Second preview of Epson Stylus 950 Photo

Digital Photography Now Printer Reviews

Printer preview 2: Epson Stylus 950 Photo

11th April - 2002
By Ian Burley
Here is our second preview of Epson’s ground-breaking new A4 photo ink-jet printer, this time over 5 pages and with 24 comparative illustrations.

Update: Epson announces A3+ Stylus 2100 Photo, click here for 3 pages of news and illustrations.

P.1 Introduction and colour

In this article we have been able to print our standard test images and make direct comparisons with Canon’s S900 printer.

Our first preview of Epson’s new A4 flagship photo printer - click here

Our initial preview of Epson’s new Stylus 950 Photo earlier this week gave an enticing glimpse of its potential and it looked very promising. But we only had Epson’s own sample prints to evaluate. Now, thanks to the staff of What Digital Camera Magazine, who let us run off some test prints using their evaluation 950 Photo printer, we can reveal much more meaningful results.

Most of our initial observations in the original article (click here) are confirmed, but one aspect of the printer in use hasn’t made sense of Epson’s own quoted figures. Epson says an image printed to A4 using best quality settings should only take about 200 or so seconds to print. Our experience so far, using a 1MB 3 megapixel JPEG camera image, is more like 450 seconds and that’s for a 10x7.5 inch print, which is smaller than A4. A Canon S900 can run this print off in less than 70 seconds

It should be emphasises that the test printer was a pre-production sample, so we reserve judgement until we look at a more representative example, though apart from the speed question, the print quality of the test printer was generally excellent.

Colour quality compared

With the Epson 950, compared to the Canon S900 print, it is slightly more cool in tone and the Canon reveals more detail in shadowy areas.

The Canon S900 shows a tendency towards yellowish skin tones and greenish blues. The Epson is more neutral. The Epson also defines the subject’s face marginally better, with a less washed out result.

In a second test print the Epson produces a more neutral result, with clean blues and a neutral grey in the tarmac of a road. The result is also slightly darker than the Canon S900 print.

Compared to the Epson 950, the influence of yellow on the colours shows itself. The sky is not as pure blue as the Epson print and some crimson red detail is verging on orange in the Canon. There is more detail in the fabric in the Epson result.

Remarkably, with this foliage and flower shot there is very little to choose between the Epson 950 and Canon S900. The Epson result is slightly darker.

The brighter nature of the S900, this time, produces a more sparkling result, however, the underlying colour of the foliage and the flowers is quite closely matched.

In this print, the white highlight at the top is actually slightly tinged in the Epson print. Again this is because the Epson result is darker. The pink colour of the pyjama material is tending towards blue whereas the Canon S900’s yellow bias (below) as warmer.

The Canon’s result is more pleasing but the Epson is probably closer to the original.

Epson says it has modified its ink system to reproduce better reds and there is some evidence that this has worked. While the 950 produced generally darker results, it also exhibited superior neutrality. Unlike other Epsons, which have looked rather cold, especially compared to the warm nature of Canon prints, the 950 is simply neutral.

If you prefer warm and bright, but less true to life results, the Canon S900 has the edge, but Epson has has delivered a technical blow to Canon in its colour neutrality. Both produce stunning results.

Our first preview of Epson’s new A4 flagship photo printer - click here

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