Tutorial
- 1. BASIC TUTORIAL Quad Tone RIP on Mac OS X Copyright © 2008 Roy Harrington Version 2.6 - March 2008
- 2. Program and Profile Installation and Removal Printer Families Ink Sets Printing Workflow Print with Preview Position and Scaling Color Management Page Setup and Centering Custom Paper Sizes 10.2 Jaguar & 10.3 Panther Manage Paper Sizes 10.4 Tiger & 10.5 Leopard QuadToneRIP Print Dialog Pane Mode Feed Curves Tone Blend Black Ink Resolution High Speed Ink Limit Adj Gamma Adj Troubleshooting and Diagnostics Diagnostic Script Printer connected to USB port of Airport or other non- standard port connections Rendezvous Printer 10.3 Panther Bonjour Printer 10.4 Tiger & 10.5 Leopard
- 3. Special Installation Requirements Version 2.6 has a major change in the location on the disk of the QuadToneRIP product. Previous versions before 2.6 resided in several "hidden" OS X system folders. Now there are two folders that contain all the files for QuadToneRIP. The first folder is /Applications/QuadToneRIP which contains all the user accessed programs, profiles and other information. The other folder is /Library/Printers/QTR which contains all the files accessed by the OS X print system. If you have used one of these folder names for your own files you should be careful to save your files before they are over-written. -------- Important OS X 10.2 - Jaguar Users Only -------- See note below about Jaguar and custom paper sizes. With Jaguar you must also have the Ghostscript package installed. for ESP Ghostscript see: http://gimp-print.sourceforge.net/MacOSX.php3 Scroll down the page and find the ghostscript disk image download. Download and install ghostscript before proceeding. ------ OS X 10.3 Panther, 10.4 Tiger and 10.5 Leopard Users ------ With these OS versions do not load Ghostscript. Installation of this new version will replace any old version. There is no need to install or uninstall any previous version. Support for the older versions of OS X -- i.e. 10.2 and 10.3 may not include some of the newer pieces. The basic print system is still supported for the time being.
- 4. Program and Profile Installation Installing QuadToneRIP Software: Simply double-click on the Install-QTR-#.#.# package -- it is an ordinary Mac OS X installation package. You will need the Admin password to install. Install it on your main hard drive. After installing the programs you must setup the printer and install the appropriate profiles. There are scripts for doing this, see the following page. Removing QuadToneRIP Software and Profiles: If for any reason you wish to remove the QuadToneRIP product simply drag the folders mentioned above to the Trash and Delete all the Quad printers using the Printer Setup Utility. For previous versions there is a new application called Uninstall-QTR that will remove all those files. Download this Application from the www.quadtonerip.com website if needed. You will also need your Admin password to run this program.
- 5. Installing and Setting up a Printer with QTR Profiles: The profile install scripts setup everything necessary for printing using the USB interface. Before running the USB scripts the printer should be attached and powered on. The firewire interface cannot be used for any of the printers. After installation you should restart Photoshop or any programs that you want to print through QuadToneRIP. Within the Profiles folder there are separate folders for each of the printers with a particular inkset. Within each there is an install script for each model of printer. Folder names consist of family name and inkset. Name Printers in Family 1160 860, 1160 1270 870, 1270 1280 890, 1280, 1290 1400 1400 2200 2100, 2200 3800 3800 4000 4000 4800 4800, 7800, 9800 4880 4880, 7880, 9880 7500 7000, 7500, 9000, 9500 7600 7600, 9600 10000 10000 R200 R200, R220, R300, R320, R340 R260 R260, R280, R380 R800 R800, R1800, R1900 R2400 R2400 Inkset Supplier and Name UC Epson UltraChrome inks VM MIS VM and UT inks VMS MIS VM Sepia inks UT2 MIS UT2 (Ultratone-2) inks UT7 MIS UT7 (Ultratone-7) inks K7 Piezography K7 inks GQ MediaStreet QuadBlack inks
- 6. Installing custom QTR Profiles for another source: Profiles are often available from other sources: ink suppliers and other users. These profiles are also very easy to install and use. There are three possible kinds of files that you may receive as profiles. They are distinguished by a 3 or 4 letter extension: a .txt or .qidf extension is an ink descriptor the "source" code for creating a profile; a .quad file is the "binary" profile format. The installation scripts handle all of these formats. The procedure is to create a new folder on your disk, copy all the profiles into that folder. Then go to the download folder Profiles/InstallScripts, find the appropriate script for your printer and drag it into your folder with the profiles. Simply double-click on the script and it will setup the printer, create and install all the profiles. Remember to restart Photoshop. With version 2.6 there are now standard locations where you ought to place your own custom profiles. The "source" profiles i.e. files with .txt or .qidf extensions should be placed in /Applications/QuadToneRIP/Profiles under one of the existing sub-folders or a new personal one. Drag an Install script into this folder and rename it accordingly (see Read-Me in the InstallScripts folder). This will create a printer, process the "source" profiles and install the .quad files in the /Library/Printers/QTR/quadtone folder which is where the drivers will access them. Notice that the sub-folders are named the same as the printer name.
