ImagePROGRAF PRO-300 - grainy prints on Premium Fine Art Smooth paper

[WoosterWill]

Hi. I really hope someone is able to help me, please. I would like to know if I am doing something wrong here, or if some photos will never print well on certain papers.

I bought the Canon Pro-300 printer 4 months ago and until recently had only made gloss prints (using Photo Paper Plus Glossy II, then Pro Platinum). Every print looked stunning, so I decided to buy a pack of Canon Premium Fine Art Smooth paper (FA-SM2) and experiment with a different paper type.

I have now printed the same A4 photo (of a girl posing in her teal colour school prom dress) on both the Glossy II and the Fine Art Smooth papers, and whilst it looks amazing on the Glossy, the mid to dark colours and shadows look very grainy on the Fine Art Smooth. A lot of the picture is the silk dress, and on the Fine Art Smooth paper all but the lightest parts of the dress look grainy, as though it has a terrible disease. On the Glossy paper, the dress is perfectly smooth throughout, even when the print is enlarged to A3. The dress looks smooth on the digital file I am printing from, when zoomed in (please see Dropbox: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/4xgmeyh8rupefk1ik3qr2/APSXk5oaA26cWTmFIhxCUjQ?rlkey=te755ngxpdgq2lb5v...)

I have tried lots of things, including applying a Gaussian blur of 10 to the dress, switching between Perceptual and Relative Colorimetric, selecting a different media type (e.g. choosing the settings for Matte photo paper, but still using Fine Art Smooth paper), but nothing makes enough of a difference. If anything, using the settings for Matte paper gives a slightly smoother and better print.

I have made a print of the same photo using my old Canon iX6500 and the default profile for Matte photo paper (there is no profile for Fine Art Smooth). The mid shadows are better on the iX6500 than on the Pro-300, but the deeper shadows are better on the Pro-300. The colours are better on the Pro-300.

The fact that the shadows look grainy on both printers makes me think that some photos will never print well on Fine Art Smooth paper. Is this correct?

But maybe there is a setting I should change? Or might there be something wrong with my Pro-300?

Thank you so much to anyone who can help me. I don’t know what else to try.

I use a Windows 10 64-bit PC and Canon’s Professional Print & Layout software. The Pro-300 firmware is the latest version. The attached photos are pictures of a print made on Fine Art Pro paper, using the Fine Art Pro ICC that came installed, and using the Pro-300
All inks and paper are genuine Canon.

[jrhoffman75]

I know this doesn't address your problem, but I have a Pro-100. It doesn't have an ICC profile or media type setting for Fine Art Smooth. Several years ago someone on DPReview made one and offered it.

I just printed a test image using the furnished ICC profile and Other Fine Art Paper 1 as the media type. Image printed exactly as expected; no issues.

Did you verify that you are printing on the correct side of the paper? Print side faces the cardboard protector in the package.

Does a nozzle check print correctly?

I've never run into a situation where a particular image didn't print well. Did you try soft proofing to see if anything strange shows up?

[WoosterWill · Accepted solution]

John !!

The problem is solved, and you were right with your first reply...

I was printing on the wrong side of the paper.

I would say that the genuine Canon Fine Art Smooth paper had been packed incorrectly, because it clearly says that I should print on one particular side and I was really careful to do that. It was only when I printed on some Premium Matte PM-101 just now and the print was perfect that I felt sure there was nothing wrong with the printer itself - and the only thing left to try was turning the Fine Art Smooth paper over... The prints are now beautiful, even when printing from the original file that has some artifacts in the dress.

Thank you so much for your help, John. I really appreciate the time you have spent.

Will

[jrhoffman75]

Hi Will. It might be easier for folks if you put the files on a file sharing site like Dropbox or One Drive.

[jrhoffman75]

Hi Will.

I downloaded the A4 at 600 dpi JPEG you posted. I was going to print it on my Pro-100 and see what I got as an aid to others who might try and debug the problem

I opened the JPEG in Canon DPP4. I saw that the JPEG has similar artifacts. Here are two screenshots. In one of them I increased the brightness of the image to make it more visible. 

Here's a full size screenshot from Faststone Image Viewer.

[WoosterWill]

Many thanks, John.

Do you think I should expect the version of the file with added Gaussian blur to overcome the artifacts issue and smooth out the dress? Unfortunately, it didn't improve the print on Fine Art Smooth, whereas the Glossy II print looks great even without the Gaussian blur. It's a mystery to me...

Thank you again, John, for trying to help me.

Will

[jrhoffman75]

Hi Will.

I can't help with that; I don't use Ps and don't understand the various blur tools. Also it is confusing to me why the glossy paper doesn't seem to print the artifacts that seem to be in the original.

Hopefully someone else has some ideas.

[WoosterWill]

Thanks, John.

Even enlarged to A3 and without adding the blur to the dress, the print is absolutely perfect on Glossy II. It is a mystery. 

Thank you, again. I appreciate your help very much.

Will

[jrhoffman75]

Are you seeing the same artifacts I see when you look at the JPEG image? I guess you are using Photoshop. 

[WoosterWill]

Hi John.

Yes, I see the artifacts in the version of the file without the added blur. They are less noticeable to me in the blurred version.

When I started printing this image, it was on the Glossy II paper, and because it printed perfectly I had no cause to look for artifacts. But when I had such a terrible result with the Fine Art Smooth paper, I looked more closely at the digital file and noticed the artifacts - and applied a blur to the worst parts of the picture (mainly the dress). But while the blur improved the smoothness of the digital file, it made no difference to the print (on Fine Art Smooth).

I am really puzzled by the fact that the artifacts could make such a dramatic difference to the Fine Art Smooth print, which looks diseased, when they are not noticeable at all on Glossy II...