Epson R3000 not making me happy

I purchased the R3000 several months ago and ran about 8 or 9 prints (8x10) just to sample various papers with the same image, no problems there except I noticed the ink tanks were showing a distinct dip. Didn't think much of it. I just went to use the printer again after about 2 months (doing house renovation) and it immediately started giving me problems.

First it would not fully feed in the front tray. I called Epson, after 20 minutes on hold, and close to an hour with a technician, we got the thing to feed (had to open it up and visually guide it) but then when I went to print it kept saying I had the wrong media type loaded. All settings were checked with him, tried printing in Lightroom, Photoshop and Windows with no luck. Then he told me to reboot the router, and while I was doing that, he hung up or I got disconnected. Tried calling back immediately but got a recording saying that they were closed. Thanks Epson.


So I went ahead and made a print even though it said the settings were wrong. Print came out horrid, colors all off to the point the print looked almost like a sepia tone. (Just calibrated monitor with Colormunki too). Then to top it all off, I notice my ink tank readings...all tanks were emptying at an alarming rate...some almost 1/2 empty after 10 prints!!!


What is going on here?!

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

I purchased the R3000 several months ago and ran about 8 or 9 prints (8x10) just to sample various papers with the same image, no problems there except I noticed the ink tanks were showing a distinct dip. Didn't think much of it. I just went to use the printer again after about 2 months (doing house renovation) and it immediately started giving me problems.

First it would not fully feed in the front tray. I called Epson, after 20 minutes on hold, and close to an hour with a technician, we got the thing to feed (had to open it up and visually guide it) but then when I went to print it kept saying I had the wrong media type loaded. All settings were checked with him, tried printing in Lightroom, Photoshop and Windows with no luck. Then he told me to reboot the router, and while I was doing that, he hung up or I got disconnected. Tried calling back immediately but got a recording saying that they were closed. Thanks Epson.

So I went ahead and made a print even though it said the settings were wrong. Print came out horrid, colors all off to the point the print looked almost like a sepia tone. (Just calibrated monitor with Colormunki too). Then to top it all off, I notice my ink tank readings...all tanks were emptying at an alarming rate...some almost 1/2 empty after 10 prints!!!

What is going on here?!

Click to expand...

When you print and your printer nozzles are firing perfectlyu and yet your colors are way off it means your settings are incorrect or your double profiling. So check that when printing out of LR or PS you are turning off color adjustment off on the MODE tab in your driver. Click on it and all the way dow it will say OFF. Choose that

Now you can tell LR or PS to allow it to print using a icc profile for the paper you are using.

In light room you choose the ICC on the far right on the printing module.

In PS you choose Let Photo Shop control color and then choose the ICC for you paper.

The Paper Choice in the printer driver has NOTHING to do with any icc profile. It simply sets paramenters for ink layment and thinkness of the paper as well as which black to the printer will use.

Concerning the apparent ink use.

The R3000 uses stationary carts attached with ong tubes to the head dampers. All of this has to be filled and primed with ink, as well as enough ink through the head and into the waste ink pads to insure that there is no air in the systrem. That uses at least 25% of the ink although the didplay does not show so you will will not have a heartt attack immediatelly upon setting it up. However it will drop rapidly to the correct level upon further use. Almost sneaks up on youl. Except for the inks used to initially flush the head, the rest is still available as it was what was used to fill up the tubes and dampers. On you next set of carts you will not see that anymore.

Since your printer sat idle it probably also ran a cleaning cycle when you resumed printing. SO MORE INK was used.

The good think is that unlike its sisters, the R3000 does not run arbitrary purges between ink cart changes. Only those that carry the carts of their printheads will normally do that.

Joe

All that was done, color management was turned off everywhere, that was one of the first things I made sure of. The Epson guy made me re-check it, but all the settings were correct.

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

All that was done, color management was turned off everywhere, that was one of the first things I made sure of. The Epson guy made me re-check it, but all the settings were correct.

Click to expand...

OK. What was your OS again?

Can you please give us all you settings that were used? Then maybe we can detect something that may not bee correct. If you are able could you scan and post your bad print, the sepia looking one.

