Great Pro-100 Profiles!

At this point I've finally refilled and reset all my CLI-42 carts with Precision Colors Inks a couple of times.
Earlier I had the common problem that many others have recorded. Slightly warm results.
Mikling's first set of profiles were no help. So I have made a couple of Colormunki profiles for a few papers and that solved the problem.

For the last several weeks, Mike has been very busy creating a full array of profiles which he has been adding to his ICC profile download page for the PRO-100.
I've downloaded and have installed all his Red River, Canon, Kirkland and Staples profiles and all I have to say is WOW! Perfect job!
Absolutely neutral and accurate results. I am afraid my Colormunki will be collecting dust for a while and will only be used for monitor recalibration every month.
I've viewed the gamut volumes of these profiles and their inherent very smooth shape of the 3D map, no holes or bumps, and right now there is nothing I would be able to do to improve their performance.

So if all you PRO-100 users have not used Mike's newest profiles for the PRO-100 I can say to you is to "RUN" over to the download page and grab them NOW.

Mike, I know very well the amount of work and effort you've put into these and I really appreciate what you have done. They are flawless. It's almost boring to print now!

Can't wait for the PRO-10 products.

Joe

It should be mentioned that Mikling's ICC printer profiles are only for Precision Colors Image Specialists inksets. If you use different third-party inks then they will not be a match.

Also, does Precision Colors do any tweaking of any of the colors in the CLI-42 inkset of the Pro-100? Mikling has done that in the past IIRC. If so, then even Image Specialists inks from another seller, for instance Octoinkjet, will not be a match.

Mikling does a superb job for his customers and deserves high praise.

Yes, the ICCs are only for his inkset.
I do believe that mike customizes the inks to be a very close match in color performance to OEM inks. Whether he personally blends them or Image Specialists blends them for him, only he can answer that.
I personally don't care who does it. They work perfectly and the retail cost of these inks is very low add to that the recent Canon Paper deals to these inks and I can afford to run the PRO-100 with zero concerns about printing costs.

As far as other inks, if you look on EBAY you will find lots of bulk inks supposedly for the PRO-100 but you really have to think more than twice about using any of these unproven inks.
I wouldn't touch them.
By the way I just registered one of my printers and was able to purchase two 50 sheet packs of Semi Gloss and got my 8 free packs, plus 50% off using the code Canon sent me after registering my printer. So I got 10 packs of 50 sheets / free shipping for $37.08
Joe

I have downloaded the

PC42KirklandProGlossy_D50.icm
PC42_RR_UltraProSatin3_D50.icm
PC42StaplesMat_D50.icm

And the Chroma seems high at a value of 10 for KirklandProGlossy, the most neutral is UltraProSatin3. I would say for commercial purposes the profiles could have been made better. As customers that understand color management would first download the profiles compare them with OEM, see the neutrality and only then decide to buy the inks.

I wonder if the method called "EZ ICCs with the Canon Pro-100" use the BPC ?
Since there is not such option in the printer driver.

http://www.precisioncolors.com/Using EZ Custom ICCs with Canon Pro-100.pdf

Do you see any difference in black point rendering if you compare it to Photoshop?

Smile said:

And the Chroma seems high at a value of 10 for KirklandProGlossy, the most neutral is UltraProSatin3. I would say for commercial purposes the profiles could have been made better.

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Not quite sure what you mean by this. Can you explain a bit more?

Smile, you're in the business of creating profiles. Can you quote me how much all the profiles I have provided for free would have cost me? Maybe I spent too much on the Xrite spectro. ((Remember, I don't have funds like Canon or Epson. 4oz of ink costs the user $6USD for the Pro-100 and $5USD for the Pro9000. That is approximately 8 refills or less than $1 per refill. So please quote me a reasonable cost. Oh, yes and I have to do these for all the supported printers. So please be reasonable about your pricing because my goodness, that will be hundreds of profiles if not close to one thousand to create for under $1500 and my time.))

The Chroma values are chosen by Argyll CMS and not within my control, or I don't know how to control them to be honest. Maybe Smile can discuss the issue with the author of Argyll CMS Graeme Gill (graeme@argyllcms.com) and why the chroma values have ended up as high as they did. That would help everyone creating profiles with his public domain software. If Graeme Gill, makes changes as a result of this discussion then I will be happy to rerun the profile creation program and repost the profiles. The readings are still the same. It is interesting because on that profile where the chroma values are high, Grandad35 ran some analysis ( http://www.printerknowledge.com/threads/profile-assessment.8249/page-2#post-64336 and the numbers seemed good these are the identical profiles for the PR1003 etc) But like I said, I am not qualified to comment so don't shoot the messenger. I'm just a user.
If you look inside the profile, Smile can extract the readings and then using his software provide for us all a superior profile to use. I certainly for one would welcome that file! and another thing, will that ICC profile be legal to distribute openly.

Oh, I haven't figured out FWA compensation as yet....I wonder if the RR Ultra Pro Satin3 with its minimal use of OBAs has anything to do with its neutrality? I don't know for sure.

