kcorcoran
Premium Subscriber
There's a couple of places I could have put this thread (Latex printers, Flexi, and here) but since color management is the primary theme, here it is...
Color Profiling in Flexi (v24) on HP 310
I'm a complete newbie to color management in printing and have only previously designed everything in CMYK if I was told it'd be printed or RGB if it was screen only. Now that I'm printing, I'm personally seeing the lack of color accuracy in my output.
I'm aware that nearly everyone says you can't get good/accurate color form an HP latex, and that's fine but it's what I have so I want to try to get the best I can from it.
I've watched as much indirectly related content as I could find.
I picked up an EFI ES-2000 (which shows up as i1Pro 2) as a device in Flexi.
I'm starting with GF-201 HTAP but I wanted to try to get colors relatively in the ballpark since the HP310 doesn't have a spectro.
Since there doesn't seem to be a comprehensive, step by step process for doing this that I could find, here's what I came up with based on everything I've researched.
- created a new substrate using the media settings from the GF201, temp, advance, tension, airflow, etc.
- created a new print mode (12p_CMYKcm_120)
- ran the printer's density and 'color calibration'
- went to Flexi and ran Profiling Wizard to create a new profile
- this is where settings seemed weird
- - even though I selected CMYKcm in the initial substrate print mode I can only select CMYK (8bit) as the color mode in the profiling wizard profile setup screen. The only other option there is Grayscale
- - can't select media, print mode, or dither
- if I select Driver Options, the media is there showing CMYKcm (efficiency mode off) and I can select the media and its available print mode.
(perhaps this is the way HP printers work compared to the ones they show in the walk through videos on profiling.)
But when I go to print, and select the profile in the output settings of color correction, print mode is locked to CMYK.
Aside from that I was able to create the profile, not sure how accurate it is because i'm not sure how to test it after creating it... but I did it, mostly.
My concern now though is I'm not too sure if I'm getting expected color as I only have a Pantone solid swatch book and realizing I should probably have the Pantone Bridge book for reference.
I tried a spot sample measurement with the ES-2000 of a physical item with a red, blue, green and yellow, using the Spot Color Mapping feature in Flexi Job Properties > Color Management > Color Mapping print settings. However, when I print the swatches the primary color (center) doesn't match the physical sample. I assume there's a variable between sampled color and output but if so, then wouldn't that skew the actual profile measurements?
Lastly, when I use that new output profile in color correction tab t print, color mode is locked CMYK only.
That said, I've been wondering about CMYKcm because I've almost run through my first set of CMYK but LC/LM seem to not be used barely at all. Maybe this is normal, maybe not.
If anyone has a step by step on starting from scratch with a new substrate including the order in which to do color profiling? I'd greatly appreciate it.
There doesn't seem to be a comprehensive step by step available I assume because of the vast number of printer and media combinations..
FWIW I also calibrated my monitor last night but I'm not sure how well I did so I'm going to try it again (BenQ PD2700U).
Color Profiling in Flexi (v24) on HP 310
I'm a complete newbie to color management in printing and have only previously designed everything in CMYK if I was told it'd be printed or RGB if it was screen only. Now that I'm printing, I'm personally seeing the lack of color accuracy in my output.
I'm aware that nearly everyone says you can't get good/accurate color form an HP latex, and that's fine but it's what I have so I want to try to get the best I can from it.
I've watched as much indirectly related content as I could find.
I picked up an EFI ES-2000 (which shows up as i1Pro 2) as a device in Flexi.
I'm starting with GF-201 HTAP but I wanted to try to get colors relatively in the ballpark since the HP310 doesn't have a spectro.
Since there doesn't seem to be a comprehensive, step by step process for doing this that I could find, here's what I came up with based on everything I've researched.
- created a new substrate using the media settings from the GF201, temp, advance, tension, airflow, etc.
- created a new print mode (12p_CMYKcm_120)
- ran the printer's density and 'color calibration'
- went to Flexi and ran Profiling Wizard to create a new profile
- this is where settings seemed weird
- - even though I selected CMYKcm in the initial substrate print mode I can only select CMYK (8bit) as the color mode in the profiling wizard profile setup screen. The only other option there is Grayscale
- - can't select media, print mode, or dither
- if I select Driver Options, the media is there showing CMYKcm (efficiency mode off) and I can select the media and its available print mode.
(perhaps this is the way HP printers work compared to the ones they show in the walk through videos on profiling.)
But when I go to print, and select the profile in the output settings of color correction, print mode is locked to CMYK.
Aside from that I was able to create the profile, not sure how accurate it is because i'm not sure how to test it after creating it... but I did it, mostly.
My concern now though is I'm not too sure if I'm getting expected color as I only have a Pantone solid swatch book and realizing I should probably have the Pantone Bridge book for reference.
I tried a spot sample measurement with the ES-2000 of a physical item with a red, blue, green and yellow, using the Spot Color Mapping feature in Flexi Job Properties > Color Management > Color Mapping print settings. However, when I print the swatches the primary color (center) doesn't match the physical sample. I assume there's a variable between sampled color and output but if so, then wouldn't that skew the actual profile measurements?
Lastly, when I use that new output profile in color correction tab t print, color mode is locked CMYK only.
That said, I've been wondering about CMYKcm because I've almost run through my first set of CMYK but LC/LM seem to not be used barely at all. Maybe this is normal, maybe not.
If anyone has a step by step on starting from scratch with a new substrate including the order in which to do color profiling? I'd greatly appreciate it.
There doesn't seem to be a comprehensive step by step available I assume because of the vast number of printer and media combinations..
FWIW I also calibrated my monitor last night but I'm not sure how well I did so I'm going to try it again (BenQ PD2700U).
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