Joe

Here is the image and how it printed. I have Windows 7 64 bit using Lightroom 4. Settings are as follows:

Ink: Matte Black

Media Type: Cold Press Natural

Color: Color

Printer Quality: Quality

Mode: Off

Source: Front Fine Art

Size: Letter

PS: Ignore blurriness of printed image, I didn't scan, just took a quick snapshot...the actual printed image is crisp.

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

Here is the image and how it printed. I have Windows 7 64 bit using Lightroom 4. Settings are as follows:

Ink: Matte Black

Media Type: Cold Press Natural

Color: Color

Printer Quality: Quality

Mode: Off

Source: Front Fine Art

Size: Letter

Click to expand...

Yes but you say nothing about chossing an ICC profile in Light Room

Choosing paper type is not choosing an ICC profile.

sambucadog said:

Click to expand...

sorry, that was of course chosen 1st.


In Lightroom under Color Management on the right in the Print module the profile is correct...SPR3000 CPN MKv1, intent Relative.


No print adjustment

Is there somewhere else to choose the profile that I am missing?

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

sorry, that was of course chosen 1st.

In Lightroom under Color Management on the right in the Print module the profile is correct...SPR3000 CPN MKv1, intent Relative.

No print adjustment

Is there somewhere else to choose the profile that I am missing?

Click to expand...

Is that profile for one of the Sig Worthy Papers?

If I may suggest a simple test.

Download this file


Do NOT edit it in any way

Open it with Windows Picture viewer and print it to common glossy Epson Paper letting the printer control color,

Just chose the paper type and size and quality/ Under the MODE choose Adobe RGB

Print it

It should print pretty much perfectly.

Now in LR inside the print module on the left side, under printer setup set it up to Paper type, Size, Quality and turn off color management in MODE tab.

On the right side locate and CHECK the box for the profile for the paper you are using. Choose Perceptual intent.

Now before printing, go back to the develop module and click on the S key which will give you a Soft Proofed view of what it will look like when printed with those settings and that ICC profile.

You should be able to see some slight changes but if you are seeing the drastic results you are actually getting when printing than something is just not right.

You should only see some changes such as slightly reduced contrast and saturation but not the drastic change you are currently getting.

Joe

jtoolman said:

jtoolman wrote:

jtoolman said:

sambucadog wrote:

sorry, that was of course chosen 1st.

In Lightroom under Color Management on the right in the Print module the profile is correct...SPR3000 CPN MKv1, intent Relative.

No print adjustment

Is there somewhere else to choose the profile that I am missing?

Click to expand...

Is that profile for one of the Sig Worthy Papers?

If I may suggest a simple test.

Download this file

http://www.inkjetcarts.us/support/article/color-checking-test-chart-image-31.html


Do NOT edit it in any way

Open it with Windows Picture viewer and print it to common glossy Epson Paper letting the printer control color,

Just chose the paper type and size and quality/ Under the MODE choose Adobe RGB

Print it

It should print pretty much perfectly.

Now in LR inside the print module on the left side, under printer setup set it up to Paper type, Size, Quality and turn off color management in MODE tab.

On the right side locate and CHECK the box for the profile for the paper you are using. Choose Perceptual intent.

Now before printing, go back to the develop module and click on the S key which will give you a Soft Proofed view of what it will look like when printed with those settings and that ICC profile.

You should be able to see some slight changes but if you are seeing the drastic results you are actually getting when printing than something is just not right.

You should only see some changes such as slightly reduced contrast and saturation but not the drastic change you are currently getting.

Joe

Click to expand...

If Lightroom is showing SPR3000 CPN Mk1V as the profile I would be checking that that is actually the valid Paper ICC Profile you have made.


If you made your own profile for the paper, assume a ColorMunki I do not think that is a label extension it would use...or is it? and I would be using Perceptual as rendering intent

jtoolman said:

Is that profile for one of the Sig Worthy Papers?

Click to expand...

Yes it is

jtoolman said:

If I may suggest a simple test.

Download this file

http://www.inkjetcarts.us/support/article/color-checking-test-chart-image-31.html


Do NOT edit it in any way

Open it with Windows Picture viewer and print it to common glossy Epson Paper letting the printer control color,

Just chose the paper type and size and quality/ Under the MODE choose Adobe RGB

Print it

Click to expand...

