How to profile a 6-color printer?

Processing
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Hi all,

I am still experimenting/playing with printer profiles
using not-so-good (= cheapish) paper qualities.

How on earth do I produce a good profile for a printer that has
CcMmYK inks? Argyll can not handle a 6-color printer (or is there
something that I have not understood?).

Ping @gwgill…

Have fun!
Claes in Lund, Sweden

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I used a commercial provider. They sent me the files (sample charts), I printed them (all colour management off), posted them off, and they analysed them with their (hopefully) good quality scanner hardware. Then they sent the profile by email. Cost was around £15. Of course it’s only for one printer / ink / paper combo.

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It’s do-able, but ArgyllCMS is missing some of the tools you will need. You need to create a (device link) separation that converts CMYK to CcMmYK. For light inks typically a couple of curves suffices.

Gaps in the ArgyllCMS tool chain:

  • Creating separation curves with tuneable overlap between the curves
  • Converting curves into a device link separation.
  • Applying separation during test chart printing
  • Applying separation ink limits during profile creation
  • Combining CMYK device profile and separation into an N-channel device profile.

But you would also need to confirm your printer driver workflow. i.e. can you

  • print N channel test charts ? If so, using what format and conventions (i.e. PS, TIFF, details ??)
  • Does your print driver handle N-Color ICC device profiles ?

(We used ArgyllCMS extensively for creating profiles for light ink printers at ColorBus, but the
separation curves were part of the printing system/drivers, not part of the ICC workflow.)

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