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Author Topic: Page Background set as black but prints faded gray  (Read 8020 times)
Gurrung
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« on: April 17, 2019, 04:54:29 AM »

Hi,
I have been using Qimage Ultimate for several years now.
My old pc died, and so I started building it from scratch.
Everything in Qimage works as always, but one thing is weird.
I created a template with a black background. (hue=160, rest is 0) It always printed pitch black.
Now on my new windows 10 machine (on the same printer, with the same ICC), it prints a dirty faded gray as background.
When I select bright red, it comes out bright red.
Its just the black that is faded to a dirty gray.
The black in images print pitch black, its only the page background that fades.

What can I do to fix this?
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Fred A
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« Reply #1 on: April 17, 2019, 09:11:54 AM »

Quote
I created a template with a black background. (hue=160, rest is 0) It always printed pitch black.
Now on my new windows 10 machine (on the same printer, with the same ICC), it prints a dirty faded gray as background.
When I select bright red, it comes out bright red.
Its just the black that is faded to a dirty gray.
The black in images print pitch black, its only the page background that fades.

What can I do to fix this?

Qimage has a built in Page Color Selector.
See screen snaps below.
I don't understand what you mean by HUE = 160. The rest = 0.
Does that refer to RGB values?
That will make a reddish black.

Try the built in page color button
Fred
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Gurrung
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« Reply #2 on: April 17, 2019, 10:11:36 AM »

Thank you for your quick reply.
The button you are referring to is the one I use.
On screen it looks perfect black. Hue fixed to 160, RGB=0
Only when I print the black page background, it comes out faded gray.

See attached photo
As you can see, it has perfect blacks in the image but not the background.
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Gurrung
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« Reply #3 on: April 17, 2019, 10:32:28 AM »

Something went wrong with 2nd attachment.
Here is the screenshot,
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Fred A
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« Reply #4 on: April 17, 2019, 11:22:30 AM »

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As you can see, it has perfect blacks in the image but not the background.

Try this experiment please.
Try a Print to FILE. See how the black page looks there.
If looks good, then the data sent to Printer is good.
Thumb of Print to File and snap of print to file image in queue.
Fred
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Gurrung
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« Reply #5 on: April 18, 2019, 04:25:33 AM »

I performed a windows 10 driver update, and even a risky firmware upgrade on my fully adobe RGB supported postscript printer.
All to no avail. (I tried both PCL6 and PS)
Do I understand it correctly that the printer first receives a command to print a black background and after that a command to print the image on top of that?

Please forgive me for not agreeing with your statement and suggested workaround process.
The fact that the conversion software understands the background command, does not mean that the printer receives the correct command for the black background. (Red background looks OK)

I must admit that I do not use a black background often, but when I do its usually 30-40 prints.
The last time was with the 2017 version. I am now on 2019.117p. (I am using QI since 2010, including the black background)
It worked before with win10 and the current printer. (Xerox Phaser 7100N using PostScript for best color gradient using Adobe RGB ICC)

What has changed in qimage that creates this anomaly?
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Terry-M
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« Reply #6 on: April 18, 2019, 07:29:36 AM »

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Please forgive me for not agreeing with your statement and suggested workaround process
I don't think Fred meant that print to file would to be a work around. It's a way of checking if the background data output from QU is correct.
Terry
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Fred A
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« Reply #7 on: April 18, 2019, 09:16:41 AM »

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I don't think Fred meant that print to file would to be a work around. It's a way of checking if the background data output from QU is correct.
Terry
Sir,
Terry has explained..... that I was not asking for a work around.
All I was trying to do was to get you to print to file, which if real black, would indicate the data being sent to the printer was pure. This would separate the problem to be either Qimage or the printer driver.
Just trying to help.
Fred
 
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Gurrung
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« Reply #8 on: April 18, 2019, 09:18:22 AM »

My sincere apologies if my reply sounded like a rant. It is certainly not meant that way.
BTW, i printed to TIFF and the black background was pitch black.

I am curious why it only happens with the black background.
And it only happens in QU  Sad. (Which I always use for printing simply because it is the best)

Other colours are correctly printed on my postscript printer.
That is why I think something in the black definition is incorrect.

I am not a colour expert, but might it be hue or perhaps saturation?
The default black background setting is Hue=160, Sat=0, Lum=0, R-0, G=0, B=0.
Could a setting be negative (-0) which causes wrong interpretation in my printer?

When I change hue, nothing changes in the print.
Also when I change printer ICC (even when turning it off), the background is not black.
(just thinking out loud)
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Fred A
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« Reply #9 on: April 18, 2019, 09:24:30 AM »

Quote
My sincere apologies if my reply sounded like a rant. It is certainly not meant that way.
BTW, i printed to TIFF and the black background was pitch black.
Thank you for the test.
Now we will turn the problem over to Mike. He has something to work with knowing the print to file was good.
Please pass along the make and model printer that produces the odd print.
Also the paper and the profile type.
Thank you
Fred
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admin
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« Reply #10 on: April 18, 2019, 11:36:25 AM »

My sincere apologies if my reply sounded like a rant. It is certainly not meant that way.
BTW, i printed to TIFF and the black background was pitch black.

This proves that Qimage is sending RGB 0,0,0 to the driver.  After that, it's down to the driver as to where the problem is occurring.  Why would black in your prints come out black and the page background turns out gray?  It comes down to how the driver handles print commands.  When Qimage prints the page background color, it sends a command to the printer that tells it to print a black rectangle covering the entire printable area.  It does this by specifying the upper left corner of the rectangle, lower right corner, and RGB 0,0,0.  The driver is then supposed to fill that rectangle with the color black.  This is different than when you print a black image: in that case, Qimage sends the actual pixels inside the rectangle rather than just telling the driver "create a black rectangle".

My guess is your driver has a bug where it isn't rendering black properly if it is asked to print a black rectangle just by specifying its coordinates and the black 0,0,0 color.  A workaround would be to create a small all-black image: say a 1000x1000 pixel image with all RGB 0,0,0.  Then instead of selecting a black page background, add that all-black image to the page using "fit to page" sizing with crop turned on so the black print fills the page.  Then add your other prints on top of that black image using freehand placement mode.  If it works, you could create a layout that has the all-black image covering the page and some templates on top where you can drag images.  It's a workaround but probably the best I can do since I can't fix bugs in drivers.

Regards,
Mike
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Gurrung
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« Reply #11 on: April 19, 2019, 04:00:13 AM »

Thank you very much for your explanation Mike.

You guess that it is my printerdriver causing the problem.
If that is the case then please explain why it has worked perfectly for 7 years.
Its the same printer, the same driver (there is no other driver) that previously worked just fine.

This is the reason why it is so hard for me to accept that its the driver/printer.
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Gurrung
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« Reply #12 on: April 19, 2019, 04:26:18 AM »

Also...I tried to find a way to create a 2 layered template but cannot find it.
Could you please give me some hints ho to do this?
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Gurrung
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« Reply #13 on: April 19, 2019, 04:32:59 AM »

let me rephrase my question.
How can i place my current template (with coloured rectangles and text) on top of a black image?
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Fred A
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« Reply #14 on: April 19, 2019, 08:37:29 AM »

Quote
A workaround would be to create a small all-black image: say a 1000x1000 pixel image with all RGB 0,0,0.  Then instead of selecting a black page background, add that all-black image to the page using "fit to page" sizing with crop turned on so the black print fills the page.  Then add your other prints on top of that black image using freehand placement mode.  If it works, you could create a layout that has the all-black image covering the page and some templates on top where you can drag images.  It's a workaround but probably the best I can do since I can't fix bugs in drivers.

This is what Mike is directing you to do

NO TEMPLATE NEEDED
Fred
« Last Edit: April 19, 2019, 08:56:19 AM by Fred A » Logged
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