Digital BW, The Print

Has anyone had any experiences with the Canon printers?

As you know, I'm a big fan of competition.  So, if there is an alternate
printer for third party inks -- B&W quads in particular -- it would seem to
be a real boon to those of us on this list.

MIS has told me they are getting strong demand for quadtone inks for
the Canon S800, S900, S9000 printers.  They are just finishing a
Continuous Flow set up for them.   I

MIS thinks Canon has done a good job in trying  to come up to the Epson
standard.  If Epson is a 10 on the zero to 10 scale, then the new Canon
printers are a 9 + in MIS's opinion.

Some attractive characteristics of the Canon machines include that refilling
is easy, with no foam problems like the Epson's, and there are
no chips to deal with.  Moreover, each color has it's own cartridge and
they are see through.

Any opinions or interest in these machines?  I'm thinking a "no curves,"
modified FS-Neutral inkset might be a way to get the ball rolling in giving
Epson a little competition in our area of interest.

Any opinions or interest in these machines or quad inksets for them?

Paul
http://www.PaulRoark.com

I agree on a viable alternative to Epson....I just downloaded a 
report from FLAAR, a non-profit digital photography group based, I 
think, at a couple of universities. The link is below if anyone is 
interested. They have several different pages on scanners, printers, 
etc. and offer free e-mail reports. The world they operate in is not 
exactly fine art quadtones but some of their stuff is interesting.

http://www.wide-format-printers.org/index.html.

These guys aren't keen on any desktop printers. They mainly like the 
high-end wide format printers. However, in the priner report I 
received they do mention the Canon as being pretty nice and have 
harsh words for the Epson, calling them disposable printers. Here's 
an excerpt:


"We get so many complaints on the Epson 1270, Epson 2000p, Epson 
1520, and Epson 3000 that we do not recommend them. However many 
users do not experience problems and/or learn how to survive with 
these printers. Other users actually like these models, after all, 
they are so low-priced they are disposable....Nonetheless, many 
people love their desktop Epson printers, so if you want a disposable 
printer, if you don't mind spending the money and then later 
realizing you need a better printer that does a satisfactory job, 
then by all means go for the Epson. These printers are great for 
practice with digital imaging. However it seems strange to buy 
something knowing in advance that after a while you may want to throw 
it away and buy something that more effectively satisfies your needs.

If you wish a really nice desktop color inkjet printer, try out the 
Canon 8500 (can't remember whether it is called the 8500 or 8550, but 
it is tabloid sized)." 

Everyone should remember what Epson did for "photo quality" printing 
but these are also the folks that brought the world the infamous 
killer chips - not exactly supportive of the fine art crowd.

Also, does an Epson, or anything else that matter, retain its 
resolution? You have to have pretty fine movements in the rail and 
print head mechanism to give the kind of results fine art photography 
demands . Does "slop" and "creep" occur in older, worn Epsons? Or is 
technology going to change fast enough that we'll all keep a printer 
for a year and toss it?

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@y..., "Paul Roark" 
<paul.roark@v...> wrote:

> Has anyone had any experiences with the Canon printers?
> 
>

Hi Thm,

May I ask your name? There are guidelines that suggest how to set your group
member ship up so that we can see it ;)

You are indeed correct that FLAAR seems to dislike Epson's... however there
is plenty of comment generally on the internet that they are 'down' on
Epson's perhaps as much due to lack of support by Epson than anything else.
PLUS, based on your quote there, there hasn't been much change in their copy
for several years (e.g. since the 1270 was released with extremely
gas-fadeable inks, and the 2000P came out) which rather negates their view
as it certainly is not up to date. Indeed I saw someone who I understand to
be an Epson rep on one group state that they had been threatened with poor
reviews if they did not provide sponsorship...

Epson are far from perfect - I for one would wish they would open their
print technology and raise the price of their printers... but make it open
to third-party inks etc (perhaps charging say $2000 to any company who
wanted 'Epson certification' for their ink). But then again, I think there
are some big companies out there who could spend a lot more time providing
education and information than marketting and 'lowest common denominator'
literature. That is to say, I think in this market they dumb everything
down, when they could teach! Epson _used_ to send out a free printer
language manual to anyone who wanted one, which just shows how things have
changed in many many respects.

But that's just my view!

