Epson 3880 and PhotoShop Printing Issue

[cowanw]

Are you using windows?
Opening up printers through the control pane, I get to "Epson stylus 3880 printing Preferences" there is a orientation settting. Is this set to landscape (if appropriate)

[Michael Graves]

Are you using windows?

OSX. It is set to landscape. And the prints are coming out in the proper orientation. It isn't the direction of print that is the issue. It's that the image is sized to 16x20 but printing at 12x15. It doesn't make sense. And I can't make it NOT do it. If I resize the same image DOWN to 12x15 and print it on 13x19 paper, it prints perfectly. Looks, feels, smells and tastes EXACTLY like the 12x15 print on 17x22 that was supposed to be 16x20.

[Brian Ellis]

I've had four Epson printers, never had a problem like this. But if I did, and after checking everything you've checked without finding a solution, I'd probably just call Epson. But out of curiosity, before doing that I'd do two things. First, instead of telling the printer to center the image, I'd try manually setting the borders for a 16x20 print on 17x22 paper myself rather than just telling the printer to center the image to see if the same thing happens. I'd also download QTR (www.harrington.com) using its image and paper size settings to see whether it gave the same problem. I'm not sure exactly what you'd learn from doing either of these things but they're easy to do and might help narrow the problem down to you, your printer mechanics, or your settings (though the settings look right to me, FWIW).

As an aside, while I haven't used Advanced B&W much, based on the few times I did use it, and more importantly on comments from people who know much more about printing than I do, I think you'll get better results from QTR than Advanced B&W apart from this particular problem.

[Frank Petronio]

Another recommendation for QTR, although it is a pain to install and figure out the first time but it does work flawlessly once you get it set.

The centering problem - does this happen at other, smaller print sizes? I'd experiment with 5x7s or 8x10s as it should be consistently wrong with everything and there is no point wasting ink and paper.

[RPNugent]

I just used my 3880 to try and print a 16x20 on 17x22 paper to see what would happen. I used Exhibition Fiber as it was what I had handy, but otherwise used virtually all of your settings. The only difference was not setting Super 2880. A perfectly sized 16x20 on 17x22 just exited the printer. I would consider calling Epson to see if they have a clue since at least I can't duplicate your problem on the same printer.

[Michael Graves]

Another recommendation for QTR, although it is a pain to install and figure out the first time but it does work flawlessly once you get it set.

The centering problem - does this happen at other, smaller print sizes? I'd experiment with 5x7s or 8x10s as it should be consistently wrong with everything and there is no point wasting ink and paper.

So far, it's only happened with this image. Tonight I'm going to go with a different negative and start from scratch just to see what happens. There could be some metadata stuck in the file that is snafu'ing the whole process.

[Michael Graves]

I have a technical explanation for the problem.


The file is cursed. Or perhaps haunted.

I restarted my MAC, loaded PS and a whole new image, that I tweaked a little, spotted and printed to 16x20. Perfectly sized. (Not perfectly printed...it looked darker than I expected, but I'll fix that.)

So, thinking it was resolved by restarting the machine (I was confusing it with a Windows machine, sorry...) I loaded the other file, checked, rechecked and re-rechecked the settings and printed it.

And got a 12x15 image in the corner of the paper. I now have four very nice copies of that image in 12x15. Anyone want to swap for one of their images? I have a surplus now.

[rjphil]

Zombies ?

[Jim Andrada]

Sacrifice a goat???

[welly]

Sacrifice a virgin????