Hahnemühle matte paper printing problems

[philipus]

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Hi everyone

I'm noticing that the ink doesn't stick well on my matte Hahnemühle papers, the Fibre Duo, Photo Rag Ultra Smooth and the Museum Etching. It's mainly at the edges that the ink comes off in very small pin-point spots as seen on the below image. The lustre paper on top shows no such problems. 

I'm printing with a Canon Pro-1000 but I guess the question could be valid also for other printers so anyone's thoughts on this would be much appreciated.

Br

Philip

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[LocalHero1953]

Paper handling in the printer? Incorrect platen gap? Does your printer know the thickness?

[philipus]

Thanks for the reply Paul. Well I think it does. I use the Hahnemühle paper profile. None of the matte papers have fed incorrectly. 

11 hours ago, LocalHero1953 said:

Paper handling in the printer? Incorrect platen gap? Does your printer know the thickness?

[LocalHero1953]

I'm not familiar with the Canon, but paper profiles deal with colour rather than paper physical characteristics. For Epson printers you have to select a paper type as well (e.g. 'art textured') which comes with a paper thickness setting - most of the time this is fine, but the latter can be specified independently if problems occur. Such problems may not be shown by feeding failure, but by surface damage like this.

[Stuart Richardson]

I have printed for 10 years on Hahnemühle matt papers at my print studio, and I have not seen this issue, though I do use Epson, not Canon. Very occasionally, I will get this kind of gap in one place, and it is from where a particularly large piece of dust or lint settles on the paper, and then when it falls off, it leaves a white mark. To me this looks like some sort of abrasion or marking left by the paper loading. If you look at it, it seems to be occurring mostly in one line at semi regular patterns. My advice would be to clean out the printer and the roll feeders as best you can, or have a tech do it. Luster paper is the most robust of all paper surfaces, so it just might not be showing up on it. Another issue would be the platen gap, which Paul mentioned. Hahnemühle papers are for the most part substantially thicker than a typical luster paper, and the distance of the head from the paper has to be commensurately increased or the head can hit the paper. The marks that you show definitely look to me like the paper is scraping against something somewhere in the process, but I don't know anything about the Canon Pro1000, so I cannot diagnose it, unfortunately. 

 

If it is only one roll of the Hahnemühle paper, it could be the batch, but I think that is a bit unlikely. If it is, however, they should replace it for free. 

[Stuart Richardson]

Final questions, is this sheets or rolls or both? Does it happen all the time, or more often at the end of a roll? If you are using sheets, are they perfectly flat, or do they curl up slightly depending on the day/humidity? Again, this still looks like a loading or paper transport problem to me...just from the single picture anyway.

Edited December 13, 2019 by Stuart Richardson

[zeitz]

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Philip, I have used the same printer for nearly two years.  I have used Hahnemuhle Photo Rag in the past and have not had any problems.  I have compiled a list of suggestions.  You may have tried some or all of these, but I include them all for completeness.

1.  The only true printing software apps are Photoshop and RIPs (Raster Image Processor) such as Image Print.  Jeff S swears by Image Print.  At some point in the future I may try it.  The advantage of Image Print is that you can easily contact the actual people who write the code and discuss your problem if it still exists when using their software.  Photoshop was originally written for printers, not for photographers.  While the image processing side has developed over the years, it still retains its printing DNA.  All other photograph editing software discussed in this subforum is designed for editing, not for printing.  (This is a sweeping statement that will get me many hate responses.)

2.  What I hate about Canon printers - You have to set the paper size and media in at least two and sometimes three places.  If they don't match in every location, the printer is sometimes smart enough to recognize the mismatch, and sometimes refuses to printer.  But the printer is too dumb to work with the size and media being set in only one place.  Even a mismatch of "matte paper" vs "matte" can cause issues.  And the printer is too dumb to recognize all mismatches.  So make sure the media type is set in "printer manages color" even though you use "Photoshop manages color".