Are you saying just to print the test chart or do everything stated on the link you provided.?

Does it have to be glossy? Changing from mat to glossy and back uses a lot of the ink, which seems to be disappearing anyway at an alarming rate.

jtoolman said:

Now in LR inside the print module on the left side, under printer setup set it up to Paper type, Size, Quality and turn off color management in MODE tab.

On the right side locate and CHECK the box for the profile for the paper you are using. Choose Perceptual intent.

Now before printing, go back to the develop module and click on the S key which will give you a Soft Proofed view of what it will look like when printed with those settings and that ICC profile.

You should be able to see some slight changes but if you are seeing the drastic results you are actually getting when printing than something is just not right.

You should only see some changes such as slightly reduced contrast and saturation but not the drastic change you are currently getting.

Click to expand...

Please explain to me what this is going to determine and how I would apply it to my situation, I don't understand. When I soft proofed the test page, there was a lot out of gamut. I have not printed it yet. When I soft proofed the horseshoe crab, all was in gamut. I am not seeing the connection to why my printer is apparently not seeing the ICC profile (or using it) and also why my ink levels are crashing.

Thanks for your patience, I'm not a very techy person!

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

sambucadog said:

Is that profile for one of the Sig Worthy Papers?

Click to expand...

Yes it is

sambucadog said:

If I may suggest a simple test.

Download this file

http://www.inkjetcarts.us/support/article/color-checking-test-chart-image-31.html

Do NOT edit it in any way

Open it with Windows Picture viewer and print it to common glossy Epson Paper letting the printer control color,

Just chose the paper type and size and quality/ Under the MODE choose Adobe RGB

Print it

Click to expand...

Are you saying just to print the test chart or do everything stated on the link you provided.?

Does it have to be glossy? Changing from mat to glossy and back uses a lot of the ink, which seems to be disappearing anyway at an alarming rate.

Click to expand...

Yes only the file. Then print it on Matte so you do not go through the ink change.

sambucadog said:

sambucadog said:

Now in LR inside the print module on the left side, under printer setup set it up to Paper type, Size, Quality and turn off color management in MODE tab.

On the right side locate and CHECK the box for the profile for the paper you are using. Choose Perceptual intent.

Now before printing, go back to the develop module and click on the S key which will give you a Soft Proofed view of what it will look like when printed with those settings and that ICC profile.

You should be able to see some slight changes but if you are seeing the drastic results you are actually getting when printing than something is just not right.

You should only see some changes such as slightly reduced contrast and saturation but not the drastic change you are currently getting.

Click to expand...

Please explain to me what this is going to determine and how I would apply it to my situation, I don't understand.

Click to expand...

What it will determine is that the printer all on it's own is printing correctly and not due to anything else such as the Photo editor or your settings! Usually this is first thing you should do the minute your printer is installed. Then you will eliminate the printer as being the culprit if anything does not look right down the road.

sambucadog said:

When I soft proofed the test page, there was a lot out of gamut.

Click to expand...

What is that profile you quoted previously? This you create it, or is it from EPSON?

Whatever you see out of gamut will not print! The printer will compress the out of gamut tones and values and attempt to fit them inside the color gamut that your printer can reproduce.

What paper are you using and are you then also using a MATCHING profile or one you made with your CM?

sambucadog said:

I have not printed it yet. When I soft proofed the horseshoe crab, all was in gamut. I am not seeing the connection to why my printer is apparently not seeing the ICC profile (or using it)

Click to expand...

Your printer will NEVER see or USE the ICC profile. The Editing software is watch uses ICC profiles to tell the printer HOW to reproduces as well as it can handle, the tones and values from your image. That's why you turn off color management at the printer driver level. You DO NOT want the printer to interfere with the commands that software, LR or OS is sending to the printer..... THROUGH the ICC profile for the paper you are using.

So Print that image I sent the link for. Use Matte paper setting as your paper choice. Print to a Matte type paper and set the driver to either enhanced matte or dual sided matted, Quality 4 or 5 and Adobe RGB in the MODE.

Send it from the WINDOWS Picture Viewer NOT LR or PH. It should print correctly. Then come back.

sambucadog said:

and also why my ink levels are crashing.

Click to expand...

