The colour audit results were a disappointment as was the resulting print. Although the Dmax had held up to a fairly typical 1.65, the print lacked saturation and the hue was biased yellow. The flesh tone sequence, for example was desaturated by more than 10% along with an ugly rotation of 5° yellow in the hue. It was not pretty and the average error was 4.45ΔE00. The highlight differentiation barely reached 246 points although the shadows were differentiated down to 15 RGB points. In an attempt to recover the situation we downloaded the Hahnemühle profile for the Canon 9500 (ie we were unsure if it was the correct one) and tried that. This was better in many ways although the shadow detail was badly blocked up. The average error value was no better at 4.54 and colour errors flying every which way. The only alternative left was to bespoke profile from scratch.
The result from this was significantly better, returning an average error of 2.69. The main error lay in the saturation component, skin tones by way of example were about 8% desaturated. As we have observed with other bespoke profiles onto this media, the hue errors were very small. The shadows held detail to 20 RGB points. The highlights had lost differentiation by the time they reached 248 points. Dmax was 1.61 and the CII measured 2.15. The Granger Chart was clean, other than a slightly sharp transition into the deepest tones, often seen with these fine art, matt papers. The gamut volume of 517,344 was 5% down on that obtained with the Epson 3800 (541,941).
Overall then the performance using available profiles was poor but this
reflects on the profiles rather than the Lucia ink set. The data above will
comfortably stand alongside what we normally achieve with Photo Rag media.
Conclusions
For the serious user the ink capacity of the 9500 Mk II is a little lacking,
which is why we are intent on looking next at the printer's bigger brother,
the iPF5100, which is more like the Epson 3800 and 3880 we tend to use as
benchmark devices. At 13ml the 9500 cartridges are a little on the small
side, paper packs also look a bit small for a professional user many of them
only contain 20 sheets.
In terms of performance the 9500 Mk II should not disappoint. The driver
interface is slightly easier to use than that of Epson as fewer options are
presented. There is no dedicated driver set for monochrome, equivalent to
the Epson ABW. The improvement in metamerism is welcome and, such are the
values measured, you should not expect any problems at all using the Lucia
ink set. The delicacy of the Pro glossy paper is a concern but there are
plenty of alternatives on the market. The paper prices we found were very
high compared with the rival media. Photo Rag 188gsm is available from 'on
line paper' at 177p per A3, for example.
Media Costs (street prices inc VAT) per A3 sheet:
FA Paper 375p
Photo Paper Pro II 210p
Pro Platinum 250p
The printer itself may be obtained for around £580 street price at the time
of writing. A full cartridge set costs about £140.
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