Hi,
I (tried) to profile my Brother MFC-9840CDW color laser printer (ok- its not a professional device but at least it should print “basic” colors)…
Calibration tool: Spyder3 print Profiling targets: First i profiled using a 150 field profiling target - next i tried it with a 700 (color) + 200 (sepia, b/w) field profiling target
Problem:
By default the targets printed with a very low color saturation (faded colors) - the b/w target even missed a dozen fields at all -
After creating the profile i printed some test images and it turned out, now there is a is much more color saturation (so far so good) but there is a massive lack in greens and reds.
Funny thing - it seems the 150 field profile produces slightly more greens than the 700 field profile…
Now i printed one test image composed of only green and red colors with the new profile and one with printer color management on. Besides the color shift the printer managed photo includes slightly more greens and more reds (Magenta).
So… to show what’s going on - look at the LAB Plot - the image shows the Brother9840 profile i created compared to the default brother printer profile. There are no greens at all and in specially in side view you will see the gap in reds. (blues and yellows are way better - conform to my impression on the printed test pictures)
My Question:
This is the first profile i created… so i might doing something wrong - but the process is pretty much straight forward and i can’t image doing something significant different…
There is no default setting for “no color correction” in Brother printer menu (only something like “color mode” to none - the one i used for printing the profiling targets).
Is this behavior well known on laser printer? Or is there something wrong with my toner? … I have no clue where to start tweaking for better results…
If I were to hazard a guess, I’d say that you still have some color management going on in the printing of your target. To confirm this, bring your target into Photoshop or some such program where you can put an eye dropper on the different patches. Look for the 100% yellow patch, so you know where it is on your target. Then find that 100% yellow patch on your printed target and look very closely at it (with a loupe or magnifying glass).
We often find that when drivers are using profiles in printing, we see other colors in that yellow patch. So if you see tiny drops of cyan or magenta toner in that yellow square, then that’s a confirmation that there is still some color management going on. “But I turned color mode to none” you say. Well, yes - but if the target image is calling for 100% yellow, and the print has little specks of green in it - then something is getting into the act and making color decisions.
If you find this, you would want to print more targets and try other settings to see if you can truly turn off color management. Sometimes it works to put the “genericRGB.icc” profile into place while using “color mode is none.”
Other ideas:
Is there an update for this driver?
Are there other drivers you could use for the Brother printer?
BTW, a target with no color management will tend to look dull and dark, rather than bright. I don’t know if this describes what you were seeing or not. This target actually has more ink in it; it’s actually printing out more, deeper color - but some people describe this as being low in saturation.
my drivers are up to date - i printed a test print with pure colors. I could’t find any drops in yellow - but (besides some color shift) obviously the printer has a problem with green - the green color should look darker to the top (like all other colors).
Could this be a problem with the toner?
Furthermore i realised when i print with a profile (photoshop manages color) - the color mode i described in my first post is not to none - it’s set to normal - AND it’s greyed out… so i can’t change it. This looks like a bug in printer driver?
Yipes. That’s some very ungreen-like green. I wonder what’s happening with the forth and fifth green patch there. This looks exactly like a low or no toner situation, except that I doubt you have a green toner. So check the levels of your other toners, esp. cyan and yellow.
We very seldom find drivers that don’t allow the color management to be turned off, but just the same we run across a few now and then. Your Brother might be one of them. Check to see that you are logged in with all administrator privileges; that might unlock some abilities you wouldn’t have otherwise.