As I mentioned earlier, your first set of carts will go fast. There is a lot of plumbing to keep filled.

sambucadog said:

Thanks for your patience, I'm not a very techy person!

Click to expand...

No Problem, we are here to help.

OK, I'll get to working on this in the morning. Sorry I missed the part on the carts and ink...I think I scrolled too fast or something! Or maybe I was just deliriously tired...

Will report back tomorrow with results. thanks!

PS: ICC profiles are all downloaded from the Epson site, used with matching paper. I have not had a chance to make Colormunki profiles yet, was hoping the Epson ones would be good enough.

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

PS: ICC profiles are all downloaded from the Epson site, used with matching paper. I have not had a chance to make Colormunki profiles yet, was hoping the Epson ones would be good enough.

Click to expand...

Are they the so called Premium Profiles for their Sig line?

One suggestion for you. Click on replly with quote so we can keep track on what has been discussed.

I will be gone all day tomorrow shooting a job but will be back online in the eve.

Do that simple test print first letting the printer contol color and Adobe RGB!!!

Then we will tacke printing out of LR or PS.

I also have made videos covering how to create Profiles with the CM in case you are interested in viewing them before going through the process.

Joe

OK, couldn't wait until tomorrow...lol. Test print looks great on cheap paper printed from windows pic viewer. Now did you want me to print the test image from LR on cheap paper or good paper? Or did you want me to try my image again?

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

OK, couldn't wait until tomorrow...lol. Test print looks great on cheap paper printed from windows pic viewer. Now did you want me to print the test image from LR on cheap paper or good paper? Or did you want me to try my image again?

Click to expand...

The idea is to print it on paper you would use for your actual image printing. You could just print a small piece.

The theory goes as follows.

If you print letting the printer control colors using only the Paper type and Adobe RGB and photo quality it your match the prints done through a Photo Editor, letting the software control color through the correct ICC profile, using the same settings fro paper choice BUT turning off color management at the printer driver.

They either match or be very close. Which the ICC printed one actually a bit more accurately rendered.

So you printed it on regular white bond paper? Or just cheaper photo paper?

I just downloaded the Epson profile myself, I was wrong, it is the correct profile sorry!, but I'd still use perceptual as the rendering intent with Art Papers.

Cheers,

jtoolman said:

jtoolman wrote:

jtoolman said:

sambucadog wrote:

PS: ICC profiles are all downloaded from the Epson site, used with matching paper. I have not had a chance to make Colormunki profiles yet, was hoping the Epson ones would be good enough.

Click to expand...

Are they the so called Premium Profiles for their Sig line?

One suggestion for you. Click on replly with quote so we can keep track on what has been discussed.

I will be gone all day tomorrow shooting a job but will be back online in the eve.

Do that simple test print first letting the printer contol color and Adobe RGB!!!

Then we will tacke printing out of LR or PS.

I also have made videos covering how to create Profiles with the CM in case you are interested in viewing them before going through the process.

Joe

Click to expand...

These are the profiles:


I'm ready to tackle the LR printing. Let me ask you...do you have a problem loading thick paper in the front tray? I have to open the top up and visually guide it, jiggle it (a lot) to make it go in the slot.

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

sambucadog said:

jtoolman wrote:

sambucadog said:

sambucadog wrote:

PS: ICC profiles are all downloaded from the Epson site, used with matching paper. I have not had a chance to make Colormunki profiles yet, was hoping the Epson ones would be good enough.

Click to expand...

Are they the so called Premium Profiles for their Sig line?

One suggestion for you. Click on replly with quote so we can keep track on what has been discussed.

I will be gone all day tomorrow shooting a job but will be back online in the eve.

Do that simple test print first letting the printer contol color and Adobe RGB!!!

Then we will tacke printing out of LR or PS.

I also have made videos covering how to create Profiles with the CM in case you are interested in viewing them before going through the process.

Joe

Click to expand...

These are the profiles:

Loading…

www.epson.com

I'm ready to tackle the LR printing. Let me ask you...do you have a problem loading thick paper in the front tray? I have to open the top up and visually guide it, jiggle it (a lot) to make it go in the slot.

Click to expand...

It should slide right in. Some are more finicky than others. Which of the papers listed are you using?