Yes, I tweak when it is possible to improve a situation. Tweaking costs little but it is still costly in controlling mixes for consistency. Having custom inks made costs a lot more than off the shelf. I know. I have had some made for me.

Smile, you're in the business of creating profiles.

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Yes.

Can you quote me how much all the profiles I have provided for free would have cost me?

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How many profiles would that be?

Maybe I spent too much on the Xrite spectro.

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We use many spectros not just i1Pro, we use Isis, barbieri etc.

((Remember, I don't have funds like Canon or Epson. 4oz of ink costs the user $6USD for the Pro-100 and $5USD for the Pro9000. That is approximately 8 refills or less than $1 per refill. So please quote me a reasonable cost.

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Have no idea what did you meant by funds like Canon or Epson, but I make my profiles with utmost care, I have made certification for RGB printers too. Usually I suggest that client would print certification before target with OEM ink and then with the brand he decided to use. This way it's possible to compare the printing quality of compatible ink vs. OEM.

So please be reasonable about your pricing because my goodness, that will be hundreds of profiles if not close to one thousand to create for under $1500 and my time.))

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I can promise profiles of great quality (certification confirmed), given the fact all things are quality oriented (I mean Ink, paper). But If you want to make one thousand profiles for 1500$ that makes 1.5$ for profile. That makes me wonder are you serious.

The Chroma values are chosen by Argyll CMS and not within my control, or I don't know how to control them to be honest.

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Chroma is a measure of color colorfulness (how colorful or gray a share of color is). Chroma can be measured as internal or external (by printing certification target) value. This values shows how neutral the profile is. Therefore it speaks how good the profile corrects the colors for given device. How linear the device is you can see with the curves however.

So given the fact you trade inks, if I would be a client I would look for low chroma profiles and that curves are as linear as possible, close to OEM.

Maybe Smile can discuss the issue with the author of Argyll CMS Graeme Gill (graeme@argyllcms.com) and why the chroma values have ended up as high as they did. That would help everyone creating profiles with his public domain software. If Graeme Gill, makes changes as a result of this discussion then I will be happy to rerun the profile creation program and repost the profiles. The readings are still the same. It is interesting because on that profile where the chroma values are high, Grandad35 ran some analysis (http://www.printerknowledge.com/threads/profile-assessment.8249/page-2#post-64336 and the numbers seemed good these are the identical profiles for the PR1003 etc) But like I said, I am not qualified to comment so don't shoot the messenger. I'm just a user.

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I'm not into open source, I do use argyll for computational, comparison tasks given it is very flexible.

If you look inside the profile, Smile can extract the readings and then using his software provide for us all a superior profile to use. I certainly for one would welcome that file! and another thing, will that ICC profile be legal to distribute openly.

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I use my own methodology to make the profile targets, profiles, certification routines etc. The profiles do not contain x-rite copyright if you asking about it.

Oh, I haven't figured out FWA compensation as yet....I wonder if the RR Ultra Pro Satin3 with its minimal use of OBAs has anything to do with its neutrality? I don't know for sure.

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I can make OBA paper fluorescence testing using my own equipement and method. I can provide results as a graph. Furthermore RGB certifcation has both OBA and UVcut modes and there is a requirement to make both types of profiles. Then it is possible to see what performs better. No need to think about something you can measure and be certain about it.

Smile said:

Yes.
Chroma is a measure of color colorfulness (how colorful or gray a share of color is). Chroma can be measured as internal or external (by printing certification target) value. This values shows how neutral the profile is. Therefore it speaks how good the profile corrects the colors for given device. How linear the device is you can see with the curves however.

So given the fact you trade inks, if I would be a client I would look for low chroma profiles and that curves are as linear as possible, close to OEM.

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Out of curiosity I have also downloaded the profiles that you mentioned in post #4 and examined them in Gamutvision. When I look at the greyscale response of, say, PC42KirklandProGlossy_D50.icm, the linearity and chroma errors seem to be negligibly small, except in the very deepest tones where these errors are much less important anyway. I've given the Gamutvision analysis below and would be very interested to hear where you see the problems with it. Should I be looking at some other parameters?

I would also be interested to know exactly what you mean by "certification". Does this mean that you are accredited by some independent agency to provide certification? If so, against what standard do you certify a profile?

I would also be interested to know exactly what you mean by "certification". Does this mean that you are accredited by some independent agency to provide certification? If so, against what standard do you certify a profile?

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I'm using modified certification method derived from www.colorcheck-online.de I actually bought their offline software and found many errors that I fixed and also I added bunch of my own stuff I care about. So no I'm not accredited by anyone.

But as far as CMYK goes to issue certification on FOGRA you must have certified equipemnt + software to be able to certify proofs. One can go direct to FOGRA for the same thing but be prepared to pay hourly labor rate and huge prices.

That is why I do not like the word "Professional" - that nowdays means nothing, you have to take your work seriously to have serious results.

I never used Gamutvision for anything else than specialized tasks like sharpness tests, etc. Or Dmax calculation.

Here is a colorthink analysis that speaks for itself: