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New to the Canon Pro-4000; need some printing advice

epforever

Member
I just set up my Canon Pro-4000 a few days ago. Prior to this I had an Epson 7890, so I’m used to printing straight from Photoshop. For those of you who use this printer, a few questions:

- Are you printing from Photoshop or from Professional Print & Layout? And why? PPL seems to have more sophisticated / in-depth controls, but perhaps most of them are also available in Photoshop’s printing interface (haven’t done a detailed comparison yet).

- Can you recommend a good tutorial for PPL?

- What settings do you recommend for B&W printing? (On my Epson, it was converting the image to sRGB and using Epson’s Advanced B&W controls.)

- For B&W printing, in Photoshop’s printing dialog, under Print Settings > Quality & Media, there’s a checkbox for “black and white photo print.” Should I check that box? What does it do?

- What maintenance do you recommend to avoid clogged nozzles? I used to leave my Epson on all the time and print a nozzle check 2-3 times per week. I don’t print a ton; probably once a week or so.

- Any advice on using the Chroma Optimizer?

Thank you,
ethan
 

vjbelle

Well-known member
Ethan..... sorry I didn't see this sooner even though I cannot directly help you with some of your questions. I do print with an ipf8400 the Pro-4000 predecessor so there are many similarities.

I always print from either PS or sometimes Qimage. I like PS because I can use the Canon print plugin that I believe is now built into the driver for the '4000'. The Canon driver is very straightforward and I recommend that you try to print at 600 ppi and use bicubic for your upsampling which should be an option available in the Canon driver.

I've never used PPL and have never seen much info regarding using it.

I don't do much B&W printing but as I recall the driver handles all of the conversion. The B&W check box you refer should be referenced in the manual somewhere. Some of the other information you are asking about should be available in the manual for the '4000'. Believe it or not I actually make it a point to delve into manuals even if they are poorly written.

I take a very different approach for nozzle maintenance. I've owned Epson's and when a head finally would become clogged and wouldn't unclog I would throw the printer away vs. shelling out lots of money to fix it. With Canon's if a head goes bad its a simple procedure to replace it. Epson's really needed some exercising on a routine basis to keep the head clear of clogs. The Canons are supplied with many more nozzles than are needed to remap the head if a clog happens. Once all of nozzles are used up the head has to be replaced. There are times when I don't print for months and what I decided was to just let the printer stand unused. It automatically agitates the ink but I don't print anything until I'm ready to actually print an image. I think this preserves as many nozzles as possible but could be mistaken but that's how I'm doing things. I've had to replace both of my heads which was very easy and very cost effective. All I had to do afterward was create new icc profiles which is also very easy.

Can't help you with Chroma Optimizer as its not available on the 8400.

Hope some of this helps.....

Victor
 

epforever

Member
I always print from either PS or sometimes Qimage. I like PS because I can use the Canon print plugin that I believe is now built into the driver for the '4000'. The Canon driver is very straightforward and I recommend that you try to print at 600 ppi and use bicubic for your upsampling which should be an option available in the Canon driver.
Victor -- thanks for all the info. A few questions:

- When you mention the Canon print plugin and driver, do you mean Print Studio Pro? Or do you mean the dialog boxes that come up when you hit Cmd-P / go to File ... Print? I'm not sure what you mean by "the Canon driver." (And I've been printing for a long time.)

- I also don't see any place for upsampling (except, obviously, in PS's Image Size function) in Print Studio Pro or in the File .. Print dialog. Where is that?

- Interesting about printing at 600 ppi. You're saying that's better than 300 ppi, even if I have to upsample to get to 600?

thanks
ethan
 

vjbelle

Well-known member
Ethan.... the print plugin is a plugin for PS that allows upsampling to 600 ppi with a choice of upsampling algorithms. Of all the upsampling schemes I've tried I have yet to find anything visually better. The plugin does not change the file dimensions but does change the PPI. That plugin is not available for the 4000 series so I assume it is incorporated into the driver. I would be very surprised if Canon did not have a way to print with upsampling to 600 PPI. More than likely when 600 ppi is chosen the file is upsampled and there should be some way to chose the upsampling algorithm.

If you have enough pixels (minimum 50MP) I would recommend always printing at 600 PPI with a Canon. Even if the advantages are subtle I think it's worth it.

Printing at 600 PPI has to be available in the print dialog. Wish I could help you out but I've never used your particular driver.

You may want to contact their tech support. I had to contact them when I lost my ethernet connection and couldn't get it up and running. The guy I talked with was very thorough and had me up and running quickly on a Windows system. I could have printed from a Mac but I do all of my PS work on my Windows PC.

Sorry for not being able to answer all questions......

Victor
 

epforever

Member
Ethan.... the print plugin is a plugin for PS that allows upsampling to 600 ppi with a choice of upsampling algorithms. Of all the upsampling schemes I've tried I have yet to find anything visually better. The plugin does not change the file dimensions but does change the PPI. That plugin is not available for the 4000 series so I assume it is incorporated into the driver. I would be very surprised if Canon did not have a way to print with upsampling to 600 PPI. More than likely when 600 ppi is chosen the file is upsampled and there should be some way to chose the upsampling algorithm.

If you have enough pixels (minimum 50MP) I would recommend always printing at 600 PPI with a Canon. Even if the advantages are subtle I think it's worth it.

Printing at 600 PPI has to be available in the print dialog. Wish I could help you out but I've never used your particular driver.

You may want to contact their tech support. I had to contact them when I lost my ethernet connection and couldn't get it up and running. The guy I talked with was very thorough and had me up and running quickly on a Windows system. I could have printed from a Mac but I do all of my PS work on my Windows PC.

Sorry for not being able to answer all questions......

Victor

Victor -- thanks for the additional info. Oddly, I can't find anywhere to upsample before printing (except of course in PS's Image > Image Size). I checked the PS print dialog, Canon's Print Studio Pro and Canon's Professional Print & Layout.

I'll try calling Canon to ask about this. Yes, their tech support is very good.

thanks
e
 
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