Color and print quality problems.

[MikeN]

Hello!
I have the Roland Versa-Camm sp330. And i am having some troubles fufilling a clients wishes.

I am printing on Convex outdoor vinyl(great stuff by the way). The client wants the 'half toned' look on the graidents, I have considered just drawing them in the file, but i dont want to be that cheap . So i am wondering what you reccomend for settings, to acheve a more 'dotted' halftone look for the gradients, from what i have read this also improves your solid fill quality?

The other problem i am having is color matching. The client requires a bright-lime-green color, ive matched it to Pantone 375C, however this prints really dark, more of an organic green. Do i need to purchase special ink? Or clean the printer? I cant seem to achieve any bright colors?

Thanks for all the help in advance!

-Mike

 

[mark in tx]

What program are you creating the "half-toned" look in?

What RIP are you using?

A CMYK printer is not going to hit all those pantone colors exactly in every instance. Some colors will never be exact.

 

[MikeN]

I am using the ColorRip 2.2

I know the CMYK colors wont be perfect, but i mean this is way off. As we speak, we just ripped off a spectrum of greens, the entire sheet looks like grass organic colors, we did half in RGB, half in CMYK - all of the greens are dark and gross?

It looks as if its mixing blacks or blues into everything..and not properly printing the colors.

 

[mark in tx]

You can go about things 2 ways, go into the RIpP and start playing with settings, until you get the results you want.
Or you can get your equipment profiled professionally.

The first method will cost you time, material, ink and will have to be done damn near every time you want to print something.

The second method will be done once, and you will be able to print correctly the first time, everytime.

Just my experience with both methods.

 

[gerald]

Are you using the right color profiles for your ink and media?

 

[Checkers]

Hiya Mike,
Profiling is the key. Not only do you have to profile your ink and media, you also need to profile your monitor and software. Without taking these steps, color matching and proper printing is a crap shoot at best.
Visit the link below to take a class on proper profiling. I.M.H.O., its money well spent...
http://www.graphintel.com/dsm/

Checkers

 

[Gino]

If the problems keep occurring, it sounds like you need to tweak your profiles, not your colors in the software program. That site mentioned would be well worth the trip. Try it… you might like it.

 

[Flame]

Lemme guess, trying to match Kawasaki green? Just have to keep printing off your wholoe gamut of colors.

Good luck. It was tough for me too.

 

[Jackpine]

Lemme guess, trying to match Kawasaki green? Just have to keep printing off your wholoe gamut of colors.

Good luck. It was tough for me too.

Try y=100, m=0, c=85 k=0...Artic Cat/Kawasaki Green

 

[BrookeWall]

I have the 300V (max inks) and get really good results on bright greens using:

C 35 to 40 (but sometimes go in rage up to 50)
M 0
Y 90 (sometimes up to 100)
K 0

 

[iSign]

surprised I haven't seen the word "Gamut" yet in this thread. Like Mark in TX said though... all the profile changes, file changes, & ink changes in the world will not change the fact that MANY color shades will NEVER roll off your printer.

I'm no expert by any means, but without converting to a 6 color set-up with the LC & LM added to your CMYK... I think the areas I've heard most difficulty in is some oranges & some greens.

Could you possibly use green media for this job? If it was just black & green thats what I would do.

 

[WB]

I know tried time and time again to hit colors on our solvent printers (Arizonas and Mimaki) only to settle for something "close". What you can try doing is printing off a large CMYK Color Chart try and see if you color is on that chart, if it's mot your most likely not going to beable to hit it.
Problem with solvent printers is that the ink just can't reproduce the large array of colors you can on an ink jet.