OCE CS665 grainy grays

[kn4n]

Hi All:

Complete printing newbie here, asking for some advice. We're a small architecture office that does a LOT of presentations in house. We just took delivery of an remanufactured OCE CS665, with an external Fiery controller.

It's replacing an ancient Xerox Docucolor 12. We had looked into getting a Doc252 but the price and general robustness of the 665 seemed better for our needs. In addition, we use OCE for all of our large format printing needs so it seemed simpler to have a single company to deal with.

Now the problem:

We like the speed and color of the 665 but we are noticing that light grays are showing up very grainy. Does anyone have any experience with this? Is this a fundamental resolution issue that we simply have to start working around? I tried the "image smoothing" setting, which did absolutely nothing.

Like I said before, I am new to this, and we are still in the process of setting the thing up. But any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks-

kn4n

 

[halmac]

Grainyness or tiny streaks.

Grainyness or tiny streaks.

We have the same machine and we get the same thing. It's usually not a problem but shows up in big areas of neutral tones. Because we design most of our own stuff we stay away from large tinted areas. Our tech doesn't seem to recognize it as a problem.
Looking forward to hearing some other's responses.

 

[thebluesdude]

Most digital presses are the same with grays best thing to do is try running on a 150 screen rather than the 200 default, it makes it look more open and like a true film screen

Good luck

 

[gotthetshirt]

Not sure about the OCE but on the Konica 6500 you can change Dot 2 to be a coarser screen. Utility > Machine Admin > System Setting > Expert Adjustment > Quality Adjustment > Custom Screen > Set Dot Pattern to Type 2. Dot 1 remains unchanged so you can select Dot 2 on the Fiery to use the coarse screen.

Alternatively on the Fiery you can set black tints to print in 4 color. (Expert Color > Print Gray using black only CMYK - Off). Obviously this will be a color click so its no use on black only jobs. It may also result in a grays having a slight color cast to them but I think it produces a smoother result.

 

[Steve_S]

Gray flat tones

Gray flat tones

If it is a color document, use a CMY mix to make your gray and it will print smoothly. Or you can calibrate for DOT 2 and change your screening method in the job to that setting. The CMY gray is the easiest method unless it has to be forced to gray.

We have a CS665 and a CS650

 

[kn4n]

All:

These suggestions are really helpful, and I will start testing some of them as soon as I can figure out how.

The difficulty with large areas of neutral tone is going to be an issue (we do a lot of this) so I really need to figure out how to make it work.

Thanks!

 

[Steve_S]

Been a long time since I have used a Fiery as both of ours are on Creo servers, but if you get stuck feel free to PM or email me. Good luck.

 

[Eric van der Kop]

gottheshirt is on the right track. The CS665/650 has more then one screening.
You can select in the driver Dot1,Dot2,Line1,Line2. Depeding on how you printers has been set up.
Default the systems from Océ are set-up on a mostly used way.

In you colormanagement settings you can use "'output GCR"' this wil print black/gray in color, but then you must calibrate the system otherwise you can get a tint of mangenta, cyaan in these area's.
But do you not have Océ service. They should know all of this.

 

[natty]

Pretty much res-stating what has been said but:

1) I think line 1 is the best screen on these machines... Digital Presses seem to print screens better as lines rather than offset dots (i have found this to be true of Xerox 700, and the Canon imagepress only prints line)

2) As said, making a grey out of more than 1 colour helps as i find black only is always very blotchy... The only disadvantage is that the grey may drift in colour as only a small change in 1 of the composite colours will change the tone of the grey.. But the more colours that go down the more density to the dot (or line) pattern hence more 'complete' pattern...

Oh and use the 'high quality' setting as well... only makes a small difference but much more than the 'image smoothing' option you mentioned...

 

[UberTech]

Pretty much res-stating what has been said but:

1) I think line 1 is the best screen on these machines... Digital Presses seem to print screens better as lines rather than offset dots (i have found this to be true of Xerox 700, and the Canon imagepress only prints line)

2) As said, making a grey out of more than 1 colour helps as i find black only is always very blotchy... The only disadvantage is that the grey may drift in colour as only a small change in 1 of the composite colours will change the tone of the grey.. But the more colours that go down the more density to the dot (or line) pattern hence more 'complete' pattern...

Oh and use the 'high quality' setting as well... only makes a small difference but much more than the 'image smoothing' option you mentioned...

This is sound advice. Esp if you have the KM version. LINE1 is by far a better screen than the default DOT1. If you are using DOT1 on your machine (and a vast majority will be) change your workflow to use LINE1 as a default.

 

[kalindd]

This is taken from workshop that I have attended 3 years ago. I think it may be useful for you

 

[kn4n]

All:
Thanks for your help. Setting DOT2 in the software helped noticeably. I will try LINE1 screen this weekend. And when our OCE training guy shows up next week I'll discuss some of these issues with him as well.

best-

kn4n

 

[kn4n]

All:

I should be a little embarrassed by this, but I did not try to adjust any settings in the machine until this afternoon. As you guys suggested, I changed the Line 2/Dot 2 Screening to Type 2 and the photographs/architectural rendeings coming off this machine are SPECTACULAR.

Thank you!