3.  What I love about Canon iPF printers - You can use the Canon Print Studio plug-in in Photoshop and bypass the printer drivers in Photoshop.  Print Studio is well arranged and has total print control.  The key feature of Print Studio is that can print "Color Management / Color Mode / No Color Correction".  Print Studio is well arranged and has total print control.  There is also a nice layout software plug-in that goes along with Print Studio.

4.  Here is the printing flow I use.  I do all my edits and save a .psd or .tif file.  I select "Edit/Convert to Profile" and apply the paper profile I want to use.  I then "Save As" a new file with a file name that gives the profile and indicates it is a printing file, not an editable file.  I then go to File/Automate/Canon Print Studio.  I print using the No Color Correction option discussed in the previous paragraph.  For your Hahnemuhle paper the media selection is "heavyweight" both on the printer and in the printer driver "Quality and Media" when the driver pops up.  You will see that in "Color Matching" all the selections are greyed out.  This work flow is referred to as Upstream Profile Application.

5. Hahnemuhle is easy to contact on-line and has a good history of response.  They only know the paper side however and likely won't know the issue on the printer side.

6. Canon can be contacted but they are unlikely to be of any help.

7.  You can contact a real Canon / Hahnemuhle value added dealer.  I will PM you such a contact.  This person sells Canon iPF printers, sells Hahnemuhle paper, is a Hahnemuhle certified master printer using iPF printers, and consults on printing with folks like us.  He is an expert on both Capture One and Photoshop.  He will know what the problem is.  If not, he can contact the correct people at Hahnmuhle and Canon to find out the problem.

[philipus]

Thank you very much, Paul and Stuart. I will take a look at cleaning the printer and at paper thickness. Actually the Hahnemühle Lustre paper I used is thicker than the Matt Fibre Duo paper that showed the problems (260 vs 210). The photo was printed on sheets which were lined up properly and perfectly flat (direct from the box). 

On 12/13/2019 at 9:54 AM, LocalHero1953 said:

I'm not familiar with the Canon, but paper profiles deal with colour rather than paper physical characteristics. For Epson printers you have to select a paper type as well (e.g. 'art textured') which comes with a paper thickness setting - most of the time this is fine, but the latter can be specified independently if problems occur. Such problems may not be shown by feeding failure, but by surface damage like this.

 

On 12/13/2019 at 10:31 AM, Stuart Richardson said:

I have printed for 10 years on Hahnemühle matt papers at my print studio, and I have not seen this issue, though I do use Epson, not Canon. Very occasionally, I will get this kind of gap in one place, and it is from where a particularly large piece of dust or lint settles on the paper, and then when it falls off, it leaves a white mark. To me this looks like some sort of abrasion or marking left by the paper loading. If you look at it, it seems to be occurring mostly in one line at semi regular patterns. My advice would be to clean out the printer and the roll feeders as best you can, or have a tech do it. Luster paper is the most robust of all paper surfaces, so it just might not be showing up on it. Another issue would be the platen gap, which Paul mentioned. Hahnemühle papers are for the most part substantially thicker than a typical luster paper, and the distance of the head from the paper has to be commensurately increased or the head can hit the paper. The marks that you show definitely look to me like the paper is scraping against something somewhere in the process, but I don't know anything about the Canon Pro1000, so I cannot diagnose it, unfortunately. 

 

If it is only one roll of the Hahnemühle paper, it could be the batch, but I think that is a bit unlikely. If it is, however, they should replace it for free. 

 

On 12/13/2019 at 10:33 AM, Stuart Richardson said:

Final questions, is this sheets or rolls or both? Does it happen all the time, or more often at the end of a roll? If you are using sheets, are they perfectly flat, or do they curl up slightly depending on the day/humidity? Again, this still looks like a loading or paper transport problem to me...just from the single picture anyway.

Hi Don, thank you very much for all these suggestions. I have so far (I got the printer this summer) used Photoshop for printing and find that it works well but I will definitely try the Print Studio plug-in. I had avoided it so far just because I am more familiar with Photoshop and like the results I get. It's a good point what you mention about setting paper size and media in more than one place. I will run a test with everything the same in all places. I also want to thank you for sharing your workflow. About converting to the profile, do you also make a selection already there regarding things like rendering intent, black point compensation etc (or is there no need to do so)?

