Do modern inkjet prints have a wider color gamut than digital prints on traditional photo paper?
Asked 6/28/2013
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I compared soft proofs and final prints from my Epson R1900 with prints from a lab that exposes a digital file onto traditional chemical photo paper. Using the lab’s ICC profile, reds, oranges, and yellows looked noticeably more muted than both the original file and my Epson output, and the final lab prints matched that soft proof closely. My monitor is calibrated and my Epson soft proofs usually match my home prints well, so this appears to be a real gamut limitation rather than a color-management error. In general, have modern inkjet printers surpassed chemistry-based photo paper in color gamut, especially in warm colors?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
13y ago
2 Answers
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Yes, the color gamut of a high end dye printer is generally superior to pigment and pigment ink is generally superior to chemical photo paper. In longevity pigment ink and good archival papers can actually out endure chemical photo paper now as well. In general, you actually see it the most with the depths of black, but when comparing anything pigment to dye, the dye is going to be much more saturated.
I am a little surprised to see such a difference between what your printer can render (since it is pigment ink) vs the chemical photo version. I would expect the chemical process to be less saturated, but not quite as much as it is there. Might just be that my local pro-lab has one of the best chemical process printers around though, but my Canon Pixma Pro-1 still easily beats it.
Originally by user11392. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user11392
13y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
Yes—modern high-end inkjet printing can exceed traditional chemically developed photo paper in color gamut. Based on the answers here, dye-ink printers generally offer the widest gamut, pigment ink is usually next, and chemical photo paper tends to be narrower. Warm tones such as reds, oranges, and yellows can be an area where that difference shows up clearly.
So what you saw is plausible: the lab profile and final print both indicated that the photo-paper process could not reproduce those colors as strongly as your Epson output. Your printer’s additional red/orange inks likely help in that part of the spectrum.
The answer also notes that pigment inks and good archival papers can now be very strong not only in gamut but also in longevity, sometimes outperforming chemical photo prints there as well.
In short: yes, inkjet—especially high-end dye, and often pigment too—has in many cases surpassed traditional photo paper printing for color gamut.
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