Nij


> -----Original Message-----
> From: thm29205 [mailto:thm@...]
> Sent: 20 April 2002 04:58
> To: DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [Digital BW] Re: Canon printers
>
>
> I agree on a viable alternative to Epson....I just downloaded a
> report from FLAAR, a non-profit digital photography group based, I
> think, at a couple of universities. The link is below if anyone is
> interested. They have several different pages on scanners, printers,
> etc. and offer free e-mail reports. The world they operate in is not
> exactly fine art quadtones but some of their stuff is interesting.
>
> http://www.wide-format-printers.org/index.html.
>
> These guys aren't keen on any desktop printers. They mainly like the
> high-end wide format printers. However, in the priner report I
> received they do mention the Canon as being pretty nice and have
> harsh words for the Epson, calling them disposable printers. Here's
> an excerpt:
>
<snip FLAAR Blurb>

In a message dated 4/20/02 12:02:16 AM, thm@... writes:

>I agree on a viable alternative to Epson....I just downloaded a 
>report from FLAAR, a non-profit digital photography group based... 

<clip>
>
>These guys aren't keen on any desktop printers.

No, but they have a paticular axe to grind with Epson and a real love for 
HP... to the point of uselessness as an unbiased source.

C. David Tobie
Design Cooperative
CDTobie@...

Paul,

Very much so.  I have seen the most beautiful color prints from their older 
8500 model.  And, as others have mentioned, the ease of refilling is a big 
plus.  If you could formulate hextone inks for the 9000, I would buy a Canon 
for the ease of refilling alone.

Helene  


> Any opinions or interest in these machines or quad inksets for them?
> 



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hey Paul,     
I've heard this idea before and it seems to be gathering steam. The 
Canons would make a pretty good platform but not without their own 
issues. Since the printhead is thermal instead of peizoelectric it 
has more limitations on the ink materials it can print. Thermal heads 
also burn out a lot easier too- especially if they run without ink. 
Other than that the new Canon printers would probably work pretty 
well. As far as competion for Canon and Epson they couldn't care less 
about the quad black users. If it's not thier ink/cartridges they 
don't even want anyone using the printers- thus the warranty void 
warnings and such. They also consider what we are doing as a "nich" 
use/market that isn't worth their attention. And certianly not worth 
a price war. Since the inks and carts are coming from third parties 
you will probably easily find someone out there interested in 
supplying inks- the prostitutes ;). A possible pitfall to 
diversifying platforms is that with each new printer platform and 
inkset a whole new set of curves and workflows need to be created. 
Before you know it B&W printing could go like so many other 
technologies and be so diversified that the different users end up 
suffering issues like we have with IBM VS. MAC -incompatibility. OK 
preaching over hope I didn't bore you to death. I have tested the 
Piezography inks (probably not your favorite I would guess but I'm 
kinda stuck with gen 1 for the moment) in a Canon 4000 and found that 
they work quite well. A few mods and you could have a working quad 
system pretty easily.      


Jeff

<paul.roark@v...> wrote:
> Has anyone had any experiences with the Canon printers?
> 
> As you know, I'm a big fan of competition.  So, if there is an 
alternate
> printer for third party inks -- B&W quads in particular -- it would 
seem to
> be a real boon to those of us on this list.
> 
> MIS has told me they are getting strong demand for quadtone inks for
> the Canon S800, S900, S9000 printers.  They are just finishing a
> Continuous Flow set up for them.   I
> 
> MIS thinks Canon has done a good job in trying  to come up to the 
Epson
> standard.  If Epson is a 10 on the zero to 10 scale, then the new 
Canon
> printers are a 9 + in MIS's opinion.
> 
> Some attractive characteristics of the Canon machines include that 
refilling
> is easy, with no foam problems like the Epson's, and there are
> no chips to deal with.  Moreover, each color has it's own cartridge 
and
> they are see through.
> 
> Any opinions or interest in these machines?  I'm thinking a "no 
curves,"
> modified FS-Neutral inkset might be a way to get the ball rolling 
in giving

> Epson a little competition in our area of interest.
> 
> Any opinions or interest in these machines or quad inksets for them?
> 
> Paul
> http://www.PaulRoark.com

I think there is sufficient chance the Eboni 100% carbon inkset will run on
Canon printers to take a shot.

