Ken,
You appear to be doing it exactly the correct way. Just make sure that you select Main/Color Intensity, select Manual and select None. But I bet you have already done this. I have a Canon Pro9000 MkII that it is a little harder to find the None setting on.

Steve W.

Terry,
If you are questioning what the number means - it is the print quality setting under Main/Print Quality/Custom in the printer driver setup. 1 is Highest Quality and 2, 3 ,4 are lower. So Photo Paper Pro 1 is highest quality print setting with that particular Canon paper, etc.

Steve W.

Terry,
Are you sure that there were not a set of Canon paper profiles installed when the ip4700 printer driver was installed? I have many Canon printers (but not the ip4700) and everyone installed a set of Canon paper profiles for their various papers. Also see this post on dpreview from another ip4700 owner: http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1003&message=33861505&changemode=1
He seems to have gotten a set of profiles to install.

Steve W.

I use an Epson V500 to generate the scans for PP. This scanner uses an LED light source - not sure what the 1600 uses. I also have a Canon LiDE 200 but think my PP profiles from the Epson V500 make better prints, have better histograms and fewer Xs. My printer is the Canon Pixma Pro 9000 Mk II presently using Canon OEM inks (will eventually use IS inks in this printer when I get empty cartridges for refilling - new profiles of course). I am profiling Red River Ultra Pro Luster paper. I found that the Red River profiles for my printer gave a much darker print than I wanted. My PP profiles for my equipment combo (in XP Home SP3) are very good in my eyes. The initial profile does have a slight blue-green tint that I edit out with the PP profile editor. The print exposure is right on in the original profile. Target is printed from Qimage using the included target printing settings and CM turned off in the printer. My scanning is done with VueScan set to 4 passes per scan, 48 bit scan, 300 dpi and RAW output. Good histograms and few Xs. Also get good profiles on Staples Premium Matte paper using this setup. Monitor (Dell 2209wa) is calibrated with an I1D2.
I personally think your problems are with the scanner. Even though your histograms and number of X's are good, the scanner light source could be causing the color shifts.

Steve W.

I was wondering about that too after you brought it up. Tried turning ClearType ON and OFF while watching my desktop. Only thing I saw was the thickening of the type fonts when it was applied - no change in brightness or contrast that I could see. Glad that was cleared up - it was concerning me and how the monitor would calibrate.

Steve W.

Hi Fred,
I was just getting ready to answer your question about selecting and using profiles in Elements 8 when I saw you had answered your own question.
It is not easy to set it up in Elements. Actually I spent a few minutes trying to find out what I had done myself. As I said earlier, it is so much easier in Qimage. I do my major edits in Elements and save the image for printing in Qimage.

Steve W.

Elements 8 can definitely use printer profiles in the same way Qimage does. Select the desired printer profile and make sure that color management is turned off in the printer. I have run comparisons of prints from Qimage and Elements, selecting the printer profile in the program and all other settings the same, and the results have been equal. Qimage is just so darned easier to set up.

Steve W.

Peter,
I just reran all my tests using Epson Scan instead of ViewScan. Some of the results were rather interesting. I ran Epson Scan in both 24 and 48 bit mode and saved the image as .tif with no compression. Think that would be pretty similar to RAW - maybe I am wrong. The file sizes for both the 24 and 48 bit scans were almost the same size as the RAW scans saved as .tif in VueScan. The only thing I seemed to lose with Epson Scan was the multipass capability.
The target analyses for the 24 bit scan from VueScan and Epson Scan were almost identical including the histograms. For the 48 bit scan (Yes to Question) the results were actually better than the 48 bit VueScan scan, but the printer target histogram was like you described - mound shaped which Mike says isn't desirable. But the 48 bit scan with No answer was much better than the VueScan version with many fewer Xed patches and Excellent Shadow Detail.
One thing that is bothering me is that the 48 bit VueScan scan was very much darker than the 24 bit scan. The only thing I changed was setting the Input Bits Per Pixel to 48 bit RGB and the Output Raw File Type to 48 bits RGB from 24 bits I had initially set in each. The two scans (24 and 48 bit) from Epson Scan were identical in brightness to each other as best I could tell. From these tests I seem to like the Epson Scan results a very little better than VueScan. Just wish Epson Scan had a multipass feature.
I am hopeing that Mike chimes in here with his wisdom on these results - especially to see if I am doing something wrong with VueScan to get such different brightness scans.

Oh yes Peter - it is a Pro 9000 MkII I'm getting, not the Pro 9500. Got a good deal (I hope) on the local Craigslist.

Steve W. 

Mike,
I tried your suggestion of the 24 bit scan instead of 48 bits. My PP setup is an Epson V500 scanner and VueScan Pro - profiles for a Canon ip4500. I ran comparisons on two printer targets I had made a while ago - Costco Kirkland Glossy and Staples Matte. I ran the 48 bit test with answering both Yes and No to the 48 bit linear question. I ran VueScan at 4 passes for both 24 and 48 bit scans. All scans were Raw which gave me uncompressed .tif scans.
The main difference I saw between the 24 and 48 bit scans had to do with Gray Patch clipping on the Prism target. In 48 bit mode (Yes to Question) I had to play with the brightness setting on the scan to get no clipping for both the Glossy and Matte papers. No to Question gave me a Poor - 3 or more clipped. With 24 bit scans both papers showed no Gray patch clipping with brightness set to 1 (default). The other values were close - 1%, 2% or 3%, and clipped patches between 2 and 6 for the 24 bit scan and the 48 bit scan (Yes). The 48 bit scan (No) had many more clipped patches for the Printer target (15 for Matte and 40 for Glossy). The Prism and Printer target Exposures were a little higher (236, 240) for the 24 bit scan compared to 219 to 230 for the 48 bit scan.
I didn't complete the generation of the profiles for each scan type but wanted to compare the target reviews for the different settings.
Looks like 24 bit scans will be the way I go in the future. Am picking up a Canon Pro9000 MkII this weekend.

