Pixma Pro-100 printing very dark

[kmyers]

Hi All, 

I just purchased my Pro-100 and installed last night. I upgraded from an HP that was strictly CMYK (only 4 ink). I installed according to the instructions, but my prints seem to be coming out noticably darker than they should be. The lime greens are printing a darker kelly green. The bright blues are printing a darker royal blue. The bright reds are printing a very dark red. The pinks are printing a dark shade of pink. Skin tones are much, much darker than they should be. 

I am printing from Adobe programs (Illustrator, Photoshop, and Pro - all CS6). Am I missing a setting somewhere? On my previous printer, I would choose "preserve CMYK primaries" and it printed perfectly. Now, I can't seem to get my prints a normal shade. I'm not attempting to "match my monitor", just simply trying to get the colors closer to their true color. I've unchecked preserve CMYK primaries and checked to have the printer decide the colors, but neither of those options seem to be helping. 

I called Canon support, but they were unable to help me. He had me put my settings all back to default and test print. When that didn't work he stated "well printers vary per brand so theres really nothing we can do to fix it". I can't imagine that this great of a printer prints that far off on colors. 

Any help is very greatly appreciated!

[castleb]

No worries. This is very helpful. Thank you!

[JMPaterson]

I have the same issue as above. I just set mine up and tried to print. This is my first fancy printer.

You said

"First off you must not let the printer set anything.  Turn off every bit off control it has.  You can do this with the Canon My Printer under the Printer Settings tab.  Do you know how?  I will guess, yes, for now but if you don't get back to me.

Second, you need to have PS handle all settings and color matching.  You know how to do this?"

Can you explain how to do this? Lay mens terms please. I am a complete newbie. Thank you.

[jrhoffman75]

See this thread.

http://community.usa.canon.com/t5/Professional-Photo-Printers/Issue-with-printing-from-Photoshop-vs-...

[kmyers]

JMPaterson,

The place I turned it off that made the biggest improvement for me was going to the following: (I'll try to do as detailed steps as possible, but if you have any questions, let me know)

Go to Control Panel

Open Devices and Printers

Right click the Pro-100

Click Printer Preferences

Click the "Main" tab at the top

There is a section halfway down titled "Color/Intensity" with two options

Choose Manual

Click "Set"

Click the "Matching" tab at the top

Choose "None" 

Save and close out

That almost completely fixed the problem for me. From there, I just had to make sure I was choosing the correct ICC Profile for what I was printing. 

I got the above and the selection of the correct ICC Profile from the help of the place I buy my paper. It's what worked the best for me and now my prints are great! 

[jrhoffman75]

kmyers is right.

Here is a visual along with how to set up PS.

[ebiggs1]

All well and good advise but if you don't have the monitor steps I suggested, you can forget the PS and My Printer settings.  Do the monitor stuff first!

[tollesonanne]

I recently purchased this printer and find that the photos appear too dark and not as sharp. I have spoken to 5 tech support people at Canon and still have the problem. I may have to sell it on ebay.

[tollesonanne]

I was told by Canon tech support to let the printer control the color settings instead of Photoshop. I couldn't figure out how to stop printer controlling colors so couldn't switch to Photoshop CS5. Help!

[jrhoffman75]

See this.

http://community.usa.canon.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/6982i6FA3D13B4B9AF7A3/image-size/origina...

[tollesonanne]

How do I disable the printer controlling colors?