How to - calibration/color mgmt with Caldera and aq inkjet

[RMarshall]

We're somewhat new to large format production in that we primarily do digital and offset printing/mailing.
A few years ago we bought an HP 560 so we could bring basic LF printing in-house.
We also have a Canon pro4000 that we use for higher quality products like photos and art prints.

After a few years of getting our feet wet I think that we're at the point where we need to lock down color management, specifically in regards to the Canon so we can offer "art reproduction" with more confidence and less manual color editing.
(I'm currently using media-specific ICC profiles provided by the paper metros/vendors and printing directly from the driver. I can print from Caldera but the colors are rarely accurate so Im stuck manually imposing jobs. Even printing from the driver requires manual color edits sometimes. No real issues with color on the HP mainly because our clientele doesn't require color accuracy on basic signage)

Before I try to convince the owner to buy a spectro and pay me to spend hours creating ICC profiles, can anyone tell me if this is the correct route to take?

I'll be the first to admit I dont have as experiential knowledge as a lot of you here, but luckily Im smart enough to be able to figure things out when I need/want to.
I'd appreciate any guidance or advice or literally any other information so that Im not blindly hacking away at a project that I will likely come to hate before I finish it.

 

[dypinc]

How much time and material do you waste trying to match or get correct color. That would probably easily pay for a spectro.

 

[ColorCrest]

I can print from Caldera but the colors are rarely accurate so Im stuck manually imposing jobs.

Colors are rarely accurate compared to what, exactly? Have you captured a controlled color source such as a Color Checker chart using a copy studio setup to judge the results while using a standard viewing area as well? Let's start there.

 

[balstestrat]

Get that spectro and maybe do a course from caldera.

 

[RMarshall]

Does it make much of a difference which spectro we get?

Its annoying that we have ones connected to our Fiery RIPs but they're only licensed to work with those specific computers so they're incompatible with Caldera.

 

[dypinc]

Does it make much of a difference which spectro we get?

Its annoying that we have ones connected to our Fiery RIPs but they're only licensed to work with those specific computers so they're incompatible with Caldera.

The EFI spectros are just Xrite i1pros. Yes they are dongled for Color Profiler.

Unless you have an older version of Caldera that does not support the newer spectros they will work just fine.

Our latest ES-3000 works fine with Caldera 14 and now 15.

What version of Caldera do you have and what versions are your EFI ES spectros?

 

[johnnysigns]

I was using an older version of Caldera, but we had great success getting much closer with an X-rite spectro and honestly just using the color mgmnt app in Caldera to build new profiles. We bought a Eye-1 at the time and hand scanned the color targets, but it made a huge change in our color accuracy. I think a pro would certainly get better results, but it made a massive difference on our old flatbed in doing it ourselves with the tools Caldera had built in to build a profile. I'm working on the assumption the newer versions of Caldera still have the color management/profile builder app in the software. The X-rite spectro wasn't cheap, but it was worth it for the display and signage printing we were doing.

 

[ColorCrest]

Does it make much of a difference which spectro we get?

You will want the i1Pro 3 Plus Publish package especially for the makeup of your particular shop and the type of work (fine art repro) you’re looking to do.

The Pro 3 has a wide aperture for large format and polarized light for reading textured media (such as canvas).

 

[RMarshall]

The EFI spectros are just Xrite i1pros. Yes they are dongled for Color Profiler.

Unless you have an older version of Caldera that does not support the newer spectros they will work just fine.

Our latest ES-3000 works fine with Caldera 14 and now 15.

What version of Caldera do you have and what versions are your EFI ES spectros?

Running Caldera 15
Our cut sheet Fiery has an ES-2000.

In the past Caldera told me I wouldn't be able to use the es2000 because EFI's licensing would conflict with Caldera's licensing and cause issues.
Naturally Im a little hesitant to play around with it to see if it will work because reinstalling/configuring Caldera is such a pain.

Maybe the es3000 is different and doesn't have licensing conflicts?

 

[dypinc]

Running Caldera 15
Our cut sheet Fiery has an ES-2000.

In the past Caldera told me I wouldn't be able to use the es2000 because EFI's licensing would conflict with Caldera's licensing and cause issues.
Naturally Im a little hesitant to play around with it to see if it will work because reinstalling/configuring Caldera is such a pain.

Maybe the es3000 is different and doesn't have licensing conflicts?

Trying to sell you a spectro were they?

The ES-2000 should work fine. Set it in EasyMedia as a X-rite i1Pro 2.

I have never heard of EFI's licensing that would conflict with other software. I have used ES-2000s with other RIPs. i1Profiler and also monitor calibration/profile software and and have never seen any conflict. I have a bunch of ES-2000s left over from Fiery controlled digital press that were traded in.

 

[RMarshall]

Colors are rarely accurate compared to what, exactly? Have you captured a controlled color source such as a Color Checker chart using a copy studio setup to judge the results while using a standard viewing area as well? Let's start there.

I know I know...thats a really subjective term and should have clarified.

