Proofs: Epson Stylus Photo R2880

Now this took me about 2 days to figure. Most Epson printers don’t support any sort of PostScript printing. You will notice that once you try to print a page from Illustrator or InDesign: The printer-icon shows up in the dock, just to disappear 10 seconds later. Meanwhile, the printer makes a little rumba - but no printing whatsoever happens. The image printing quality is absolutely stunning and it would be a waste to not use this printer for proofing purpose. But this made me a little disappointed.

No PostScript support! Well, “no problem”, you think, “you just have to export a PDF and use Acrobat to print”. Well my friend, not so easy. Apparently, Acrobat also sends PostScript Data to the printer, which produces the same very unproductive results.

There are basically 3 Options, which allow you to print PostScript data to this printer (and every other Epson Stylus, for that matter):

1. Use a RIP software

Well, if you can afford it, you might wanna check out the various companies which offer professional level RIP software for OSX which also feature accurate color proofing and so on for a variety of large format printers. There is “KTI Harlequin RIP,” “PowerRIP X ” by iProof and a number of others. But jeez, I’m not gonna spend my money on this. There has to be another (free) way.

1. Use GIMP-Print/Gutenprint

Based on CUPS, Gutenprint allows you to do the same like the pro RIPs. But don’t expect color accuracy. It’s more of a workaround than a real professional solution. If your printer is supported, you might give it a try. The R2880 isn’t yet on the list of compatible printers. I used the driver for the R2400 to give it a try but the colors where way too light. But if you wanna give it a try: Gutenprint / GIMP Print CUPS based printing on OSX. While this might be a very good solution if you run a color laser in a workgroup or at home, it doesn’t work for me.

1. Preview.app

This one made me chuckle, honestly. OSX comes with “something like a RIP”, built-in! You can print your EPS, PS and PDF data with accurate colors on your Epson printer using the original Epson drivers. All you have to do is open the file in preview.app and print. Voila. I haven’t tried it yet with large PostScript 3 files with complicated layers and transparencies, but so far, I was quite blown away by the simplicity. Could have saved me 8 hours of browsing the web.. But at least now I know the product palette of many major RIP software companies out there. And - by reading the comments on macupdate for example - how much those companies suck in respect of support et al.

Of course, if you need to print 20 proofs a day, you should have a look at high-end proofing workflow solutions and pro-level RIP software. But if you’re just a small freelancer, you should better spend your money on another backup harddrive, rather than buying RIP soft which costs a fortune (..with each update).

So, I hope this helps someone. ;)

PS. Keep this in mind: When I say “accurate colors” I don’t say “I measured every dot with a densitometer”. I compared a few printouts with offset printed originals from a couple of my projects with neutral lighting and the difference was actually not noticeable. Also, it heavily depends on what kind of paper you use for proofing. Coated, uncoated.. it needs some fumbling. But if you try out a couple of papers and settings, you find yourself a pretty low-cost, but accurate proofing solutiong for the home office.