- 7. Printing Workflow QuadToneRIP is completely integrated with the standard Max OS X Printing. It is very similar to all the normal printing one does on OS X. There are separate printers with names such as Quad2200. One uses these printers as if they were Black & White i.e. grayscale printers. All the system features such as Presets, Remote and Shared Printers work with QuadToneRIP printers. You use all the standard Page Setup and Print commands from any OS X application. Typically one would be printing grayscale images but RGB files can be used. They will be automatically be converted to grayscale. The one major addition is a separate QuadToneRIP print dialog page. On Mac OS X since QuadToneRIP runs as an standard print driver you can print from any Application that has a Print command. Most Applications will just print centered images but Photoshop and Photoshop Elements are recommended to layout an image on the paper exactly as desired. The Photoshop Print with Preview command allows this complete control. This page has many sections. If the lower section isn't visible click More Options and Color Management. The first thing to do is make sure the Page Setup is correct i.e. the correct size paper and correct orientation. See below for more info about Page Setup. If you want a centered image on the Pro Printers pay particular attention to the Centered Paper Size in Page Setup and the Center Image box below. Note also that Position is measured from the margins not from the edge of the paper. Typically the margin will be 1/8 inch or about 3mm.
- 8. The Print Document shows your embedded Profile Space. The Options section shows how color management is being used. Color Handling: Let Photoshop Determine Colors Printer Profile: QTR - Gray Matte or Photo Paper Rendering Intent: Perceptual and Black Point Compensation If you have a custom grayscale ICC profile from QTR-Create-ICC use that for the Printer Profile. Photoshop CS2 — Print with Preview
- 9. Photoshop CS3 — Print ... In Photoshop CS3 there is only the Print ... command but it is very similar to the Print with Preview command. Similarly use Color Management: Color Handling: Photoshop Manages Colors Printer Profile: QTR - Gray Matte or Photo Paper Rendering Intent: Perceptual and Black Point Compensation Note that Match Print Colors gives a soft-proof of the result. This is useful if you have a custom ICC print profile that shows the hue of the print.
- 10. Page Setup and Centering Standard Paper Selection Page Setup is as usual. By selecting Format for a Quad printer you can see all the built-in page sizes for the printer. Select the desired Paper Size and the Orientation - see feed icon for Portrait or Landscape. Page sizes and image centering have very often been a source of frustration. One of the main sources of the problem is the difference between the physical page dimensions and the printable page dimensions. Some Epson printers typically have a mechanically imposed page margin restriction and it is usually larger at the bottom than on the other three sides. This results in the printable area not being centered on the physical page. However, it is the printable area that is used for all the high-level positioning algorithms. So the default, centered image very often isn't centered on the physical page.
- 11. Centered Paper Selection for Pro Printers To alleviate this problem for printers with uneven margins, QuadToneRIP has expanded the Page Setup dialog. The Paper Size pull down selection is now a two level selection. Each page size has two versions: first, the hardware restricted printable area which allows the maximum size image and second, a version with a centered printable area. The centered version has a slightly smaller printable area since the top margin must be increased to match the bottom margin. When selecting a page size be sure to drag down to the desired size and also to drag right to select which version of printable area you want.