 

I know little about the model numbers and cartridge types to know which
model(s) to target.

 

Please give me some feedback as to where you'd like the Eboni (100% in the
small droplet and dilute in the larger droplet printers) inkset to go.  I
think it's time we declare independence from Epson, and I think we - the B&W
photo enthusiasts - can do it.  Frankly, I think the thermal head will win
the war anyway.  So, it's time to migrate (as well as totally work around
the Epson barriers). 

 

Anyone who wants to loan a Canon printer to the cause is most welcomed to do
so.

 

 

Paul

www.PaulRoark.com <http://www.paulroark.com/>  

 



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Roark"
<paul.roark@...> wrote:
>
> Has anyone had any experiences with the Canon printers?
> 
> As you know, I'm a big fan of competition.  So, if there is an alternate
> printer for third party inks -- B&W quads in particular -- it would
seem to
> be a real boon to those of us on this list.
> 
> MIS has told me they are getting strong demand for quadtone inks for
> the Canon S800, S900, S9000 printers.  They are just finishing a
> Continuous Flow set up for them.   I
> 
> MIS thinks Canon has done a good job in trying  to come up to the Epson
> standard.  If Epson is a 10 on the zero to 10 scale, then the new Canon
> printers are a 9 + in MIS's opinion.
> 
> Some attractive characteristics of the Canon machines include that
refilling
> is easy, with no foam problems like the Epson's, and there are
> no chips to deal with.  Moreover, each color has it's own cartridge and
> they are see through.
> 
> Any opinions or interest in these machines?  I'm thinking a "no curves,"
> modified FS-Neutral inkset might be a way to get the ball rolling in
giving
> Epson a little competition in our area of interest.
> 
> Any opinions or interest in these machines or quad inksets for them?
> 
> Paul
> http://www.PaulRoark.com
>

Yes, I've owned and used a Canon S9000 for all my up-to-13x19 color
printing since it came out a few years ago, and have been very, very
happy with it.

If MIS were to support the S9000 (or any other Canon printer) for B&W
printing, I'd happily dump my B&W-dedicated Epson 1280 and switch to
Canon for all my B&W printing.

John M. Esparolini
ESPimages Photography

Hey Paul,

I live over in Lompoc and dropped by to see you at the museum. I have 
a Canon 9100 that I only use for quick prints on copy paper. I have a 
Epson 2400 also. You would be welcome to give it a try.

Steve Wadlington

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "sloopjohne2002" 
<sloopjohne@...> wrote:
>
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Roark"
> <paul.roark@> wrote:
> >
> > Has anyone had any experiences with the Canon printers?
> > 
> > As you know, I'm a big fan of competition.  So, if there is an 
alternate
> > printer for third party inks -- B&W quads in particular -- it 
would
> seem to
> > be a real boon to those of us on this list.
> > 
> > MIS has told me they are getting strong demand for quadtone inks 
for
> > the Canon S800, S900, S9000 printers.  They are just finishing a
> > Continuous Flow set up for them.   I
> > 
> > MIS thinks Canon has done a good job in trying  to come up to the 
Epson
> > standard.  If Epson is a 10 on the zero to 10 scale, then the new 
Canon
> > printers are a 9 + in MIS's opinion.
> > 
> > Some attractive characteristics of the Canon machines include that
> refilling
> > is easy, with no foam problems like the Epson's, and there are
> > no chips to deal with.  Moreover, each color has it's own 
cartridge and
> > they are see through.
> > 
> > Any opinions or interest in these machines?  I'm thinking a "no 
curves,"
> > modified FS-Neutral inkset might be a way to get the ball rolling 
in
> giving
> > Epson a little competition in our area of interest.
> > 
> > Any opinions or interest in these machines or quad inksets for 
them?
> > 
> > Paul
> > http://www.PaulRoark.com
> >
> 
> Yes, I've owned and used a Canon S9000 for all my up-to-13x19 color
> printing since it came out a few years ago, and have been very, very
> happy with it.
> 
> If MIS were to support the S9000 (or any other Canon printer) for 
B&W

> printing, I'd happily dump my B&W-dedicated Epson 1280 and switch to
> Canon for all my B&W printing.
> 
> John M. Esparolini
> ESPimages Photography
>