Steve W.

I know this response is late for this thread - but I have been away and just got back today. I don't know the differences between the ip4700 and the ip4500 - both use five inks (CMYK dye based and 1 pigment BLACK) - but I have the ip4500 and get absolutely beautiful prints. I sure don't consider it to be a second rate photo printer. Probably not as good as the 8 color units but as good as my ip6000D was. With PP I get profiles that work well with it. Bought PP so I could use non Canon inks and paper.

Steve W.

In my opinion the Printer Profile Usable Range is the most important given your values for the other items. The PP directions state that ranges between 0-255 and 26-255 are the most typical. In your second profile the values are considerably out of that range limiting the range of printed colors. All my profiles, as best I can remember, have a range of 0-255 for all three values. Also I like to get the Printer/paper/ink coverage of Lab Space at least 15% if possible. For glossy papers it usually runs 15-16% but for matte paper it is around 14%.

For your limited Printer Profile Usable Range you may be laying down too heavy ink when doing your printer target. What kind of values are you getting on the prism target. If they are real good then the problem must be with printing the target. What brand of printer and scanner? I am using both/either a Canon LiDE 200 or, more recently, an Epson V500. My printers are Canon - ip4200, ip4500, ip6000D. All my profiles with any combo of scanner/printer have good usable ranges (0-255).

Maybe Mike can give his opinion on what parameters are most important.

Steve W.

Updated database took care of the problem for me also.

Steve W.

Let me jump in here with my two cents worth. I use both Profile Prism and Qimage Studio.

First - although I am not familiar with Lightroom I am also surprised that you are getting poor results with Canon ink, Canon paper and the canned Canon profiles. Sounds like double profiling to me although you said you had it set up correctly. You should really try Qimage for printing - it is so easy to select a profile and get good prints. I also have Photoshop Elements for complex photo editing, but my prints from it using the same profile as I use in Qimage never come out quite the same. Am sure it is the settings I am using in PE but I am not sure what I set wrong. So - I edit in PE and print from Qimage.

Second - Profile Prism. I have both a Canon LiDE 60 and more recently a LiDE 200. Until a week or so ago I used the CanoScan software that came with the scanners with fairly good results especially with glossy papers. I use third party inks (Image Specialists dye based) and Costco Kirkland Glossy Photo and Staples Matte papers with my Canon ip4500 printer. When Mike hosted this forum on Yahoo there was a File that described how to use CanoScan SW with PP to get 48 bit scans and obtain profiles. Don't know if those files from Yahoo are available here - maybe Mike can tell us. It was a complex method of different settings and scans and answering yes or no to the "linear (gamma 1.0) image" question, but it worked and I got good profiles on glossy paper. Not so good with matte papers. Just started using VueScan Pro and what a difference in ease. Using the LiDE 200 with scan passes set to 4, Color to None, and output Raw I get very few (3 to 5) X's on both the Prism target and Printer target analysis and almost perfect profiles. Only adjustment I make in VueScan is adjusting brightness to correct dark or bright X's. The profiles come out very good for both glossy and matte papers. The only adjustment I made on the glossy paper profile was a slight increase in brightness. Colors on the prints I have made are good and the gray scale is correct with no color tint to the grays.

Just wanted to state my experience with Qimage and PP. Also just bought new IT8. 7/2 targets from Wolf Faust (coloraid.de). My original target was over four years old and Faust recommends new ones every two years. Guess I could have gotten a new one from Mike, but I wanted to try both the Fuji paper and Kodak paper targets Faust offers.

Steve W.

Gordon,
I just updated to version 262 (Studio Edition) and all seems OK. Can load images fine.

Steve W.

This thread made me finally register  

I have been using third party inks for several years now in my various Canon printers (ip4500, ip4200, ip4000 and ip6000D). The inks have been from Hobbicolors and more recently Image Specialists. I have had totally no clogs due to these inks. I print quite a few pictures - mainly lighthouses and covered bridges. I could/would not be able to print the number of pictures (mostly 8.0" X 10.5") I do if I didn't refill. I do only use Canon OEM cartridges for refilling. Have a chip resetter for the new CLI-8 cartridges. Also I purge (clean) my cartridges after several refills. I don't find refilling or purging to be a particularly messy job. At times my printers sit idle for several weeks between uses. They print perfectly when called for. Perfect nozzle checks.
Of course using third party inks and non Canon paper (mostly Costco Kirkland Glossy Photo) requires printer profiles. That is why I have Profile Prism. I have run non-scientific fading tests with prints in full sunlight. Canon OEM ink fades a little less but they do fade
The cost of OEM ink cartridges is much too high considering the small amount of ink provided. Canon OEMs cost between $13 to $15. I can refill for between a buck or two per refill.
Just my two cents worth.

Steve W.