B&W prints on laser printer - Green tint with 4 inks

[LERsince1991]

Hi,

I'm just trying to get some half decent prints with some photos I've taken on my 400d, desaturated and edited in Aperture, exported 8bit tiff files, then placed in a layout in inDesign cs5. Then exported to pdf to print from in my uni print room.

But when I print them the parts of the images which are meant to be the darkest are green, the rest of the image is decent.

I've tried using loads of settings when printing but cant find anything thats resolved it and its using up so much money and card!

The printer is a HP laser printer, pretty new I believe.

I've tried printing in grey scale and obviously it only uses the black cartridge and comes out relatively washed out.

Does anyone know much about this issue or how I can get round it?
I also tried opening the pdf in photoshop (rasterising it) and then printing but it gave the same results.

Luke.

 

[carlgo]

I could rant forever about the printing process that, in 2011, is dismally fragmented and astonishingly nerdy. Damned spendy as well!

You might try having your printer control the output, rather than having the computer control the color.

Being careful to select the type and grade of paper plays a big part as well. For example, the output on Canon Glossy Pro is different than on matt, the colors are actually squirted out differently.

By experimenting forever and finally resorting to less costly bulk ink, I finally got rid of the color cast on my B&Ws, as well as getting better color prints. I am pretty happy now.

BTW, the color inks are indeed used in the B&W printing process. There are all-black and gray inksets available for some printers.