HobbiColors for my iP8500 make prints look greenier

[Zakkorn]

Hi,
I just found this forum and I noticed that most of you have experience with other Ink makers apart the Official OEMs such as Canon in my example.
Less than 2 months ago I bought a new iP8500.
Imediately I bought through ebay the HobbiColors series that match this printer.
About a few days ago I began replacing the original Canon inks with HobbiColors refilled ink.
The 1st change was the Photo Magenta. I printed a sample image to check any difference and looked perfect (no difference with Canon's)
The next days I changed both Photo Cyan and Yellow, and when I printed a sample image it looked bluish, the yellow looked a little pale and the reds (in the image) lost their brightness.
I bough an OEM Canon yellow and removed the HobbiColor. I printed the same image and looked closer to the original (with full Canon colors). So my conclusion was that the Hobbi yellow is "weak" compared to Canon's.
Yesterday I changed the Magenta Canon with the Hobbi and again the print looked very close to the original (full Canon colors).
Today I had to change Cyan.
And that was the another slap in my face.
The print looked greenier. The Hobbi Cyan is as "weak" is the Hobbi Yellow to the Canon OEM.
I put the Hobbi Yellow back in the printer just in case both work better together. So I printed an image with Canon (Red, Green, Black) and Hobbi (Photo Magenta, Photo Cyan, Cyan, Magenta, Yellow) and the result was bad.
The man that was in the photo that printed looked "ill" and the overall print had less contrast.

Are they any specific settings for photoshop for the HobbiColors because I dont understand how most people find them even or better with Canon's OEM when I find them greenier and weak.

Just before you ask me about it, the printer dont look clogged. There are no strange or missing lines of colors in the prints.

 

[skypilot]

Hello;

I'm having the same problem with Hobbi-Colors. I've been using them for several months but have the same problem. I thought perhaps it was a print-head problem, as this can give the same symptoms. I've thoroughly cleaned the print head, and, a couple of months ago replaced it with a new one. Still green.

I'm glad to hear your report only to confirm that the problem might be with the ink.

Bob Coy

 

[jackson]

@skypilot
I use Hobbicolors ink in a Canon ip3000 and ip5000.The photo's have an overall 'olive' cast to them.
The effect is more pronounced as the price of the photo paper increases (and there is probably an excellent technical reason for this).
Because of this, any photo's that I wish to keep are processed by a lab, however I am satisfied with the plain paper graphics output and don't intend to switch (unless their newer ink is proven superior in my current hardware).
I have considered custom profiles, but am leery about the learning curve; on-line processing is cheap (compared to the price per print that I payed thirty years ago).

 

[Zakkorn]

@skypilot
I use Hobbicolors ink in a Canon ip3000 and ip5000.The photo's have an overall 'olive' cast to them.
The effect is more pronounced as the price of the photo paper increases (and there is probably an excellent technical reason for this).
Because of this, any photo's that I wish to keep are processed by a lab, however I am satisfied with the plain paper graphics output and don't intend to switch (unless their newer ink is proven superior in my current hardware).
I have considered custom profiles, but am leery about the learning curve; on-line processing is cheap (compared to the price per print that I payed thirty years ago).

@skypilot So I am not the only one to realize this.


@ jackson From your post I understand that you don't care as me for good quality in your prints because mainly you use your printer for simple stuff.
Unfortunately I am using the printer for show examples of my work to my clients so the print quality is what I care, as I am a Graphic Artist.
So at the moment 2 people that replied to my thread have the same or similar greeny result with the Hobbi colors.


Hmm.... still is early for a final conclusion but I don't think that will change from the conclusion I reached now. That the Hobbi Colors are cheap and close to the Canon range of colors but not suitable for photos or professional examples that need the maximum quality.

 

[Grandad35]

Zakkorn,

AFAIK, there is NO inkset that matches the Canon ink if you are fussy about your colors. If you are going to run a non-OEM ink and you want good color, you will need a custom printer profile for your inkset and paper combination. Ink sets are meant to be used as a complete set - changing out each color as its cart empties can cause some strange color casts that will not stabilize until all of the inks are switched over.