- 12. 10.2 Jaguar & 10.3 Panther — Custom Paper Sizes These system feature allows the user to define paper sizes and the margins that will be used. Printers have minimum and maximum sizes as well as minimum margins. can also achieve the different printable areas but you will have to set the margins to get the printable area you want -- make sure the top and bottom are the same to get centered prints. Notes on using custom pages: -- go to Page Setup > Settings: Custom Paper Size -- hit New and enter a name -- fill in height, width and margins -- important: hit Save, but do not hit OK -- back at the top again, select Page Attributes -- select your custom size in the Paper Size pull down.
- 13. 10.4 Tiger & 10.5 Leopard — Manage Paper Sizes The new Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger has changed and improved the method of handling custom paper sizes. Now in Page Setup > Paper Size you will find Manage Paper Sizes... at the bottom of the list. On this dialog page you can create and modify paper sizes. Most is self explanatory but note the Printer Margins. If you are making a paper for a specific printer it's best to set the margins according to the printer -- select a printer and it will show the margins allowed. You should not use a margin less than specified or you may find images cropped at the edge. After creating a custom size be sure to select it after leaving the Custom Page Size dialog.
- 14. QuadToneRIP Print Dialog Pane:
- 15. QuadToneRIP has a very specialized print dialog page. All of the commonly used options are readily visible and available on one page. Some printers may not have all options. There are quite a lot of options and sliders but after some practice they should become clearer. The interface will gray-out options that are not appropriate at the time. After finding values that give you the results you like it's highly recommended that you use the OS X Presets for saving the selections for future use. Under the Presets: pull down use Save As to save the settings under a name of your choice. Mode: select QuadToneRIP for normal printing the QuadToneRIP Calibration Mode is used just for printing the inkseparation.tif files. when the Calib mode is selected all the Curve options are disabled and a single Calibration Ink Limit slider will appear and is used to set the overall ink limit. Curve1, Curve2 and Curve3, Curve Blending: These options are the critical part of QuadToneRIP. You must select at least one curve here -- None will produce unpredictable results. Unlike the standard color profiling systems, QTR allows 1, 2 or 3 curves (or profiles) with different color tones to be selected. The blending allows you to vary the tone of the print based on the different Curves. The blends are varying percentages of each curve or tone. The percentages must total 100% and the slider interface insures this. If Split-tone Curve Blending is enabled it's also possible to make a split-tone blend from highlights to mid tones to shadows. The example above shows neutral highlights that gradually warm to the midtones and then add more sepia in the shadows. When fewer than three curves are used the blending will gray-out the unused ones so they are not active. If you try no curves you will get a warning that the print results are not predictable.
- 16. In a much simple example typically one would pick a warm and a cool tone. The Curve Blend then allows you to blend the two color tones for your own personal taste -- you can pick any tone between the two extreme colors. The following example shows several color tones plus a 50/50 blend. Print from a cool/neutral tone curve. Print from a warm tone curve. Print from a sepia tone curve. Print from 50/50 warm/sepia tone.
- 17. Paper Feed: select the type of Paper Feed desired. its important to have this agree with the physical paper slot you use for the paper. Resolution: The resolutions supported are 720, 1440, and 2880. 1440 also has a "super" version on some printers that does a more elaborate weaving if the printer is capable of that. Most of the supplied profiles so far are created for 1440 dpi resolution and can be used with any 1440 mode. Profiles meant for 2880 have this in the profile name. Speed: selects either Uni-directional or Bi-directional printing. The Pro printers usually do well with faster bi-directional but the desktop printers often improve with better uni-directional. Black Ink: this option is only for the Epson 4000 or Epson 3800. it allows you to select which black ink -- matte or photo -- will be used. Advanced Adjustments: this click box enables the use of the following special adjustments. Ink Limit: this option allows you to increase or decrease the overall ink limits all the ink limits in the profile are multiplied by this factor. the mostly case you might use this is to use a paper that can handle more or less ink than the profile allows. also you might increase the ink limits for a print that you want to really push the blacks dark -- there may be some loss of shadow detail however. Gamma: this option allows an overall lightening or darkening of a print without re- editing the files. the effect is identical to using the Levels command in Photoshop. the percent value is approximately how much the 50% midtone will be affected. Dither: this option allows selection of different dithering algorithms. in general the Ordered dither will be just fine. the others may be tried for unusual banding problems.