If I print from photoshop using the print driver and media specific icc profile (the one provided by mftr/vendor) colors are pretty accurate to what I see on screen (m1 iMac), granted I have to turn screen brightness down.
If I print straight from Caldera the colors are darker and less vibrant across the board.
Besides not being able to accurately calibrate color, the main issue is that printing from photoshop is a pain and inefficient - I have to manually impose images, I can't use corner crop marks, there's no consolidated print history log, etc.

FWIW I recently tried 3 different ways of printing from Caldera, all using the same image of clients art.
(Maybe I'll try again with a test target when I have more time and motivation to experiment)

1. using caldera's default color mgmt (output profiles are adobe 98 / gracol 2013, both colorimetric with bpc) – print come out dark across the board

2. I saved the icc profile in Caldera's library folder so that I could choose it as the output profile. Brown/neutral area printed too red, reds were closer, grays were way too dark and cool, and greens were strangely bright - in some areas almost neon.

3. Caldera's tech support recommended using the media icc profile as the simulation profile. Brown/neutral area and greens were much better, reds were too dark, grays were closer temperature-wise but still way too dark.

 

[dypinc]

2. I saved the icc profile in Caldera's library folder so that I could choose it as the output profile. Brown/neutral area printed too red, reds were closer, grays were way too dark and cool, and greens were strangely bright - in some areas almost neon.

Not sure what profiles you are saving here.

Have you tried using the print driver media specific icc profile in caldera. Most times I have found that the printer drivers address the print different from the way the RIP do and is not an exact match. But it might be worth a try. I have not tried that with Caldera so I don't no what differences you might see.

I would try the ES-2000 with Caldera. I would trust it so much that I would be willing to try on of our ES-2000 right now if you would like.

 

[ColorCrest]

the main issue is that printing from photoshop is a pain and inefficient - I have to manually impose images, I can't use corner crop marks, there's no consolidated print history log, etc.

A quick fix for this is Qimage One found at the link...

https://www.binartem.com

It's inexpensive print layout software that will use your existing driver setup for the Canon and should produce the same results you're getting now.

Understand your present Caldera setup is not using the same calibration as your Canon driver, thus the differences.

 

[dypinc]

Another option to consider if you don't want to try the ES-2000 on Caldera is to create your profile with Fiery Color Profiler for the Caldera Canon setup. You can create RGB profiles . Export the targets as a PDF. Just print them with CM turn of in Caldera.

 

[Humble PM]

Sorry if this is a slight hijack.
We're currently running an 8400 through Fiery xpress, profiles produced with xRite prolier using a rev D i1Pro, on a rather old macpro running high sierra. Great neutrals, smooth tonal transitions, but not fast enough for practical work.
Had a sales call with a reseller, looking into Caldera, as we're looking to move up to a larger roll to roll aqueous, driven by a modern machine (likely mac, as we're almost entirely a mac shop). Reseller explained that Caldera can do per channel ink limits in the profiling module, going beyond the basic ink limitations from Xpress, which seems to piggy back the Canon print engine.
Any comments on how Caldera's profiles look compared to 2000+ patch profiles from Profiler? I know the rev.D is getting on, but is still reading charts from 10 years ago with a delta E of around 1.0, and producing good profiles, but is almost 12 years old, so liekly EOL... Would be nice to be able cut out the cost of a full profiler license as part of the upgrade path, with either an ES-3000, or i1pro3 basic.
Reseller offerd a hefty discount for chopping in the Xpress license. I'd like to start the transition before we get the new machine in, so I've got my head around the new software quirks and features.
Sorry again for the hijack, if you've got AM1 files for the media you're printing on, does Caldera recognise those?

 

[dypinc]

Sorry again for the hijack, if you've got AM1 files for the media you're printing on, does Caldera recognise those?

For iPF8400 no it doesn't. The best you can do is create a new media with the same name as you custom media. Then with the Canon utility you can find out what the base media (Canon default) and set that new media to use that base media. Not always ideal depending on the media settings on the printer. You also have to tell the 8400 to allow it to use a different media if different from the RIP than what is loaded.

 

[Humble PM]

I was actually wondering if this would work for OP's 4000.
Happy to set up new media, and build profiles - we chop and change around a lot of art materials (and banner, SAV etc), so it is part of the process. Tend to use the onsite media test image for the paper set up in the Canon utility, but would love to be able to set per channel limits on individual media.

 

[RMarshall]

Ok, so Im back.
I've never done a color calibration through Caldera and their documentation on the process is severely lacking so Im gonna hack my way through this.

Just plugged the ES-2000 into my imac that runs Caldera, created a new media project for the paper Im going to try and calibrate (kodak photo paper) and Im clicking through the calibration steps.
I have two options - "create profile with i1Prism V2" and "create a profile with OBC".
Regardless of which option I choose I have to select a device from a dropdown menu...go figure the ES2000 isn't listed.
Can I lie and say that Im using one of the listed devices or is there a way to "install" the ES so I can use it?
If we need to buy a new spectro so be it, I can happily add that to my list of things my boss needs to invest in lol.

Thanks for everyones help in my wild and wonderful world of being completely self taught :')

EDIT: saw that someone said to set it as the Pro 2...trying that now wish me luck

 

[dypinc]

For as what setting to set the ES-2000 Spectro I answered you in Post #10.

I usually use i1Prism V2 but in your case a would try both and see which you prefer.