Hobbicolors won't disclose the source of their ink, so they are free to change ink suppliers at any point in the future, rendering useless any custom profiles that you buy or develop.

You should be aware that we have not seen any 3rd party ink that matches the longevity of the Canon ink against fading - details are contained in (http://www.nifty-stuff.com/docs/inkjet-fading.php).

This post describes how to use custom profiles with Canon printers (http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=625#p625).

As a Graphic Artist, have you calibrated your monitor with a colorimeter?

 

[Zakkorn]

Zakkorn,

AFAIK, there is NO inkset that matches the Canon ink if you are fussy about your colors. If you are going to run a non-OEM ink and you want good color, you will need a custom printer profile for your inkset and paper combination. Ink sets are meant to be used as a complete set - changing out each color as its cart empties can cause some strange color casts that will not stabilize until all of the inks are switched over.

Hobbicolors won't disclose the source of their ink, so they are free to change ink suppliers at any point in the future, rendering useless any custom profiles that you buy or develop.

You should be aware that we have not seen any 3rd party ink that matches the longevity of the Canon ink against fading - details are contained in (http://www.nifty-stuff.com/docs/inkjet-fading.php).

This post describes how to use custom profiles with Canon printers (http://www.nifty-stuff.com/forum/viewtopic.php?pid=625#p625).
As a Graphic Artist, have you calibrated your monitor with a colorimeter?

Thank you very much for the links.
I agree that if I print with the complete set of HobbiColors instead of a mix with a few Canon's OEM will be better, but not much better from the mess that it is now. Only Red, Green and Black remained Canon's OEM, the rest were Hobbi's.
Unfortunately I haven't calibrated my monitor as I don't have the money at the moment to purchase the SpiderPro solution.
But the problem would not be corrected. Because the prints are yellowish/green and a little washed with Hobbi's and the monitor is not that much different from the real photo I printed with those inks.
Before using the Hobbi's inks I had some custom printer profiles from the company that makes the paper I am using (Ilford).
If I use these profiles the result becomes worse. (even more yellow and washed).

Is there any general custom profile for Hobbi's colors on an ip8500 or similar printer?
Thank you in advance.

 

[Grandad35]

Is there any general custom profile for Hobbi's colors on an ip8500 or similar printer?

This is a problem with using non-OEM ink - the paper suppliers don't generate profiles for such small market segments (most people who use 3rd party inks aren't all that concerned about color). However, you can get a custom profile for only $40 (e.g. Cathy's profiles - http://www.cathysprofiles.com/), so it pays for itself very quickly when compared to using OEM ink.

Unless your monitor is calibrated, you should print grayscale images to judge the color of your printer/ink/paper combination. Once you get your monitor calibrated and your printer profiled, you'll wonder how you ever lived without it.

 

[Tin Ho]

It is a known inkjet printer problem to be impossible to print a grayscale that is not colorful. I have tried many times with OEM ink and I always get colorful grayscales. Do you think custom profile can cure this? I don't think so.
This is why people can't print black and white images using inkjet printers, except perhaps very few Epson printers which are only OK still.

 

[fotofreek]

MIS has black and white ink sets that take the place of the color carts for specific Epson printers. I believe they come with software to control accurate grayscale printing. The carts are filled with black plus shades of gray. As I recall, there was an HP inkjet printer in the last few years that had a black and a gray cart in addition to the color carts.

With some printers I have done black and white prints that were more neutral with the printer set to color instead of grayscale. I don't know why.

 

[Tin Ho]

It has something to do with color management. The grayscale image I printed was pure gray scale color data such as 255,255,255 and 120,120,120. The color data are gray but when printed by inkjet printers they do not look gray.
To say they are coloful is exaggerated a bit. But there are slight color tint in each gray printed. If you print a black and white image the print will have color tinit all over everywhere on the print. OEM ink or not does not matter.