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Pixma Pro-100 printing very dark

kmyers
Contributor

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!

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

ebiggs1
Legend
Legend

"... theres really nothing we can do to fix it"."

 

Well, of course this isn't true.  I have three of these printers in this line.  The 9000, 9500 II amd the Pro-100.

They all printed differently but after a little tinkering with the settings, they all did very well.  They are great printers.

 

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?

 

And lastly, it is essential you get some settings on your monitor that somewhat matches what the printer is printing.  Your printer may be doing exactly what you are telling it to do and you have no idea it is.  Because your monitor is off.  If you don't do this step, you can forget the other steps.  However, there are only a few things that you need to be concerned with.  You don't need any fancy extra add-ons to do this.

But you must get the grey-scale very close.  You need to get the brightness very close and you need the contrast very close.

 

After you do these things you can make adjustments to your prints by just looking at your screen.  Because you know the monitor and printer are on the same level.  One more point, you can NOT get a printer to print every color exactly the way you saw it.  It isn't possibile as all colors and adjustment effect all others.  My goal is to get the skin tones right.  That is what people notice.

 

For instance, I know my newest Pro-100 tends to print darker than what I see on the monitor.  So, I automatically know to set it's prints one stop brighter in PS.  It also prints with a slightly warn tone.  Most of the time, with protraits especially, this if OK but sometimes it is not.  In that case I adjust the "temp" setting slightly cooler in PS.

 

Make sure you have the correct ICC profiles and you are using Canon brand ink and paper untill you get good with the printer.  Very, very important!

 

EB
EOS 1DX and 1D Mk IV and less lenses then before!

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112 REPLIES 112

What I wound up doing last night was I cranked down the brightness on my monitor quite a bit. I just never had to do this with my Epson 1400, at least not that drastic. Thanks so much for your help. Steve

Just to confirm - when you opened the Outback test image you didn’t make any adjustments before you printed it? And your paper and media settings were confirmed?

John Hoffman
Conway, NH

1D X Mark III, Many lenses, Pixma PRO-100, Pixma TR8620a, LR Classic

The only thing i did was to resize it. The colors were accurate, just a tad too dark. I have to 'treak' the monitor settings i guess. 

The objective is that the Outback image prints correctly and you adjust the monitor so that it looks like the Outback image. Then when you edit and adjust your own images on the computer the prinyed output should look like the monitor.

 

If the Outback image is too dark for your tastes it depends by how much. You can dial in a printer brightness adjustment till you get the Outback image to your liking and then adjust monitor to look ike the Outback image.

 

You can adjust printer settings in the driver and save as a preset; then call up the preset when you go to print. Its hard dealing in words to see exactly what the output looks likeSmiley Happy; I've always gotten feedback that the Outback image looks great and the problem is elsewhere. 

 

 

John Hoffman
Conway, NH

1D X Mark III, Many lenses, Pixma PRO-100, Pixma TR8620a, LR Classic

Yes, the outback image does look correct. The problem lies in my monitor I've come to believe. I have an Epson printer, but need to get ink, but will let you know the results with that one. thanks for your help. Ink = $$$

 lol

Understand. If Outback is printing correct then printer is OK. Adjust monitor to look like Outback. Then adjust your image it look how you want. Then, when you print it it should look OK. I adjust my monitor to 80 cd/mm^2. Eyes quickly adjust. Plus I edit in a dim room. 

John Hoffman
Conway, NH

1D X Mark III, Many lenses, Pixma PRO-100, Pixma TR8620a, LR Classic

I'm running an iMac 5K retina display and every time i printed an image through lightroom or Print Studio Pro the colour was good, but the image came out darker on the Pro100. I calibrated the monitor with a x-rite colormunki display and printed out the printer calibration image you refered to and the printed Image looked great.

 

I compared the printed calibration image with the same image on screen and confirmed the screen was way to bright. I then dropped the brightness of the display until it matched the brightness of the printed image and now they both look great, with perfect colours and equally as bright.

 

Dont underestimate how much you have to drop the displays brightness. Mine is now down to 1.6 squares. Tip for Mac users, when you adjust the brightness using the F1 & F2 keys, the brightness is adjusted in full squares, (full stops). Holding the Shift and Option key whilst adjusting the brightness (F1 & F2 keys) will allow you to adjust the brightness with a finer control in steps of about 1/3 square (1/3 stops)..

 

Hope this helps the Mac users out there.

 

Can you help with these settings?
I opened the Canon My Printer and went to the Printer Setting tab, but not seeing anything to stop the printer from setting anything.
Thanks Much for your help!

Hi all:
I recently got a Canon Pro-100 (having used Epson printers in the past), and am having the same problems addressed in this conversation, but I have to admit that I am not sure I know how to do a couple of things that ebiggs suggested at the beginning of this thread: a) "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?", and b) have PS handle all color settings and color matching.Can you help me get started?

 

Also, I see references to "Canon My Printer": where do I find that?

 

FYI, I am on an iMac 2017, retina display, using Phtoshop CC 2018. Thanks so much!
rsonnino

For macOS the printer driver automatically disables printer color control if you select photoshop manages color.

 

Do you have the IJ Series printer installed and not the Bonjour or AirPrint version?

John Hoffman
Conway, NH

1D X Mark III, Many lenses, Pixma PRO-100, Pixma TR8620a, LR Classic
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