- 18. Troubleshooting and Diagnostics The most common problems: 1) not installing Ghostscript on a Jaguar 10.2 system 2) custom paper sizes on a Jaguar system There is a Diagnostic Script that can aid in solving problems. If there are any difficulties running QuadToneRIP, please run this script by double-clicking on DiagnosticScript. The script will open a window and show lots of information about your print system. Cut and paste this info into an email when inquiring about a problem. There is a yahoo group that has many users of QuadToneRIP, see: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/QuadtoneRIP Email questions to quadtone@harrington.com Jaguar 10.2 and Custom Paper Sizes While Jaguar is fully supported with this release, since Jaguar was the first Apple release of the new CUPS printing system some people have run into a few bugs in Jaguar CUPS. The most notable one is an error with Custom Paper sizes -- some sizes work, some don't. One easy workaround is to use the next bigger standard size and calculate your own margins. Another method is to use the Preview program to print rather than Photoshop -- this lacks the positioning of the Photoshop Print Preview but allows simple centered prints. The difference here is that Preview uses a PDF workflow whereas Photoshop uses a PS or PICT workflow. I've recommended to several people to upgrade to Panther or Tiger. This fixes the custom paper problem, has more consistent behavior with printing Presets, and some with older computers have reported faster processing. Another nice addition is that with Panther you get easy access to the Epson Printer Utility from Print Setup.
- 19. Printer connected to USB port of Airport This is just for printers connected to the special USB port on the back of the Airport Extreme Wireless/Router. Using with Panther 10.3 - Rendezvous Printer This requires some manual setup of printer. You must have already downloaded and installed the Epson driver for this printer. 1) Connect printer to usb port of airport. 2) In Printer Setup: Hit Add, Select Rendezvous Printer should show after a few moments. Select it. For Printer Model, select QuadToneRIP and the appropriate printer name. Hit Add. 3) You now have the right printer but the name is Stylus Photo ... instead of Quad.... (Note: you can't just go to Show Info and edit it). 4) Run DiagnosticScript. At the top you'll see an entry such as: device for EPSON_Stylus_Photo_R200: mdns://EPSON%20Stylus%20Photo %20R200._pdl-datastream._tcp.local./?bidi It's a big long name but the important thing to find is: mdns:// from here to the end of line is the unique name for the printer. Leave this on the screen. 5) Now go back to Printer Setup. Hit <option> Add. Select Advanced. Device: Rendezvous register printer ... For Device URI, go to the Diag output and copy/paste the unique name for printer. Make sure you start exactly at the "m" for mdns and go to the last character. Printer Model: QuadToneRIP and the appropriate printer. Hit Add. That's it. You can delete the printer with the Stylus name. Run the Profile install script from the QTR download to get the profiles.
- 20. Using with Tiger 10.4 - Bonjour Printer Printer Setup Utility -- Add command There are three important selections or entries on this page. 1) Select the Printer Device to setup -- note Name & Connection 2) Change the Name to QuadXXXX where XXXX is the Epson model number such Quad2200, QuadR800, Quad7600, or QuadR2400. Note some printers have a letter "R" preceding the number. If the printer has a special inkset add dash '-' and the inkset name such as Quad2200-K7. 3) select the Print Using to QuadToneRIP and the printer model. In this example all the printer model numbers match, but it is possible to different ones if you have a special need. (1) is the hardware device, (2) is the printer name and also refers to profiles you will use, (3) is the QTR driver software that is to be used. Run the Profile install script from the QTR download to get the profiles.
- 21. Using with Leopard 10.5 - Bonjour Printer System Preferences - Printer & Fax -- Add command The three selections here are the same as above under Tiger info. Notice there are several connections to the 3800 printer. Bonjour is probably the best.