Getting consistent colors from different Tektronix / Xerox printers

Hello,

We are looking for a solution which would allow us to get printouts
from our printers which are more or less consistent with the images we
see on the screen. For now we have no color calibration solution at
all. Our setup is following: 3 x Windows based Workstations with Dell
2001FP Monitors, Tek / Xerox 750 DX, 780 Plus and 850 DP Phaser
printers and a wide range of software, anything from normal office
applications through custom DB design tools to Photoshop &
Illustrator.

The unlucky thing is that although all printers come from the same
company, the printouts using the ICC profiles provided with them and
identical driver settings (TekColor is off in all cases) are very
different in colors. 750 produces rather light images, 780 rather dark
and 850 is closest to what we see on display but is still quite off.

Should not the ICC profiles supplied by manufacturer for those
professional grade printers (At least 750DX and 780P can be considered
professional units) offer at least more or less consistent results?
Also, if we disable ICC and rely on printer's own TekColor correction
mechanisms, prints improve a little (Especially with sRGB setting) but
are still far from being similar to each other and screen.

Is the dedicated color calibration solution the only way to go? And if
yes, which would suit our needs? So far I have found 3 which would fit
in our budget:

Monaco Optix XR + EzColor Bundle + good scanner
ColorVision SpectroPRO Suite
Gretag Eye-One Photo Suite

The problem is: I have no clue which one would fit best to our
environment, firstly most of them are targeting Inkjets, while our
printers are Laser / Solid Wax, secondly I have read very
contradictory opinions about ezColor, some say it is good, others
claim that all "Scanner-Based" tools are useless because of poor
scanners. ColorVision products seem to be old and Gretag Eye-One Photo
claims to profile RGB printers only.

Please help, I am lost

Best Regards

Kirill

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I have written a Monitor calibration system with the sequel imaging probe,
and using the xyz space as the invariant space, and I use postscript mode to
pull out the xyz color directly out on HP and many hi end printer models,
sounds the results are way behind what we expect.
HP hi end ink give a better result thatn the Xerox wax, generally, I feel I
can get a 70% satisfaction on the color consistancy btw monitor and hi end
printers.


"Kirill Ponazdyr" wrote in message
...
Hello,

We are looking for a solution which would allow us to get printouts
from our printers which are more or less consistent with the images we
see on the screen. For now we have no color calibration solution at
all. Our setup is following: 3 x Windows based Workstations with Dell
2001FP Monitors, Tek / Xerox 750 DX, 780 Plus and 850 DP Phaser
printers and a wide range of software, anything from normal office
applications through custom DB design tools to Photoshop &
Illustrator.

The unlucky thing is that although all printers come from the same
company, the printouts using the ICC profiles provided with them and
identical driver settings (TekColor is off in all cases) are very
different in colors. 750 produces rather light images, 780 rather dark
and 850 is closest to what we see on display but is still quite off.

Should not the ICC profiles supplied by manufacturer for those
professional grade printers (At least 750DX and 780P can be considered
professional units) offer at least more or less consistent results?
Also, if we disable ICC and rely on printer's own TekColor correction
mechanisms, prints improve a little (Especially with sRGB setting) but
are still far from being similar to each other and screen.

Is the dedicated color calibration solution the only way to go? And if
yes, which would suit our needs? So far I have found 3 which would fit
in our budget:

Monaco Optix XR + EzColor Bundle + good scanner
ColorVision SpectroPRO Suite
Gretag Eye-One Photo Suite

The problem is: I have no clue which one would fit best to our
environment, firstly most of them are targeting Inkjets, while our
printers are Laser / Solid Wax, secondly I have read very
contradictory opinions about ezColor, some say it is good, others
claim that all "Scanner-Based" tools are useless because of poor
scanners. ColorVision products seem to be old and Gretag Eye-One Photo
claims to profile RGB printers only.

Please help, I am lost

Best Regards

Kirill

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Do the prints match each other if you create a standard RGB or CMYK
matrix of color patches in Photoshop? Have you set the rendering
intent of the output profile and input profile in Photoshop? Simply
loading the printer profile is not adequate to guarantee reproduction
to a monitor. How have you standardized the monitor? Is is balanced
for D65 or D50? Do you have an accurate profile of the monitor? What
is the ambient conditions? A hardcopy to softcopy match must also
control the ambient conditions, such as intensity and chromaticity of
the light source and surround.

Any of the systems you describe will be able to characterize your
printer and monitor. However, only you will be able to request the
correct combination of PCS parameters. This will require you to
thoroughly study the training details of each system.



Kirill Ponazdyr wrote in message . ..
Hello,

We are looking for a solution which would allow us to get printouts
from our printers which are more or less consistent with the images we
see on the screen. For now we have no color calibration solution at
all. Our setup is following: 3 x Windows based Workstations with Dell
2001FP Monitors, Tek / Xerox 750 DX, 780 Plus and 850 DP Phaser
printers and a wide range of software, anything from normal office
applications through custom DB design tools to Photoshop &
Illustrator.

The unlucky thing is that although all printers come from the same
company, the printouts using the ICC profiles provided with them and
identical driver settings (TekColor is off in all cases) are very
different in colors. 750 produces rather light images, 780 rather dark
and 850 is closest to what we see on display but is still quite off.

Should not the ICC profiles supplied by manufacturer for those
professional grade printers (At least 750DX and 780P can be considered
professional units) offer at least more or less consistent results?
Also, if we disable ICC and rely on printer's own TekColor correction
mechanisms, prints improve a little (Especially with sRGB setting) but
are still far from being similar to each other and screen.

Is the dedicated color calibration solution the only way to go? And if
yes, which would suit our needs? So far I have found 3 which would fit
in our budget:

Monaco Optix XR + EzColor Bundle + good scanner
ColorVision SpectroPRO Suite
Gretag Eye-One Photo Suite

The problem is: I have no clue which one would fit best to our
environment, firstly most of them are targeting Inkjets, while our
printers are Laser / Solid Wax, secondly I have read very
contradictory opinions about ezColor, some say it is good, others
claim that all "Scanner-Based" tools are useless because of poor
scanners. ColorVision products seem to be old and Gretag Eye-One Photo
claims to profile RGB printers only.

Please help, I am lost

Best Regards

Kirill

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