Learning to Manage Color, Mutoh and Flexi?

[David40]

I am in the process of learning to run a Mutoh 1204GA eco-solvent CYMK printer using Flexi RIP and Print. My latest challenge is shades of grey. I can print out a shades of grey chart using only K and it comes out perfect, but if I print out a full color photo that contains grey scale elements, the greys come out as greenish/blue tints. I assume this is happening because the image is being created by combining CYM to make all the colors including black? I would appreciate it if anyone could tell me how or where I can learn how to get my full color photo images to print shades of grey like they are supposed to be, if that is possible.
Thanks

 

[psbc2009]

Go to your color curves in flexi. Click on the center "50%" for cyan, yellow, and magenta channels and adjust them down to 40%. I usually adjust magenta a little further down to 37-38%. Your grey should look pretty good after this adjustment. Leave black as is. Silvers, metals, chromes will look nice as well. I normally run a oracal 3651G profile.

 

[David40]

Thanks, I'll give that a try.

I loaded my bitmap test image, and then I hunted for the color curve settings but could not find it. I searched the help file and could not find any mention of it there either. Could you tell me where to find this adjustment?

 

[psbc2009]

After you select rip&print the next window should have a color adjustment tab - click on that tab and make your adjustments. I am running full version flexi sign pro 10.3 but it is the same on my 7.7ver

 

[David40]

I got it, thanks. I'm starting to wonder if the problem is with the image and not my color balance? I printed the two images at the same time along side eachother, on one bitmap test image and the gray scale came out good, but on the other image I got the blue greens instead of grays. What's odd is that they both look the same on the monitor. Very perplexing!

 

[4R Graphics]

Not to hijack thread but is ther away in flexi to tell it to use just k for the blacks?

I can do this in rasterlink and it made a huge difference in all my stuff lettering, shades of greys they all look so much better when printed with just K.

 

[David40]

For sure you can do it with vectors by just selecting shades of K. In bitmaps I'm not so sure there is a way to do that other than overlaying your greyscale elements with vectors.

 

[4R Graphics]

thats to bad! I dont have to do anything all I did was tell it to use pure C,M,Y,K and then it the cmy=k I told it to use K from 0-255 and its awesome straight black beautiful greys no pink no green and I have even printed 52" X 30' of straight black like 3 panels and it was great and yes that was 30 feet. The reason I ask is because a friend of mine uses Flexi on his JV3 and has troubles with his blacks and greys. When I showed him my stuff he was really interested but we couldnt figure out how o do it in Flexi. Thought maybe ther was some setting deep inside that we missed.

 

[David40]

What software are you using? I'd like to switch to something else, Flexi stinks, you would think a 4K piece of software would make your job easier instead of harder.

 

[4R Graphics]

I use rasterlink 5 it is for the Mimaki only as it is made by Mimaki.

I used Flexi a few years ago its not bad once you get the hang of it and get good profiles.

If you design in some other program and just use production manager to rip and print it seems to be a little better speed wise.

 

[David40]

Mutoh makes a spectrometer for the two larger versions of the 1204. Have no idea why they did not make it to fit this one too, but there are third party meters that will work on any printer.
Spent an hour with a remote connection to tech support at Signwarehouse and they showed me how to keep it simple in Flexi because it's easy to confuse the software. Basically keep everything at the defaults and make changes in the Production Manager Job Properties only. Flexi is a great example of how a software can become too complex for it's own good.