EDIT: When the printer driver loads and I press Print there is an error that the "media type and paper size are not set correctly". But regardless what I select under Paper Handling the message keeps coming back (and all options in the other pull-down menus, such as Quality and Media, are greyed out).

I will try all your suggestions and report back.

br

Philip

17 hours ago, zeitz said:

Philip, I have used the same printer for nearly two years.  I have used Hahnemuhle Photo Rag in the past and have not had any problems.  I have compiled a list of suggestions.  You may have tried some or all of these, but I include them all for completeness.

1.  The only true printing software apps are Photoshop and RIPs (Raster Image Processor) such as Image Print.  Jeff S swears by Image Print.  At some point in the future I may try it.  The advantage of Image Print is that you can easily contact the actual people who write the code and discuss your problem if it still exists when using their software.  Photoshop was originally written for printers, not for photographers.  While the image processing side has developed over the years, it still retains its printing DNA.  All other photograph editing software discussed in this subforum is designed for editing, not for printing.  (This is a sweeping statement that will get me many hate responses.)

2.  What I hate about Canon printers - You have to set the paper size and media in at least two and sometimes three places.  If they don't match in every location, the printer is sometimes smart enough to recognize the mismatch, and sometimes refuses to printer.  But the printer is too dumb to work with the size and media being set in only one place.  Even a mismatch of "matte paper" vs "matte" can cause issues.  And the printer is too dumb to recognize all mismatches.  So make sure the media type is set in "printer manages color" even though you use "Photoshop manages color".

3.  What I love about Canon iPF printers - You can use the Canon Print Studio plug-in in Photoshop and bypass the printer drivers in Photoshop.  Print Studio is well arranged and has total print control.  The key feature of Print Studio is that can print "Color Management / Color Mode / No Color Correction".  Print Studio is well arranged and has total print control.  There is also a nice layout software plug-in that goes along with Print Studio.

4.  Here is the printing flow I use.  I do all my edits and save a .psd or .tif file.  I select "Edit/Convert to Profile" and apply the paper profile I want to use.  I then "Save As" a new file with a file name that gives the profile and indicates it is a printing file, not an editable file.  I then go to File/Automate/Canon Print Studio.  I print using the No Color Correction option discussed in the previous paragraph.  For your Hahnemuhle paper the media selection is "heavyweight" both on the printer and in the printer driver "Quality and Media" when the driver pops up.  You will see that in "Color Matching" all the selections are greyed out.  This work flow is referred to as Upstream Profile Application.

5. Hahnemuhle is easy to contact on-line and has a good history of response.  They only know the paper side however and likely won't know the issue on the printer side.

6. Canon can be contacted but they are unlikely to be of any help.

7.  You can contact a real Canon / Hahnemuhle value added dealer.  I will PM you such a contact.  This person sells Canon iPF printers, sells Hahnemuhle paper, is a Hahnemuhle certified master printer using iPF printers, and consults on printing with folks like us.  He is an expert on both Capture One and Photoshop.  He will know what the problem is.  If not, he can contact the correct people at Hahnmuhle and Canon to find out the problem.

 

Edited December 15, 2019 by philipus

[zeitz]

Philip, in the upstream profile application (Edit/Convert to Profile) and then in Print Studio (No Color Correction) is used, rendering intent is greyed out and can't be selected in Print Studio.  (Rendering intent is instruction to the printer what to do with out of gamut colors.  Perceptual is the normal choice.)  I did not see black point compensation in this print work flow.

[julianfarnandez5]

I have an printer (Epson WF-3640 Blurry Printing) and this printer i very good.But when I print on paper the print is totally hazy and looks not good. please help me to solve this problem.

[jaapv]

I would suggest that you contact your Epson representative or ask your question on an Epson/printing forum.