EPSON Stylus Pro 4000 printer

Page 5.

First prints

I know this is the page that many will be waiting for, how well does this printer perform?

Before I get on with uploading the test prints I need to make a couple of points very clear. The EPSON Stylus Pro 4000 is a professional printer designed to be used in a working environment, i.e. a photographer's or design studio. It is not a printer that would fit easily within a domestic environment, I have made it clear that this printer is large and expensive to run. For a professional most of the running cost can be offset against the re-sale value of the printed work. For the dedicated amateur this printer represents some of the best quality prints you can achieve, but unless you are going to feed it high quality original material then this printer could be an overkill.

The 4000 uses the same UltraChrome pigment inks as used on the 2100/2200 and 7600/9600 printers. The inks have been well documented and have proved themselves to many photographers by delivering outstanding results. My initial testing on the 2100 showed that the inks produced a softer looking photograph than say the Canon dye based printers. The softer look is particularly well suited to portrait photography, but not for dynamic Zap in your face colour's. The 4000's profiles have been tweaked up to give a happy balance between dye and pigment, this printer has been producing some first class prints all day. My problem is that my scanner is not big enough to scan in 16 x 24" prints, so these are going to be re-photographed or printed smaller.

The 4000 uses a 3.5 picolitre drop size, which is more than adequate for large prints A3 & A2 etc, but for A4 it does not compete with the latest state of the art printers that are delivering 1.5 and 2.0 pl drops. I am going to include my usual eye shot, but please bear in mind that this is a scan from an A4 print, from a large format printer - this would be the equivalent of cropping a 5x4 neg to 35mm size or put in another way using a sledge hammer to crack a Walnut.

Original file	Epson Stylus Pro 4000	Epson R800

First impressions are that the 4000 adds slightly more red to the image, Sophie's face has a healthy look, but not the same warmth as on the R800 print. Below I have reproduced the eye detail and placed the R800 detail next to it. As stated earlier, the 4000 uses 3.5 pl whereas the R800 uses 1.5pl. Looking at the eye shots below, you can appreciate just how good the R800 printer is, but of course the print size is limited to A4 maximum, you would need the 4000 to produce larger prints. Rather than compare the eye ball with various printers I have printed out the test chart using the three dpi settings; 720, 1440 and 2880. There was very little difference between the 1440 and 2880dpi settings, the 720 dpi produces a slightly coarser image, although under normal viewing conditions this isn't very noticeable. Printing times for an A4 print are as follows:

The 2880 dpi setting used more ink and therefore gave a well saturated looking print, the 1440 setting produced a well balanced looking photo. For all practical purposes you could leave the printer set to 1440dpi. For large prints that are required for temporary display, then the 720 dpi setting may be the most economical choice.

Epson 4000 at 1440dpi	Epson R800 at 1440 dpi
Epson 4000 at 720 dpi	Epson 4000 at 2880 dpi

The Cotton reels is where we can see the full potential of any printer, the 4000 doesn't disappoint here. Notice how the UltraChrome colour's have become more saturated when compared to the original 2100 scan. The yellow has jumped into life and the green has more depth. The reds have been given a lift too, perhaps a bit too much for some taste. Detail has been maintained throughout all the reels, (please bear in mind that the pictures on this page are scans of the actual prints and will have lost some of the subtlety)

Epson Pro 4000
Epson R800
Original file
Epson 2100
Canon i950
Browns perhaps too warm for some	Reds are too hot for me
Excellent green and blue	BW is not quite neutral but pleasing

So far the 4000 has put up a very good performance, the colour's are rich and vibrant. The test chart has been printed using the 4000 default profile and quite frankly it is very good, a more experienced printer may want to create a tailor made custom profile, but for a jobbing photographer who just wants to get on and produce quality prints, then the 4000 will deliver quality results straight from the box. I have printed several large format prints this afternoon and I have not produced a single print that I would not be pleased to hang in an exhibition. I have also printed several b/w pictures that I also have bromide prints for, I will publish these later in the review.