Rasterlinkers

[Neil]

This illustrates my point in reverse. What you're seeing is the artificial inflation of the sRGB color when it is assumed to be aRGB by your RIP. It will definitely be an obvious change. You may like it, and that is great, nothing wrong with liking it or your customers liking it. But it isn't accurate or true to the file.

Sorry, the geek in me feels compelled to make a point about how this works. If you like it, carry on and ignore me.


Just watch out that your flesh tones don't look wildly sunburned and grass go kinda neon. Stuff like that can be a problem at times.

I'm glad you pointed that out and it makes things much clearer.

I guess in the end we should have both input profiles in our arsenal, using one primarily and then switching to the other when deemed necessary.

 

[Neil]

if i design a website in photoshop and forget and use aRGB instead of sRGB when i publish it the color change is immediately noticeable.

Yeah, I get that problem because I work in ARGB space and use rgb vectors for some colours, when I send a pdf to the client, it blows the greens etc.

 

[signswi]

To throw some gas on the fire, this is changing--modern web browsers are beginning to support embedded ICC, and with the shift to more and more households having decent LCDs even on their crappy $500 computers color accuracy on the web is finally starting to show some improvement.

If you're shooting digital there's actually no reason to worry about this too much--shoot RAW and output for your usage (Adobe RGB or ProRGB for print work (whatever your workflow is), sRGB or device independent for web, etc.). If you can't shoot RAW/don't know RAW workflows--time to step up your game!

 

[sjm]

This illustrates my point in reverse. What you're seeing is the artificial inflation of the sRGB color when it is assumed to be aRGB by your RIP. It will definitely be an obvious change. You may like it, and that is great, nothing wrong with liking it or your customers liking it. But it isn't accurate or true to the file.

Sorry, the geek in me feels compelled to make a point about how this works. If you like it, carry on and ignore me.



I should not have used the word "wrong". I should have said it simply wasn't a properly color managed workflow. Just as above, you're running a workflow that does not respect the incoming working space. There is a mismatch between the file and what your RIP is setup to think it is. This can give you inflated (sRGB run through an aRGB input profile) or deflated (aRGB run through sRGB input profile) color. Neither is a proper workflow. But you may like the results of the sRGB going through a RIP setup with aRGB as the input profile because it inflates the color (artificially). Just watch out that your flesh tones don't look wildly sunburned and grass go kinda neon. Stuff like that can be a problem at times.

What this illustrates is learning to build a good profile and not relying on a stock profile. I think where you continue to make a mistake is that a CMYK workflow is not valid.

Maybe you can explain why it's important colour numbers are preserved in a CMYK workflow? "Safe" is the term I have heard mentioned?

 

[Neil]

What this illustrates is learning to build a good profile and not relying on a stock profile.

I think it's time to remind you the purpose of this thread.

It is to let people who use Rasterlink know that they can actually alter the the colour output they are getting by simply editing the print conditions.

This is not immediately obvious when you look at Rasterlink.
I had no idea you could and therefore thought I was stuck with whatever the profile/printmode yielded.

The Rasterlink profiling module is around $4000 extra.
I thought you needed this to unlock all the colour edit settings but you don't.

The stock profiles included can be improved a lot by simply changing some settings.

I am hoping to get other Rasterlinkers on board so we can discuss some of these edits with more detail. Like how to do it and what settings work best etc.

Maybe you can explain why it's important colour numbers are preserved in a CMYK workflow? "Safe" is the term I have heard mentioned?

I have no idea what you're talking about.
Why don't you start another thread where you can discuss that.
Whatever it is.

 

[sjm]

I think it's time to remind you the purpose of this thread.

It is to let people who use Rasterlink know that they can actually alter the the colour output they are getting by simply editing the print conditions.

This is not immediately obvious when you look at Rasterlink.
I had no idea you could and therefore thought I was stuck with whatever the profile/printmode yielded.

The Rasterlink profiling module is around $4000 extra.
I thought you needed this to unlock all the colour edit settings but you don't.

The stock profiles included can be improved a lot by simply changing some settings.

Edit it's cost the same $4,000 extra whether you own a $20K piece of equipment or $200K plus piece of equipment.

I am hoping to get other Rasterlinkers on board so we can discuss some of these edits with more detail. Like how to do it and what settings work best etc.






I have no idea what you're talking about.
Why don't you start another thread where you can discuss that.
Whatever it is.

That's the money question that separates the tinkers from the doers.

Edit: it still costs the same $4k whether you own a $20K or $200K piece of equipment.

 

[Hanzo]

It is to let people who use Rasterlink know that they can actually alter the the colour output they are getting by simply editing the print conditions.

