting to think maybe I should just Flush ALL my colors. What do you guys think? you were spot on with the cyan mix up and thanks again for that

Edit, how long after flushing do the carts need to set? any tips on drying them? Canned, compressed air perhaps? I left the last ones to dry overnight.

 

[William Seaward]

My experiences tell me to let it sit a couple of days to dry. If you're using a scale, it should weigh approximately 13.6 grams empty.

 

[Roy Sletcher]

Time to get a grip and diagnose the real problem.

First off! No need to be embarrassed about doing stupid things. We have all done them at one time or another. I have ink stains on my carpet to remind me of this daily.

Secondly we need to look at the main problem. Despite your concern about flushing and drying cartridges, I see your main problem as:

Quote
Now all I have is My original Problem, I still have to Set my "COLOR/MANUAL INTENSITY ADJUSTMENT", under Print preferences, to "Intensity = -25"| "Contrast +15" (see attached picture)

If I don't set it this way, all my prints are what appears to be slightly over saturated and overall darker, Only the colors though. The gray-black scale seems unaffected.
End quote

Some of the foremost experts on this board have tried to give advice and you have not responded with answers. For example:

"Try printing a test sheet, for example this one: http://cream.sourceforge.net/ColorCard.pdf"

Did you do that and what was the result? This is second in importance only to a nozzle check.

Once we know all nozzles are firing and the head seems OK we need to know how the printer is printing a STANDARDIZED AND KNOWN SET OF COLOUR VALUES. Using that information is is usually pretty straightforward to pinpoint what is happening under the hood.

Sure it COULD be PC inks - Probably number 99 on a 1-10 list of problems.

Other information you could supply that would be useful for our resident experts here to consider a solution:

MAC or PC?
What brand and grade of paper?
Are you using a printer profile, or is the printer managing colour?
If a profile - Canned or home made?
Is your monitor hardware calibrated?

I don't classify myself as one of the experts on this site, but your settings of -25 intensity and +15 contrast do not seem right. The pro-100 is a well behaved and docile beast. Getting it to print excellent colour is simple and straightforward most times. I am sure when all the facts are know you will get this problem solved.

rs

 

[Sammickk]

OK I'll start answering all your questions I can,

1)PC
2)San Gabriel SemiGloss Fiber From redriver paper
3)Pro file Provided by red River for the paper
4) not sure I understand, Canned i think?
5)yes did the calibration test

Nozzle check came out clean, no smudges or streaking or lines or banding or anything. Not sure if all the colors are where they are suppose to be or not. Should I try uploading a picture? I don't think you could really tell if any of them are slightly off with a pic snapped on a phone... But if it helps I will do it.

Also attached is an image of the color card PDF, it printed everything on there good, no smudging or missing spots at all.

When the printer was first purchased it printed beautifully right out of the box, and continued to for a good while. You are correct the -25 intensity and +15 contrast was something I had to do in response to the printer just started printing darker for some reason. I was very similar to what happened when I mixed up the cyans, happened the same way, which is why i think it may be a ink cart problem. Either me messing up again or something else. Now if the print I'm doing is overall Light grey lets say, I have to return the two settings closer to 0 or the grey will be too light. This is why I think only colors are being affected, not the grey scale, but I'm no expert which is why I am here.

 

[mikling]

http://www.precisioncolors.com/PC42G_ICC.html

Red River Profiles are for Canon OEM ink. Why are you using that when there is a much superior solution with the PC42G? you get 5 lighting conditions as well whereas OEM and others give you just ONE. To get that versatility with Epson you'd need to get a RIP, or a Canon Pro-1 and 1000 using OEM.

I guess some folks just don't see the ridiculous value they are getting with the provided ICCs.

BTW, my Pro -1 inkset was finished this week. That printer is a monster when it comes to shadow detail. It walks over Epson like they were standing still. Their P800 was an attempt to improve the shadow detail over the 3880. The Pro-1 is still superior and if I could get a Pro-1000.

 

[PeterBJ]

Edit, how long after flushing do the carts need to set? any tips on drying them? Canned, compressed air perhaps? I left the last ones to dry overnight.

See this post by @ghwellsjr . This method for draining a Canon ink cartridge is also suitable for drying it after a purge. It is the method I use and recommend.

 

[The Hat]

When the printer was first purchased it printed beautifully right out of the box, and continued to for a good while.

Hurray someone mentioned profiles, as you said the printer worked fine out of the box till you started to experiment with it, and then things started to look odd !, try not to blame the ink for something you’ve done..

Go back to the start again and let the printer take care of the colour and just use the inbuilt media setting supplied by Canon and print this test file, (No alterations) then match it against your screen: - http://www.digitaldog.net/files/2014PrinterTestFileFlat.tif.zip

 

[Sammickk]

Hurray someone mentioned profiles, as you said the printer worked fine out of the box till you started to experiment with it, and then things started to look odd !, try not to blame the ink for something you’ve done..

Actually I'm almost certain a profile is not to blame, because I bought this printer to use specifically with the Redriver paper, I have never changed anything since i first got it and set it up. I print with the same paper always, it's what the printer is used for. Though I will try this anyway just to make absolute certain. My color shift that I had is allot more drastic than I have seen by swapping profiles, which happened the same way my cyan mix up did. This is why I think its something to do with ink. I have a whole extra set of CLI-42 Carts that I flushed over the weekend and are now drying, that I'm gonna give a shot (excluding the yellow because that color causes issues when precision Inks mix with Canon inks)

 

[Roy Sletcher]

Afraid I do not know enough to give a further definitive answer.
I was pinning my hopes of appearing knowledgeable if the OP was using a Mac.

Adobe`s new release of PS CC2015 5.0 has been a disaster for Mac users who try to use it for printing. Incorrect colours and worse. The blame game is in its early stages, but appears a fix will not be available til August.

All the Adobe Forums are lighting up like Christmas trees with the fury and frustration.

The story here.
(Although LuLa is a paid site - this story is a free download)
https://luminous-landscape.com/whither-adobe/
https://luminous-landscape.com/whither-adobe/

Back to the OP`s problem - The printout he posted of the colour ramps is very blurred and low res so cannot see much to diagnose the problem. Certainly the black and white ramp looks lacking in density, but again could be do to the low grade image.

Something has to have changed if previously printing OK. Lightning does not strike out of a blue sky.

Any of our resident experts have a better sense of the problem.

rs