[Chwisch87]

Ok guys. Background. I use Lightroom 3 exclusively for photo management. I have a new canon pro9000 m.2, and some canon matte as well as some plus glossy 2 from canon. I printed out some pictures but they were not as good as i think this printer can do (not lab quality). Considering I just plugged it in and set everything on high and vivid lol. I would imagine the issue is some setting...

I'm not sure where to start. I know printers like this require some work and are not plug and play. I see things like color management settings in lightroom 3 and not sure what to set this too... does DPI matter? As you can tell I have a lot of questions and honestly need some help with the basics. This is obviously my first serious pro-sumer photo printer (first photo printer period lol) and just ... need help.

(yes this is like my third thread but hey, maybe it helps someone in the future lol).

PS - I have two Dell 2209WA displays. (IPS).

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Last edited by Chwisch87; 11-06-2010 at 09:16 PM.

[Miguel]

To do things right with a very good printer like yours requires a basic understanding of color management. That's way beyond the scope of a forum like this. Google color management and Lightroom. Adobe also has great information. I recommend Martin Evening's Lightroom 3 book.
Start here. And here. This too.

M

[imtheguy]

I can give you a to-do list having gone through the learning curve with the same printer recently with the help of Canon tech support.

The whole object is to get prints that match your monitor.

So first, you need hardware calibration (like the Spyder 3 or similar). Of course a decent monitor helps. Calibrate your monitor being careful that no artificial light is hitting the screen and affecting results.

Simplify the process by sticking with Canon brand (not clone) ink.

Start off with Canon paper and print using the Canon Easy PhotoPrint (EPP) utility instead of printing directly from LR or PE or CS5. This is because the ICC profiles for all Canon paper is built into the EPP utility but you can not add other profiles. The process to get the same results is more complicated to debug when using applications (LR, PE, CS etc). If you can't get prints that match the screen with the Canon utility, you won't either with an application.

In the Advanced tab of the EPP, make sure "Enable ICC Profile" is checked, and use "Perceptual" for home printing on the 9000Mk2.

If after the above you do not have matching prints, Canon tech support can help and will send you a hi-rez portrait to print with no adjustments as a correct looking sample.

i got there, you can too. I ended up sticking with the Canon print utility because its simple to use and always matches my screen.

Best of luck, let us know how you do.

EDIT - Just reread your post and it looks like you are using print driver settings to modify the print ( like "Vivid"). Suggest you do not do that but work towards prints that match your screen.

[Miguel]

The advice for having your two excellent monitors calibrated with a hardware device is spot on. If you have two IPS monitors, you surely need to calibrate them to bring forth their value. Calibration is not magic though, and it is near impossible for prints and the screen to look exactly alike: the monitor is backlit, the print is illuminated by external light. But you can come pretty darn close.

After that you are going to have to decide one of two paths for color management with a printer.
1) is having the printer (and not software including Lightroom) manage the color. So in Lightroom Print module you go to the Print Job section on the right and under the Color Management part you'll see the Profile drop down menu. You can choose managed by printer. Then you have to go into the Canon print dialog box and configure the color settings. In color mode drop down you'll have choices like Photo, Graphic, Vivid. Experiment and save configurations that work.

2) is to have software such as Lightroom manage the color. Then in the Profile drop down menu you will choose a profile that matches the paper you are using. You will also have to disable color management in the Canon print driver so it will know that LR is doing the work. I don't know exactly where the setting is for that.

The pre-requisite is that you load the appropriate Canon (or third party) paper profiles into Lightroom. That's pretty easy, but certainly research how to do that depending on the computer OS you are using.
Also you should choose the Perceptual rendering intent as a safe choice. Do note a future homework session on rendering intents.

If you are outputting B&W you will have to use the Printer Color Management settings. RTFM about proper settings for that, I don't have that model printer so I cannot help you specifically, but my guess it means checking the Grayscale Printing box.

The question is which way to go: printer managed or application managed. It used to be that application managed was the way to go because printer software was not too good. But those days have changed to an extent.

Except for B&W/Greyscale output, I always go with application managed, but I sell in galleries, teach color management classes, and consult so accurate prints are stupid important to me. Most of my peers do the same. Generally application managed is more configurable if you know how to use your software well.

That said, I've seen output from a printer managed approach that's equal or better than what I can do the other way, so. . .

I think Lightroom does an outstanding job with printing. If you already know the Canon printing utility (and it's pretty decent), then start there and enjoy your printer. If you don't, I would not burden myself with yet another piece of software to learn. Instead I'd focus on getting full value out of Lightroom and having it manage your output.

Realize that all of this incurs a big time learning curve. But great prints are worth it.

M

[Chwisch87]

Well this gives me a good starting point.

I have two Dell 2209WA monitors, which of course seem to be quite popular lol (and a macbook pro). I did a lot of research and settled on them for the IPS and budgeting editing monitors. I actually built my computer to handle ~23 MB raw files loading in lightroom. I'll probably pick up a Eye one display 2 here soon since I figure before anything my monitors need to be set to proper colours.