Epson3880

after seemingly endless research, I settled on going after the Epson 3880 tfor making exhibition quality prints and shutting the darkroom down for good. What is your experience? Is it really that goodHow long will it take me to do what I want with it and what should I watch out for?
thanks for sharing your experience in advance.

should be good to go out of the box, do an alignment check and create or download printer profiles. watch for check make sure "printer manages colors" is off in the printer driver to avoid double management.

I have been using a 3800 for the past few years and it is great and I am sure the 3880 is an improvement.

the other day I was making some prints and forgot to reset the information and ended up printing out a color print in black and white. It was amazing good, not great and not something I would hang or sell, but for the masses they might think it great.

I've been using a 3800 for years now and it produces extremely high quality prints. As with anything one must do the testing and establish a work flow that will yield the desired results. Many different papers to choose from as well. Generally galleries will only accept matte paper.

I've been using a 3800 for inkjet negatives and for digital prints from various file types. It is a very good printer. Recently however one of my students has been showing me glossy prints he does on a high end Canon printer and they are amazing. I had him print the same image file on the Epson with photo black and Epson glossy paper and the Canon print was superior in my opinion. I was quite surprised. I'd never even considered Canon printers before. Next I'd like to print some matte prints for comparison.

Which Canon?

A few years ago in one of my classes I used to print out some panos for my student assignment and as we rarely used a printer I picked up something cheap at Office Depot. It was a basic "family" type office printer and it was shocking how nice the prints turned out.

So as with everything else in the tech world changes are happening fast and furious.

It really is a very good printer. I've had mine for a few years. Mine sometimes gets left to sit idle and I've had a few head clogs. A cleaning cycle takes care of them, but I now print a nozzle check before the first print of the day. Ink usage has been ok, but not great. It seems to use a little bit over time, so it costs you even if you aren't printing. The solution of course is to print frequently.

The factory profiles are very good, but I make my own with the ColorMunki. I'm not sure if they are more accurate or not. I print 95% of the time using the PhotoBlack ink. My preference in paper is for Canson Platine Fiber Rag or Epson Exhibition Fiber. The Canson is nicer, but I bought a large supply of the Epson at a good price. I proof on InkJet Art Luster paper. It's cheap and just as good as the Epson Luster.

My only issue with the printer is I wish it could handle roll paper. I find that from the D800E I would sometimes like to print full frame 16x24 prints. Those don't fit on the 17x22 paper very well And cutting roll paper down has proven to not work well with the curl (head strikes the paper). Printing long panoramas would also be nice, but not easy without roll support.

I print a lot of black and white and am happy with the results with the factory inks. I've used the ABW, Quad Tone RIP, and just toning and printing as color. I've mostly settled on the toning and printing as color since it delivers good results and works well through Lightroom.

I almost recently thought I was going to buy a 3880 since my "ancient" 2200 said it needed service and Epson recommended getting a new printer. I found a technician to service it at 1/6 what the the 3880 was to cost so I went with the service since I still use my darkroom. He told me that the printers keep track of each use and at a particular point tell you to have it serviced. If you exceed the warning by too much they just shut down so I would be cautious about buying a used one. It is also best to print something every few days (even a test print) to avoid clogs and cleaning cycles since that uses up alot of ink and fills the ink pads.

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FYI, my student is printing on a Canon i9900.

thanks, that was my first thought.

I am printing on a Canon Pixma Pro 100 and it is very nice. It only prints to 11x14 so it probably not work out for you. One really nice thing is that I don't have to deal with print head clogging though it has at times been two or three weeks since my previous prints.