A Look at Epson Papers and Profiles for the 2200

Version 2.0, page 3, ©2004 by Dale Cotton, all rights reserved

* Shadow gamut: handling of dark shades of saturated hues such as red, green, orange, and blue. See here.

** Price per (13x19) sheet is how much I pay here in Canada; the relative values should be roughly the same in all areas.

Vocab: watercolour papers have a rough, bumpy surface texture. When that texture is only mildly pronounced it's called velvet. When it is quite pronounced it is called textured.

Semi-gloss and Luster are similar sheens about half way between matte and gloss.

Profiles: throughout this review I will discuss the performance of the new Epson profiles as though your 2100 or 2200 and my 2200 function identically (have zero unit-to-unit variance). If your experience with these profiles differs from my own, you should only take this as indicative of a unit variance in your machine if you are supremely confident in your monitor profile and your software configuration. (I'm using an Eye-One Display 2 with Match 3 software for monitor calibration, and my Photoshop and Epson driver are configured thusly.)

Heavy-weight Matte (HWM)

I think of HWM as the light-weight little brother of EEM. This paper is not one of the supported 2200 papers, but the EEM and VFA profiles will work. The wood pulp base is even thinner and probably less archival, the ceramic coating is very nearly as white as EEM’s. The serious short-coming of this paper when used with UltraChrome is its blacks, which are significantly lighter than EEM’s: definitely not a paper for images with large areas of shadow or other blacknesses. Otherwise it handles colour like EEM but with a narrower gamut.

Many people experience rippling when printing on EEM and HWM. This has nothing to do with humidity; the paper base is too thin for the amount of ink it takes to make the darker areas of an image. Experiment with reducing Colour Density under Advanced in the driver. For mild cases of rippling, also try Frank Magalhães' brilliantly simple solution.

Epson Enhanced Matte (EEM)

This wood pulp base paper has a smooth surface without added texture. The optical brightener laced ceramic coating is a very pure white (at least for a matte paper). In other words, this is a paper that was developed with inkjet photography in mind. The goal was clearly to come as close to the RC standard as possible while retaining a true matte finish. On the other hand, the relatively thin wood pulp base was chosen for economy.

Blacks are very nearly dye-ink pure; I find them more than acceptable for all but largest areas of pure black or deep shadow, which reflect just a smidgeon of light due to the matte finish - blacks definitely are not charcoal grey. Gamut is somewhat reduced from RC max; but I find it quite acceptable for most images.

The big issue with this paper, however, is not with the paper itself, but with the Epson profile. Shadow handling with the new Epson profile can be seen in fig. 3. This can be dramatically improved by using a better profile. Try using the Epson Velvet Fine Art profile or one of Nick Wheeler's profiles for Epson Enhanced Matte, if you don't have a good custom profile.

Velvet Fine Art (VFA)

To many art photographers this is Epson’s king of matte papers. Apparently Epson agrees, to judge by the price. On the Epson web site they tout VFA as having the highest contrast of all cotton rag papers (I assume, before UltraSmooth) and as employing the same ceramic coating as EEM. Of course the downsides they don't mention are a) the highly fragile surface that will scuff if you so much as look at it cross-eyed; and b) the fact that the OBAs, etc., used to achieve its brilliance will fade with time.

As mentioned, VFA has the same coating as EEM, so the blacks and gamut are identical to EEM, just as Epson claims. In fact, EEM is the obvious paper to use for proofing the ultra-expensive VFA. VFA is the one matte paper that the new Epson profiles actually handle properly, so use its profile for both EEM and VFA to further enhance the proof/final correlation between the two papers.

One real limitation of this paper is the lack of large sizes. It only comes in 8.5x11 and 13x19.

Note that the 19 mil. thickness means the straight paper path must be used.

Watercolour – Radiant White (WRW)

This paper, with a wood pulp base, is fairly thick but also fairly lightweight. The coating has some degree of optical brighteners added but is definitely not as pure white as EEM or HWM. It has a very slightly salmon/pinkish cast to its whiteness. The texture is velvet. Snobs may frown on the wood pulp base, but Wilhelm shows longevity numbers higher for this paper than for any of cotton rag papers with optical brighteners.

It's performance may seem less than exciting, but this is par for a paper with little or no optical brightening. (It is also what a paper like EEM or VFA will look like in 50 years when the OBAs have self-destructed.) Blacks and shadows are average for a matte paper and only slightly better than HWM. Nevertheless, this is a superb paper when used for the purpose for which it was intended: achieving the subtle beauty of watercoloured art.

Fig. 5. Example of an image that works beautifully on WRW

Like EEM, WRW is another paper that suffers at the hands of Epson's 2200 profiles. If you have Epson Watercolour Radiant White, try using the Hahnemühle Photo Rag profile instead of the Epson profile. I find a dramatic improvement. Although there are a few problems with certain colour gradients that result from the mistmatch between profile and paper stock, it's still a far better expedient than what Epson provides at this time.

Only available in 13x19 sheets.

One thing to note about WRW and many other watercolour papers is flaking. Motes of the coating can come loose during shipping and handling but remain on the paper surface during printing. During or after printing such a mote will finally fall off leaving a white spot behind on the print. For this reason, always brush the surface of a sheet of watercolour paper before printing with a clean soft brush.

PremierArt Canvas

I have no experience with this medium.

...And that completes the Epson matte paper line-up. Let’s move on to the Epson RC papers. These are so similar that it will be easier to discuss them as a unit:

Premium Luster, Premium Semi-Gloss, Premium Glossy

I’ve never used the Glossy but have seen samples. So far as I can tell all three papers start out life the same then Luster and Semi-Gloss are imprinted with different patterns to reduce glare. The Luster pattern has a coarser tooth, while the Semi-Gloss is so fine as to be very nearly invisible.

Glossy has a slightly leaden appearance that is hard to describe but that causes most experienced photographers to give this paper a miss. Technically, Luster has a very slightly larger gamut than Semi-Gloss, but the only visible difference I see between the same image printed on Semi-Gloss and on Luster is the surface texture. Both are delightful papers that never disappoint, but Premium Luster is available in many more size options than Semi-Gloss. Luster and Semi-Gloss also have a - to my eye, at least - ever so slightly deeper blacks than Glossy (!). Whether the blacks of any of these three papers is deep enough, however, is a matter that has been much debated. Epson has made great strides over previous pigment blacks, but the result is still perhaps a tad shy of true dye-ink black.

The new Epson profiles for these RC papers seem to be excellent in every respect.

These papers are rugged and waterproof but can be scuffed in the blacks.

The great Achilles heel of all these papers is something that is not even their fault: when used with pigment inks (in other words, UltraChrome) they all exhibit a differential glare called bronzing. Areas with little or no ink reflect light differently than areas with more ink causing a very strange appearance when viewed at any angle that induces glare. Obviously one is going to avoid viewing at a glare-inducing angle in any case, so this phenomenon is more a curiosity than a real problem. Also, the bronzing disappears when the print is safely framed behind glass where it belongs or sprayed or laminated. Still, for those who would like to use an UltraChrome printer to mass-produce snapshots on RC paper, bronzing may be a deal breaker.

One caution regarding Luster: it is one of the few papers that come in two-inch core rolls as well as sheets. The two-inch core leaves the paper with so much curl that it is virtually unusable. Go with the sheet stock.