I'm setting Gimp up for printing, it's going better now that I've found the Linux drivers for my Canon printer, but there's a couple of problems and I was wondering what's the best settings to use.
So far when I set an RGB profile in preferences whichever one I select, Mint 15 comes with about a dozen pre installed profiles, I get a message on the front of the drop down tab for RGB profile that says (Invalid UTF-8 string) Not sure what that means but it doesn't sound too good.
Actually it's probably easier if I post a screenshot of how things are set up so far.


I have also installed Gutenprint, which works well. There is a definite improvement in the quality of the prints over Gimp's standard print, but in Gutenprint the images are much darker after printing than they are using the standard print. Not sure if there's a way to lighten them up without having to do the lightening work to the image itself.

Any advice as to the preference settings and how to get the best out of Gutenprint is much appreciated.

IMHO, Canon are terrible for linux support. I am biased, I do have an old pixma ip4500, and I did have to purchase the turboprint drivers if only to print CD/DVD's.

Only just dumped TurboPrint in the last week. Reason, new Brother Printer which works just as good. Keeping the ip4500 until the ink stock runs out.

So this is in a PCLOS machine, Gimp 2.8.6 and Gutenprint 5.2.9 and a medium sized panorama.

http://i.imgur.com/75wNgrG.jpg best I can get is 600 dpi which to be fair is not that bad for this image.

but tweaking using adjust output is a bit hit-and-miss, no real clue as to the outcome.
http://i.imgur.com/xjEisUH.jpg

A better bet. I would do some pre-processing with something like delabratory

http://i.imgur.com/dm9JmER.jpg

I know you have a good camera (unlike me) have a look at partha's site for references, really easy to compile. Supports RAW (with a bit of luck), tiff's and jpegs.

edit: does not really answer your question about Gimp colour management, but you do not have a monitor profile set so what you get is nothing like what you see.
Have a browse round one of my favourite sites.
http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/
maybe - http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutori ... ration.htm

Ok, had to zip off there for food.

This is the set up in my Gimp. I have colour profiles in a folder in the ~/.gimp-2.8 folder structure but they could be anywhere.
http://i.imgur.com/gv3dC4C.jpg

Note I do not actually have color management enabled as a norm, it is a pita. Turn your monitor brightness right down so that it matches what is printed (more-or-less). see the cambridgeincolour info.

A couple of icc profiles attached for you to try, plenty for free if you search for them.

@ Caz,
Did you read the gutenprint manual?
I've been using gutenprint with Gimp for years and I'm quite pleased with it.
There's oodles of adjustments possible in gutenprint.

@ rich2005,
The Canon ip4500 is supported by gutenprint 5.2.9.
And thanks for the links,mighty interesting reading.

Gerard.

Edit: I considered buying turboprint but the read it's based on gutenprint.

@gerard82



Yes I know, Gutenprint is not the problem. If you look at the screen shot you will see I have the canon selected.
It is the poor Canon ip4500 linux drivers that let the printer down. (Apart from cleaning heads/wasting ink at the drop of a hat) . I hope that more recent Canon printers have better support but I will never buy another Canon. (said that about Epson as well maybe 12 years ago, running out of manufacturers)

@ rich2005
Thanks for the profiles I'll check them out and see if it gets ride off the 'invalid string' warning on the profile tab - not actually sure if it is a warning it just sounds like one.

I didn't notice that if adjust output in Gutenprint was clicked then it brings up a load of adjustment levels, cheers for pointing that out. I also had a run through on the calibrate monitor by eye section on the cambridgeincolour site and my one appears to match what they are showing. I know it's only a rough guide but the monitor I'm using is only a week old, I wanted something bigger than the old one, and I've already turned the brightness right down on it.
I'll just keep messing around with the print settings and see what I can come up with. As it stands the print quality is good if somewhat dark so that's the only thing I need to sort out. Thanks for your help.

@gerard82
No I didn't read the manual, I installed gutenprint through synaptic and didn't realise that there's a manual for it. I will get a copy of it though, cheers for letting me know about it.