I read good stuff about Formulabs color accuracy and longevity. However, test on my ip5000 have some issues, especially with purple/magenta tints in shadows. Also, I'm getting more blending/dithering posterization than with the OEM.
Overall complaints about the ink based on bright room viewing of typical phots on range of subjects, based on color accuracy and smoothness of transitions:
*** Black seems weaker than OEM.
*** It tends towards magenta/purple in shadows and yellow in mids/highlights. Either can be corrected in print settings, but not both.
*** Prints of dark browns to black tend to go: brown>dark brown>*purple>black = a purple band which pops out. It's worst in brown but noticable in other colors. Often a band of blue, red or purple will pop right before black, depending. That means the mixed colors don't have enough density to get to black IMO.
*** Correcting shadows requires yellow/green which throws of mids and skins.
Correcting both mids and shadows via Photoshop was tried, but is essentially impossible and created posterization. For example, attempting to get an accurate dark brown means adjusting shadows in Photoshop to green, while leaving mids red/brown. That requires a lot of the printer and driver dithering, which winds up creating noticable color stepping (posterization) in the print, and can throw off nearby colors.
*** It *might* be possible to profile the ink using a scanner/IT8 target or color spectrometer, for satisfactory results. I'm ordering a IT8 chart for color profiling reagrdless, so I'll post the results.
Any info about the problem, a work around, or ink that performs better is welcome!
Overall complaints about the ink based on bright room viewing of typical phots on range of subjects, based on color accuracy and smoothness of transitions:
*** Black seems weaker than OEM.
*** It tends towards magenta/purple in shadows and yellow in mids/highlights. Either can be corrected in print settings, but not both.
*** Prints of dark browns to black tend to go: brown>dark brown>*purple>black = a purple band which pops out. It's worst in brown but noticable in other colors. Often a band of blue, red or purple will pop right before black, depending. That means the mixed colors don't have enough density to get to black IMO.
*** Correcting shadows requires yellow/green which throws of mids and skins.
Correcting both mids and shadows via Photoshop was tried, but is essentially impossible and created posterization. For example, attempting to get an accurate dark brown means adjusting shadows in Photoshop to green, while leaving mids red/brown. That requires a lot of the printer and driver dithering, which winds up creating noticable color stepping (posterization) in the print, and can throw off nearby colors.
*** It *might* be possible to profile the ink using a scanner/IT8 target or color spectrometer, for satisfactory results. I'm ordering a IT8 chart for color profiling reagrdless, so I'll post the results.
Any info about the problem, a work around, or ink that performs better is welcome!
