Precision Colors PC72SE Pro-10 inkset on mid-to-shadow saturated reds/purples

[BrightGuy]

A year or so ago, I completely replaced the PC72V2+OEM-R inkset with the SE+OEM-R one. Overall, a considerable improvement in many aspects. Less bronzing, less gloss differential, larger gamut on greens (although welcome, it wasn't exactly my need) and other hues, but it lost a bit on the reds and purples, specially those mid to shadow saturated ones. On photo RC papers it's not a problem, as the new gamut, while narrowed on those hues, still reaches enough saturated mid-to-shadow reds/purples. But on fineart papers like Hahnemühle Museum Etching, the difference become visible and sometimes unpleasant because of banding and/or a too low gamut ceiling on those reds. Setting i1profiler smoothness parameter to the maximum value of 100 to solve/mitigate the banding, but of course the relatively narrow gamut on these mid-to-shadow red/purple tones remains, replacing it with less saturated orange-proned reds. Does someone has any experience replacing the PC72SE Magenta for the old V2 or even the PC1000SE-OEM Magenta? And would this recover that lost gamut area on reds without producing too accentuated side effects on other hues? Also, I recently read that it's possible to calibrate the printer, so change ink density. Would it be in some way possible to rise magenta density so I would mitigate the problem?

 

[palombian]

Calibrating the printer brings it to the standard, you can't change ink densities this way.

I am very satisfied with the gamut of the SE Magenta, but you could try the PRO-1 Magenta, exactly the same as the OEM PRO-10.

 

[Artur5]

How do you calibrate a Pro10 if it doesn't has an internal densitometer, like Pro1000 or (presumably ) the Pro300 ?

 

[palombian]

How do you calibrate a Pro10 if it doesn't has an internal densitometer, like Pro1000 or (presumably ) the Pro300 ?

You do this with your Colormunki, @jtoolman told about it.
Not that it is of much interest for someone who refills his own printer and makes custom profiles.

 

[Artur5]

Now that you mention it, I recall that José and/or Mike said something about that but I didn’t pay much attention.
Anyway, if we must rely on an external device like the Color Munki, internal calibrations of different printers would depend on the consistency and accuracy of that particular device, Maybe we could reset our Pro10 to factory defaults, but another user won’t obtain exactly the same results if his/her Color Munki unit measures slightly different. I think that, at this point, we’re splitting hairs.

 

[mikling]

Well the functionality of the Calibration is often misunderstood. If you are making your own profiles, would it make a difference? At first it may appear no. The ICC will compensate. And to this you are correct.
However suppose you've made ten profiles or even twenty. Great!
Now you get a new batch of inks even OEM for that matter. And the splitting hair person notices a slight drift. Now what?
They need to recreate ALL of their profiles?
Now if the person had calibrated prior to making any of their profiles. With this drift, then ALL profiles would still be good by just recalibrating.
Again, this aspect of performance is likely lost on the person who is refilling.
It is also lost on most of the printing community because it is a feature that is indeed splitting hairs and Epson would not rather not talk about it at the consumer level products. But you gotta give Canon credit for putting this level in the hands of those who want to use it.

Calibration might not help the initial thread issue. One attempt is to try pure OEM and see or you might have bumped into a weakness of the Pro-10. Here's another thing. Have you tried using Argyll CMS?. Different profile creating software will create different profiles. If you are having banding issues, typically it will indicate the quality of the software or the target itself. It tells me the software is missing a part of the character of the printer and the assumption in that area is not correct. I would use Argyll and use a three level or at least a two level target method. The first one tries to get an idea of the general shape of what the printer is capable of. The next set of targets will then further explore, more defined what the shape actually is. The third with more targets will then explore more accurately the printer potential. Each iteration yields less improvement. I have not uses iprofiler for over 7 years so I no longer remember what it does but at this time I stick to open source documented software. I really believe in Argyll CMS because it takes the correct steps in creating profiles.

 

[palombian]

Well the functionality of the Calibration is often misunderstood. If you are making your own profiles, would it make a difference? At first it may appear no. The ICC will compensate. And to this you are correct.
However suppose you've made ten profiles or even twenty. Great!
Now you get a new batch of inks even OEM for that matter. And the splitting hair person notices a slight drift. Now what?
They need to recreate ALL of their profiles?
Now if the person had calibrated prior to making any of their profiles. With this drift, then ALL profiles would still be good by just recalibrating.
Again, this aspect of performance is likely lost on the person who is refilling.
It is also lost on most of the printing community because it is a feature that is indeed splitting hairs and Epson would not rather not talk about it at the consumer level products. But you gotta give Canon credit for putting this level in the hands of those who want to use it.
...

I was thinking about using this calibration for 3th party inks, but thought it was a silly idea.

But if it readjusts all my profiles after a shift in OEM ink, would it work also when I change say the grey ink from 3th party supplier A to ink from supplier B ?
Or several colours at once ?
On the condition I use the same (Canon) paper to calibrate.

 

[Ink stained Fingers]

Canon, Epson and the other companies are installing icm profiles at the time of driver installation which easily can create the impression to the user that they are eternally valid, there are batch variations, ink variations, printer variations, aging effects etc but I never have seen a driver update for the reason to update a profile, not by the printer manufacturers , but as well not by paper companies offering icm profiles for typical printers - some of such profiles are many years old, and I just cannot believe that their current paper production still matches such old profiles.

 

[mikling]

I was thinking about using this calibration for 3th party inks, but thought it was a silly idea.

But if it readjusts all my profiles after a shift in OEM ink, would it work also when I change say the grey ink from 3th party supplier A to ink from supplier B ?
Or several colours at once ?
On the condition I use the same (Canon) paper to calibrate.

If the inks are close enough, it can readjust to reuse OEM ICCs to a degree. Not pefectbut better than no calibration and might be acceptable to the user. Creation of a new ICC is certainly better, but the calibration for an OEM workflow is ideally meant to use OEM products. Unfortunately on my Pro-1000. I do not recall the ability to create a custom calibration which is what would be ideal for aftermarket use of this. But remember, these tools are meant for OEM use. So keep that in mind.
You should also keep in mind that Canon engineers from the Pro-9500 days were concerned about ink color consistency. This tool is for that. They must know something about this to be concerned.

 

[mikling]

Canon, Epson and the other companies are installing icm profiles at the time of driver installation which easily can create the impression to the user that they are eternally valid, there are batch variations, ink variations, printer variations, aging effects etc but I never have seen a driver update for the reason to update a profile, not by the printer manufacturers , but as well not by paper companies offering icm profiles for typical printers - some of such profiles are many years old, and I just cannot believe that their current paper production still matches such old profiles.

This is certainly interesting and makes you wonder especially the aspect that one of the chosen papers to use in the calibration is Canon Photo Pro Luster. The same paper that Aardenburg found to be not desirable.
The calibration values are fixed inside the memory or file. So if printhead and inks drift and paper drifts all at the same time. The total of all three is compensated for because the target value is fixed. As long as the paper key characteristics don't drift too much. I am sure that Canon engineers figured out the foundational colors for each inkset/printer engine and knows what colors need to be matched to retain a consistent profile.