Hi

I have an Epson 1400 for printing my film positives

I have been perfectly sharp images on the printer up until this morning, nothing setting wise has changed but the prints are awful, lots of bleeding and blurring.

I've run the head cleaner 3 times but it still has the same result

Has anyone had this problem? If so how was it sorted?

Thanks

Difference between the prints

That is very interesting. Here are a few questions to start with....

1) If you print a piece of paper does it do the same thing?

2) Are you printing the correct side of the film positive?

3) Are you using the same film as you were when you had good results?

4) How long has it been since you last used the printer?

Maybe we can make some kind of a conclusion based on these answers. But it will still be an educated guess I suppose

I saw the duplicate post and replied then saw this and deleted that since this is in the right spot. Thanks for looking through the categories.

Oh wow. I have never seen that happen. I'm very interested as to what is the cause.

Thanks for your reply

1) it prints fine on paper still

2) yes, rough side

3) same film from same batch stored in same place together

4) it was around a 6 days the printer was not used

Thanks for your help

Also the artwork is slightly different in the picture, but changed using the same file on illustrator

Interesting. I took another look at your image and it looks like there is some font substitution. So this could be a file issue.

"the artwork is slightly different in the picture, but changed using the same file on illustrator" - does this mean you created the file as an EPS with different software? Or did someone else create it with AI and send it to you?

The bottom line is this is strange and would appear to be a computer issue of some kind. The file could be corrupt or not able to be read properly in the version of AI you're opening it in. When someone sends you an AI or EPS file it needs to be saved specifically so it will not change when reopened in AI again. All text should be saved as "curves" or "outlines" and the AI file should be saved down to the same version you will open it in.

BUT.... if it prints fine on paper exactly as it has printed before then this may be a film issue. If it is not a file issue it looks like the film is being printed on the NON emulsion side. That is what it normally looks like when you print the wrong side. But the font substitution is odd to me. There seems to be 2 different fonts there.

Hi

Yes the font is different, it's an ai file I created and I changed the font using the same file and saved it as normal

I've just flushed the print heads and have some new film, it's printed perfectly again.

I tried the old film again just to be sure and it's still terrible, it's definalty on the correct side though. The film must be bad in some way.

Thank you for your help

Aha! Yeah That's what it looked like. Like printing inkjet ink on a piece of acetate. Without an emulsion layer the inkjet ink runs and bleeds badly.

You can see here that without all the info it is difficult at best to diagnose problems. Sometimes the solution is right in front of us

Could storage conditions cause the inkjet films to go "bad" that quickly?