COLOR: Looks fine. Prints horrible.

[KariLiz]

In changing to Affinity Designer from Illustrator I have one *major* issue. It's been a problem for months.
My labels for my biz have been absolutely horrible and I need this fixed. I was printing my illustrator files from affinity.
Turns out I can't even print a black tint properly from Affinity.
Instead of going through the entire story, I'll sum up the issue.
Basics:
- Older Computer, windows 7, Illustrator cs 5.5.
- New Computer, Windows 10, Affinity Designer (updated)
- Printer: HP color laserjet 2025dn (same for both computers)
- Colors look fine on the screen for both.

- Created a file in Affinity Designer. Made 3 boxes using ONLY tints of black. They don't print grey... they're green.
Exported the file to a PDF. Prints green using new and old computer.

- Created a file in my old Illustrator. Made 3 boxes using ONLY tints of black. They print properly.
Saved a PDF.
- Opened PDF on new computer, printed it... it prints properly.
- Opened the PDF in Affinity. Looks fine. *Prints green*

Please someone have a reason for this. I realize colors aren't perfect from screen to printer, but this is beyond being able to work with...
I can't even print a greyscale from affinity. No wonder all my files from Illustrator look ridiculous printed out now.

I tried to take a pic to help demonstrate the issue... hopefully it shows how GREEN a black tint is coming out.
Again, looks fine on the screen. And it seems to be with just Affinity.

Please and thank you. I'm losing my dang mind.
 

[lacerto]

(...)

[KariLiz]

No wonder I'm going nuts.
Thank you for the explanation.
I think it's insane I need to save out a file to print it. Hope it works though.
If it does, I guess I need to make a whole new PRINTING folder and save allllllll my files.
It's gonna be a long day.

Again, thanks. At least I know what the issue is now. *sigh*

EDIT: It doesn't work. I don't have any of the programs you listed.
If I click on the PDF, it opens in I'm assuming whatever is on Windows 10.
And it still prints incorrectly.

Any help with working around this? Pretty much makes the software useless if I can't get it to print to my printer.

 

Edited May 6, 2020 by KariLiz
didn't work

[wonderings]

6 hours ago, Lagarto said:

Unfortunately Affinity apps can only send RGB data to the printer so even if your document is in CMYK mode, it will be converted to RGB if you print the job via an Affinity app.

You would need to export your document in CMYK color mode using black ink only and then print the PDF using an app that supports sending data in CMYK mode to the printer (like Adobe apps, CorelDRAW or Xara Photo & Graphic Designer).. 

Yikes that's a big issue. I think the work around is do not use Affinity to print anything. Personally I never print from Adobe, everything is exported to PDF. It is proofed in PDF and exported for PDF for imposing or printing. Another reason to stick with Adobe for now till Affinity can catch up. I wonder if you installed Acrobat Reader if it would print in CMYK properly. I have Acrobat DC Pro which I know works. Might be worth giving the free PDF viewer a shot, if any free software is going to do it I think Acrobat would.

[KariLiz]

It is a HUGE issue.
I downloaded adobe reader and tried it.
No go.

So, this is pretty useless software. Unless someone has some magic way to get this to work.
Why should I need ANOTHER program to print from? Why make software that I can't print from directly? It doesn't make any sense!

[KariLiz]

I played around with the PDF options.
Found one that seems to work. (for print) and making sure it says CMYK in options.
Adobe Reader prints it fine.

I can't believe I have to save all my files.
I regularly open and print everyday, I make labels for my products.
I have 100s.
I'm just floored with how ridiculous this is... again, why make a program you can't print to your home printer from? Who does that?

Thank you all for your comments and help.
I've got some files to save....
 

[lacerto]

(,,,)

[wonderings]

19 hours ago, KariLiz said:

It is a HUGE issue.
I downloaded adobe reader and tried it.
No go.

So, this is pretty useless software. Unless someone has some magic way to get this to work.
Why should I need ANOTHER program to print from? Why make software that I can't print from directly? It doesn't make any sense!

It is new software and we are in V1. There is lots of things that need improving and fixing. I own all 3 apps to support the company as I like what they are attempting to do, but I do not use the apps save every now and then because they are not a replacement for Adobe CC yet. You should not need another program to print from, but that is the reality at the moment. If Affinity does not work for you then it would be best to look at something like Corel. Corel has a higher price tag but no subscription fee. I don't like Corel myself, but it should have all the options you need and can handle vector .eps files and give you the printing features you need. Demo is out there to give a try. 

[KariLiz]

I haven't used Corel since the 90's... I actually didn't even know it was still around.
Thanks for the idea.

[tonyri]

I have had a similar problem moving my documents from Adobe CS5 to Affinity Publisher either via PDF or IDML.  PDFs lost much of the formatting of my text and I ended up manually re-centring blocks of text, IDML retrained all the formatting but changed the colour of my text from Black to a grey scale.  Find and replace brilliantly changed the colour of my text back to Black, but it still printed in Grey!  I found that the "Noise" value impacted on the depth of the black printing and so by again using Find and Replace I was able to globally change all my text so that it properly printed Black. (Change the "Noise" value to 100%)

 

Hope this helps

[Xzenor]

Have you reported it as a bug?

It won't be fixed if they're not aware that it's an issue.