Why are the colors on screen and print different?

Hi flying tart,

Have tried to follow your instructions but OSX can't open profile files from OS9 - they appear as grey oblongs and double-clicking gives message about choosing an application etc.

Profiles are ubiquitous. It doesn't matter where they come from. You can switch them between a Mac and Windows computer if you want. It's probably just that OS X isn't recognizing them. Add a .icc suffix to the end of the files. Do they work now? If you double click on them after adding the suffix, they should open in ColorSync Utility and it will show you information about them. If they don't, then you likely didn't copy over profiles.

Printer does not seem to allow choice of profile

That part is confusing in OS X. You don't actually choose your printer profiles there. With the Epson printer chosen, you should also have a choice in the drop down menu of "Printer Color Management". There you would select the radio button for "ColorSync". Note though that you can't choose any profiles there. The print driver assumes you've already selected your profiles from the print dialogue of the application you're printing from before print drive dialogue comes up.

Let's say you're printing from Photoshop. You would:

1) Select Print from the menu. In the dialogue box that comes up, choose your printer.

2) Expand the print settings box if you need to (this doesn't apply in CS3, everything displays without having to expand the box). Where it says "Color Management", select the radio button for "Document". Under "Color Handling", choose "Photoshop Manages Colors". Select your printer profile in the drop down list. Select an Intent (I prefer Relative Colorimetric). Make sure "Black Point Compensation" is on. Click "Print".

3) When the Epson print driver box appears, choose "Printer Color Management" from the drop down menu. Select the radio button for "ColorSync".

How well color matches your screen depends greatly on choosing the correct printer profile for the type of paper you're using. Though that's only part of the full operation. Once you get it, getting the best color possible out of a ColorSync workflow is actually not that hard. But into the light goes on and you "get it", you feel like you're trying to read Egyptian hieroglyphics without ever having been taught how.

Let us know how things worked out.

Hi, Kurt,

Add a .icc suffix to the end of the files. Do they work now?

Yes, thank you. Have managed to select original SC760 plain paper profile. Blue is now much lighter , almost too light but you can't have everything, I suppose.

With the Epson printer chosen, you should also have a choice in the drop down menu of "Printer Color Management". There you would select the radio button for "ColorSync".


I am only trying to print from Word and these options don't appear. Is there anything else I could do or shall I just keep trying different profiles to see which suits best?
Thanks again,
Tart

Interesting. As far as I know, and can see in it's settings, Word is not ColorSync aware. In fact, it has no color controls at all. Where did you select your printer profile? In the Epson print dialogue? I was basing my instructions on the Epson 4000 we have here. You can't select a profile from it's print dialogue. But with the simpler C80, you can.

It sounds like you're on the right track though. While you may be using "plain" paper, there's no telling what type of plain paper Epson used when creating that profile. Various papers will give you equally various results.

Hi

I can see where Kurt is coming from and its more than possible that his suggestions will cure your problem, however I think the issue you are having is entirely different from the OP. I’ve seen a similar problem where the user has selected Photo Quality Output but installed 80gm plain paper, or selected output for plain paper and inserted Photo Quality Paper. Its also more than possible that the printer is faulty.

The Epson RX520 is an all-in-one, have you tried the photo-copy feature to see if you get a similar result? If this is a fairly new unit and it has always output prints the way you describe (as well as giving similar results when copying) then I would think about taking it back to the retail outlet you purchased it from and getting a replacement (if its still under warranty). Perhaps you should pursue this avenue rather than giving yourself a brain meltdown, it might prove to be a quicker route to a lasting solution.

One other thing, this model is pretty cheap even by all-in-one standards and to expect professional looking accurate prints similar to what you can achieve from something far more expensive is stretching your expectations a little too much.

Tony

Hi there,
Thanks for the replies. Kurt, I selected profile in ColourSync utility under devices / printers and then selected the profile I had put into the library from my old mac. I'll keep experimenting now I know how to change to different profiles.
Tony, I take your point about the paper but it is set to plain paper. I think perhaps you are right that the machine may be faulty because it is painfully slow too so I might pursue that.
Thanks for all the advice -
Regards
Tart

I selected profile in ColorSync utility under devices / printers and then selected the profile I had put into the library from my old mac.

Aha! I see what you're doing now. I'm so used to the app I use having full ColorSync control built in that I've never looked to see what you could do in the ColorSync Utility. Heck, as far as I know, what you did has been there since the beginning of OS X, though I didn't move to OS X until 10.3.x.

As you know, in OS 9, you could only set a few input and output profiles globally with the ColorSync Utility. OS X has taken that function way beyond OS 9 and allows you to assign a profile to each individual device. In OS 9, the global settings rarely worked for non ColorSync aware apps since they simply wouldn't pick them up. But you've proved that it works in OS X by getting a different result after assigning an output profile to your printer in the ColorSync Utility. Even though the app you're using (Word) has no color controls at all.

Here's the basic rules for using ColorSync when printing:

1) Have a proper monitor profile loaded in the Display section of the System Preferences.

2) Select the printer profile for the paper you're using.

3) (The biggie!) Apply ColorSync only ONCE!

I mention the last in particular since you may have unknowingly applied it twice (colors were too light) in your post above. That would have happened because you assigned the profile to the device in the ColorSync Utility. Printing out of Word caused the OS to convert your monitor profile to the color space of the output profile assigned to your printer in the ColorSync Utility. But then the output profile was applied a second time because you clicked the "ColorSync" radio button under the "Printer Color Management" drop down setting of the Epson print driver.

So what you should try is this when printing from Word:

1) When Word's print dialogue comes up, go to the "Print Settings" choice of the drop down menu first. Choose "Plain Paper". Use either "Automatic" or the "Advanced Settings" radio button to choose your detail level. Don't use the "Custom" button. There's a resulting drop down menu that allows you to choose ColorSync. If you do that, you'll be applying ColorSync to the output twice.

2) Go to the "Printer Color Management" section of the print dialogue and select the radio button for "Off (No Color Adjustment)". You want to do this since OS X is going to be handling the ColorSync conversion since you assigned your profile directly to the printer there. If you were to use the "ColorSync" radio button in this section, it would be applied a second time.

3) Click "Print".

How does that work?

Hi again,
Can't follow your advice exactly as when I click print I don't get a Print Settings choice on the drop down. I do get 'printer features' where I have chosen RGB colour rather than grayscale, CMYK etc.plain paper, automatic resolution, mixed text and graphics image type and economy print quality(because it is so slow). There is no custom button so I can't choose ColorSync there. Nor is there a 'printer colour management' section so all I can do is select a different combination from the 'output mode' 'media type' 'print quality' image type' and 'resolution' drop downs, then save each set under its own name and print to see which gives best results. I cannot understand why my old (cheap) Epson printer was so much faster and more accurate than this new one. And all I did was connect it up, choose speed or quality with the slider and print.
Regards
Tart

Dang! I was afraid you'd say that. 🙂 I was hoping since it was a newer Epson model, it would have pretty much the same print features. Obviously not. I tried to download the manual for your printer so I could look over the functions, but while the support pages displayed fine, nothing would respond to a download. I'll try again later.

Hi there,
Thanks for all your help. Problem finally solved - downloaded new drivers from Epson site as apparently I was using built in GIMP driver which gives poor results. This has greatly speeded up print times too!

Ah! That's why it was so different. I was thinking of linking you to the page of Epson downloads, but assumed you were already using the drivers provided with the printer, or ones that were up to date. Glad you got it figured out.