All reviews I found say that it prints out good photos, but these are not good. They are not mediocre - they are plainly unacceptable.
My previous Canon inkjet was 15 years old and it just died. It printed very nice photos. I bought G7020 and the photos on the same glossy photo paper come out washed out and low-contrast. The colors look good, but the blacks are just not there, they are just grey. As a result, overall contrast fades. I don't even have to compare - it just looks faded. Side by side with my old Canon - it's even more obvious. The difference is huge.
Is there something I'm doing wrong or I can do? If not I'd have to return the printer, shipping at my expense, so I'd rather fix this if possible.
- Everything has installed fine, printouts of nozzle checks are fine, and everything is clean and neat
- Document printing (black text) is fine
- Color balance looks good, other than washed-out blacks it looks good
- I tried printing from image viewer (Irfanview) as I always did, Photoshop with "Canon IJ 2015" ICC profile (disabled color matching in driver), Lightroom with the same profile and without, default Photo printing settings, also Standard printing settings (on Glossy Photo paper setting), the driver manages colors, or ICC profile colors. results are very close and all have washed out blacks.
- I also printed from my phone over WiFi via Canon Android app - got the same low-contrast grayish blacks. So it's definitely not software.
- I'm sure it's not possible for any reviewer to judge those photos as anything close to acceptable. And yet all photo reviews say it's OK. Nobody said "it's terrible". I'm not aiming for a pro level, but just decent everyday photos. Dark black hair looks grey, the face looks pale, etc. It looks just like someone has pulled the black level way up, destroying all contrast.
- Is there another ICC profile I could try, or a setting that I'm missing? Driver dialog looks very similar to 15-year old Canon, so I'm fairly sure I'm setting everything correctly.
- I'm aware it uses pigmented black not dye but it still should be able to print acceptable photos. I must be missing something...
