Hi,
I'm having problems with setting my Epson 2880 correctly for the Entrada Rag Bright 300. It seems far too much ink is being put down and it soaks into the paper and spreads.
I'm printing from Lightroom4 on Windows 8; Lightroom is set for Lightroom controls colour, using the MOAB Entrada Bright Epson R2880 VFA icc profile. Brightness and contrast in the print panel are not changed.
The printer was set for front manual feed, colour adjustment off, quality set to "quality". No changes to the other advanced settings.
I tried both Velvet Fine Art and Watercolour Paper Radiant White with the same results.
The image is trees and forest floor in a mist, seen at http://www.pbase.com/andy_fraser/excess_ink
The problem is most easily seen in the lower part of the pbase photo - the green/black smudged area is actually outside the printed photo area (it's not the shadow of the print!). I don't know if the print head actually touched the paper and ink was absorbed like a sponge? The forest floor and tree trunks are also seem to be affected by excess ink.

I think I could use the advanced settings to reduce the amount of ink put down but this doesn't seem like the right solution. Are there some other settings that should be changed?

Thanks
Andy

Aha! That was the problem. It seems the best paper path for the Entrada (on the 2880) is not straight in through the front feeder as the Epson driver suggests when Velvet Fine Art paper is picked, but from the top feeder. This seems to hold the paper in a much better position all the way through. No bleed at all and the branches are well defined. Once I thought I had to slightly hold the paper up so it wasn't as heavy, so the printer didn't feed it straight through without printing but it might have just been clearing itself of a previous misfeed.

Beautiful paper, and for the branches as they go deeper into the fog and become more monochromatic, grey-scale, the texture of the paper starts to become part of the sense of the image, it's great.

Thanks,
Andy

Hi Andy,
Were you able to select Velvet Fine Art for the media type when feeding via the top feeder? If not, which media type did you use?
Thank you,
Donn

Hi Donn,
Yes, I did select Velvet Fine Art in the driver. I've printed several more sheets, and it does seem that each time the paper feeds best if I lightly hold it up, so that not the full weight of the paper is in the printer. That way it will be pulled in correctly, otherwise it seems to slip in to far, and the 2880 will just feed it straight through without printing.

How is it working in your printer?
Andy

Andy, thank you for the very speedy reply!!!

No success at my client's place with attempting to feed via the front manual feed, always smudging the print. We fed instead from the top feeder, but there was no way the to select velvet fine art media.
Another thing is, my client is using the Moab paper that is 11" x 17", for which there is no setting for front manual loading. We used the 13" x 19" media setting and just adjusted where the image was positioned.
Tried printing with 11 x 17 and then choosing ultra premium matte media, which did print but colour calibration isn't good enough to use.

Your posting before my first one seemed to suggest you were feeding from the top feeder, is that the case? Your reply to my posting seemed to suggest that you were still feeding from the front manual feeder. Would you be able to clarify?

Cheers and thanks again!!
Donn

Hi Don,
I was never able to get the front feed to work either, it seemed the paper just wasn't held close enough to the print head. I would assume it'll also fail the same way using the rear feed (horizontal in from the back).
So I am using the top feeder. That also has the advantage of allowing any size paper to be selected such as 11x17.
Is Velvet Fine Art grayed out? What about the other papers in the fine art group? When I pick VFA, I get a popup message that "manual - roll" feed is recommended for the paper source, and clicking OK causes that to change also. I don't remember if I left it that way and fed a sheet through the top anyway, or changed it back to "sheet" first.
As far as I know, the only thing that affects which papers are enabled is the type of black ink. Matte enables the matte and fine art papers while graying out the photo papers, and photoblack does the opposite.
Just tried a quick search and this thread implies the printer is picky about the paper size and source,
http://www.lightroomforums.net/archive/index.php/t-12823.html

However I just tried the following sequence:
select VFA
popup recommending manual - roll, accept that and the paper settings source changes to manual - roll; now change that back to sheet again.
change the size to US ANSI 11x17 and print (cancelled the print just after that)
Re-checked and VFA was still selected.

I'm using Lightroom (probably not relevant) on Windows 8 desktop, and the Epson driver shows it's version 6.61.

It seems like it should work, but puzzling if VFA is not selectable but other matte papers are.
Andy

Hi Andy, again thank you!
None of the fine are papers are available to select. My client's computer is a newer iMac running OS X Snow Leopard (10.6.8). Printing from Photoshop CS.
Donn