Printing on Hahnemuhle Photo Rag paper with Epson 3800

I don't write many technical blogs and I don"t think I have ever written one on printing technique.  However, it has taken me days to get the best settings for Hahnemuhle fine art paper and I thought it was worth sharing. For those of you that have never used Hahnemuhle Photo Rag 308g paper before it is a matt fine art paper.  It has a smooth but very slightly textured paper and certainly isn"t like the Epson Archival matt paper which is much brighter white and very very smooth.  When printed on correctly it is an amazing paper and the detail and colour saturation are amazing.  Full settings below.

epson3800printing

All images were printed from Lightroom 4.3.

The settings that I used were

Lightroom Print Module

Printer profile: HFA_Eps3800_MK_PhotoRag.icc

Intent: Relative

Print resolution 300ppi

Print sharpening: Standard / Matt

Print Dialog (Mac) / Print settings

Media Type: Velvet Fine Art Paper

Color Settings: Off

Print Quality: Superfine - 1440dpi / High speed - OFF / Finest Detail

Print Dialog (Mac) / Paper configuration

Color Density: 0

Drying Time: 3 (This is critical)

Paper Thickness: 5

Platen Gap: Auto

I found 2 of the settings that did make a big difference were turning on Finest Detail and Drying Time of 3.  I experimented a lot with the drying time and a longer drying time resulted in significantly improved detail.  This maybe my specific printer but these settings created amazing prints.

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Fuji X-T2 vs Fuji X100T - Finally decided which one

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My D800 photographic exhibition