Epson 1280 dye inks vs. Epson 3800 pigment inks
Recently, someone asked the question why the Epson 3800 they just purchased didn’t produce the “richness of blacks and saturation that I can obtain with the Epson 1280.” His main papers were the Hahnemuhle Photo Rag and the Epson Enhanced Matte. He also mentioned that he was a commercial photographer and used his printer mostly for his portfolio, and that image quality is his #1 priority.
The 1280 dye inks will typically produce on most fine art papers a D-Max that is 0.4 to 0.7 greater than what you can archive with the Epson K3 pigment inks (Epson 3800), even though they are super pigments inks. This means that where you might get a D-Max reading of 1.6 to 1.9 with the K3 inks on the Hahnemuhle paper, you can archive a D-Max range of 2.0 to 2.6 with the 1280 dye inks. This not only gives you incredible blacks, but in increases the richness and saturation of all your other colors.
If you’re not displaying your 1280 dye prints on a wall, but only in a “portfolio” book, they should last for decades. On the wall, even behind glass, you’ll be lucky to get 5 to 10 years before significant fading occurs. The K3 pigment inks will give you 50 to 100 years of display longevity (or more), depending on the media and other display factors.
Despite some of the limitations of pigment inks, they’ve come a long, long way since I started using some of the first pioneering inks. The gamut of the K3 inks is incredible when properly profiled. This may be part of the problem. Even the canned profiles that come with your Epson 3800 for Epson’s own media can be improved with good custom profiles.
I don’t get any money or brownie points for making this recommendation, but you should give Inkjetart’s custom profiling service a try. They typically have a profile emailed to you within 24 hours of receiving your printed targets. Some places charge as much as $500 for this service. This may be the best $25 you’ve ever spent.
Posted by Royce Bair on 02/12 at 05:50 AM
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