Unfortunately, most dealers bundle Rasterlink instead of Wasatch, Onyx or PhotoPRINT. RL is a good RIP, but there are better options, specially when it comes to color management. Whenever possible, invest in Wasatch (BTW, the 16 bit rendering technology Mimaki is using in RL is owned by Wasatch). Stock profiles will get you by for now, but take action ASAP if you want more accurate results.

The Rasterlink profiling module is around $4000 extra.
I thought you needed this to unlock all the colour edit settings but you don't.

X-Rite Profile Maker 5 Platinum / i1 UV Bundle= around $2500
Wasatch SoftRIP 6.7= around $1495
Total= $3995

Add also additional cost for color training.

 

[eyecandy]

I've enjoyed Raster link pro3 That came with my Mimaki. I think it prints great. I create all my artwork in cmyk and it prints in cmyk. I'v even had to match/patch a wrapped vehicle's quarter panel that had been wrecked. I did not wrap this vehicle, so I did not have the file or the pms color chart to compare it to. All I did was take a high-res photo of the existing wrap. Imported the photo in CorelDraw. I used the eyedropper tool and clicked on the photo in which I took the closed up picture of the wrap. Then I used that eyedropped color on my layout..Did not know what the color was named or pms number...Then sent it to the printer and when it printed it matched exactly. The first print was exactly the same color!
I use this method all the time now. I have a lot of cheap customers that just want the hoods re-wrapped because they get cooked from the heat of the engine and the direct sunlight, so they just want the hood re-wrapped. I take a picture of the existing wrap that is on the quarter panel right next to the hood and it matches every time. AS long as you do not use flash . It has to be a good picture without shadows or highlights.

That said...I do have a problem with my Raster link pro3 right now. I defragmented my computer the other day and now raster link is super slow!!! I mean SSSSLLLLoOoooooooWwwww! I don't know what it did to it but It's like waiting on dial-up. Anyone know why this is? I'm guessing that I need to uninstall and then re-install. I just don't want to lose all the setting and files saved on mine now.

 

[Safetyguy]

Great Info!
Thanks Neil

 

[Neil]

Okay just digging up my own old thread as I've linked to it from elsewhere here. It looks like the tutorials link is non existent now, which is a pity as it was the most useful thing I'd encountered from Mimaki. There's a few good Rasterlink tutorials on YouTube though - and if they don't help you I have copies of the original videos saved here I could send if you PM me...

 

[sebb]

Okay just digging up my own old thread as I've linked to it from elsewhere here. It looks like the tutorials link is non existent now, which is a pity as it was the most useful thing I'd encountered from Mimaki. There's a few good Rasterlink tutorials on YouTube though - and if they don't help you I have copies of the original videos saved here I could send if you PM me...

Can you send me copies of tutorial videos for Rasterlink? thank you

 

[memeller]

You can still access the DSG Mimaki tutorials at https://web.archive.org/web/20120320221101/http://dgsmimaki.com.au/pages/tutorials/tutorials.html

 

[Jim B-]

rasterlink rip speed

compared to onyx, the rasterlink rip speed seems awfully slow. Any tricks for speeding it up. I have 8 Gig of ram, with a quad 3.8 ghz processor, and the machine is dedicated. We seem to wait forever, and the immediate print setting doesn't seem to help any.

 

[Solventinkjet]

Immediate print should be RIPing the file while it prints. It should be nearly instantaneous. Sometimes if the file size is really big it can have a few hiccups while printing but it will continue once it catches up. When you use immediate print what happens? I just printed a 93" x 30" 356MB banner on a CJV30 with Rasterlink and it printed right with no delay on a crappy test lap top with only 2gig of ram.

 

[Jim B-]

Immediate print should be RIPing the file while it prints. It should be nearly instantaneous. Sometimes if the file size is really big it can have a few hiccups while printing but it will continue once it catches up. When you use immediate print what happens? I just printed a 93" x 30" 356MB banner on a CJV30 with Rasterlink and it printed right with no delay on a crappy test lap top with only 2gig of ram.

How about when you have "arranged" more than one job? It waits for every job to rip before printing. Immediate Print seems to work on just one job.

 

[Solventinkjet]

When you arrange, it renders those jobs separately and then combines the data so immediate won't work the way it's supposed to. Unfortunately, I haven't found a way around that yet.

 

[Jim B-]

When you arrange, it renders those jobs separately and then combines the data so immediate won't work the way it's supposed to. Unfortunately, I haven't found a way around that yet.

Sounds like you continue to try and tweak this software. The only other thing I can think of and I haven't done it yet, is to change over to USB 3 instead of 2. I'm going to ask the guy who sold it to me and see if he knows anything