German paper maker Hahnemühle is well-known for making some of the best papers in the business since 1584 with the highest paper quality parameters for its Digital FineArt papers.
In this article, I share my thoughts on the three excellent Hahnemühle Matt Fine Art papers of which two are textured:
- German Etching 310 gsm - 100% Cotton mould-made white (data sheet)
- William Turner 310 gsm - 100% Cotton mould-made white (data sheet)
and one is smooth:
- Photo Rag® 308 gsm - 100% Cotton white (data sheet)
I also give some basic pointers on how to use these papers on Mac and Windows computers using my Epson SureColor P800 and Canon PRO-2000 printers.
ICC Profile / Color Gamut Analysis
In the following animation, what you see is that all three of these Matt Fine Art papers have roughly the same size color gamut using the ICC profiles from the Hahnemühle Download Center. The animation starts off with William Turner then Photo Rag and finally German Etching:
While there are some subtle differences, in practice all three papers performed equally well. I did find that it is possible to get a lot more out of these papers with a finely tuned custom ICC profile so some users may look to building their own or leveraging ColorByte ImagePrint for the best results.
Despite the fact that matte papers traditionally have a smaller color gamut and a lower d-max (maximum density of blacks in a printed image) than glossy fine art papers, I found all three of these papers to be extremely good and delightful in use. In fact, for the prints I put on display I frequently found that viewers didn't realize it was a matte paper until I told them or they touched these papers.
In the hand
While some people swear off matte papers like the plague, I personally love them for one significant reason and that's how they feel in your hand. I'm a very tactile person so I love wood, leather, linen, cotton, etc... because of their textures and how it feels in my hands.
If you are this type of person then you are in for a sensory delight with these papers. Here's my thoughts on each:
- Photo Rag - this is the paper you want if you want a hearty substantial feel, yet a smooth surface that draws the light in a positive way for a brighter natural white tone. I found it to have a light surface texture that when viewed at a harsh angle is visually delightful as it has the appearance of a centuries old handmade paper. This is the go to paper for portraits of models with smooth skin that you want to touch.
- German Etching - this paper takes the texture that is visible in Photo Rag and brings it to the surface for a noticeable texture that feels like a very high quality hand made paper that is a joy to hold in the hand. It's almost orange peel like, but in a good and more aesthetically pleasing way. This is the perfect paper for images with leather, clothes, fruit, flowers, etc...
- William Turner - this paper has a significant "tooth" to it and I love it! It's almost like 600+ grit sandpaper which might sound weird, but when you hold it you think "wow, this is good stuff". Surprisingly it prints beautifully too so the texture vanishes unless held at an angle in indirect soft light. I love this paper for landscapes and images that look so real that you want to touch them (I.e., rock, wood, bark, etc...).
Scans of Prints
WARNING: Scanning a print to a JPEG means you end up with details from one color space being lost in another color space and a much lower fidelity image than what you hold in your hand. As a result DO NOT JUDGE the print color based on these images.
Instead, the value of this section is so you can do relative comparisons against the other scans of the same image for different paper types (in this article only - not other articles on this blog). This can be useful to see how these papers compare against each other with identical images.
It should also be noted that if you look carefully at the intentional white border of these scans of each of these papers that you can get a hint of the texture pattern for that given paper.
Click any print to see a full-size JPEG scan, but remember it's color fidelity is MUCH lower in the photo than in real life. All images are copyright Ron Martinsen and may not be used for any other purpose but viewing while this article is open in your web browser.
The Outback Printer image is courtesy of the late but great Uwe Steinmueller and used by permission of Bettina Steinmueller. It should be noted that in real life all three papers show visible squares up to 6 in the blacks and 252 in the whites, even though that detail is lost in the scans. The color is virtually identical even under a light box for all three which means you can mix papers and get color matching for gallery exhibitions.
Photo Rag
Outback Print Printer Evaluation Image - Photo Rag
Gary Parker is a Pulitzer prize winning photographer who has done magazine covers for the who's who of high tech including Bill Gates and Steve Jobs as well as amazing commercial pet images. He's also my friend and mentor, so I have this photo I took of him in hanging by desk that is printed on ILFORD GALERIE Prestige Smooth Pearl Photo Paper.
In my experience a glossy will always beat a matte paper when compared side by side, but what struck me about this print (in real life - vs the washed out looking scan) was how close it was in quality to the glossy - on a matte paper!
As a result, this was my paper of choice for this image because it felt smooth with a very subtle texture - much like Gary's vest. It was a perfect match for this photo, so I sent a copy of this print to Hahnemühle for review.
German Etching
German Etching is a long-time favorite of mine as Canon had sent it to me at the start of my printing series when I reviewed the iPF6300. I never got around to reviewing this paper and I loved it so much that I ended up hoarding the rolls to save this paper for only very special images. Years later, I had the freedom to try it out again and I loved pretty much everything I printed on it.
Outback Print Printer Evaluation Image - German Etching
While the colors from the scan are very washed out from a source image that is intentionally aged (using Texture Effects), the combination of this paper and its texture reminded me of what my hand felt when I touched this chair. I immediately knew it was the perfect paper for this print and immediately printed a copy to send to Hahnemühle for review.
Now this is a favorite image of mine done with Simplify that people either love or hate with every fiber of their being. I'm okay with that though because any image that evokes strong emotions is a successful image in my opinion.
With that said, I never imagined ever printing this image as it's obviously meant for the digital realm. However, the feel of German Etching reminded me of the feel and texture of these stones so I had to print it out. The net result is something that turned out better than expected and one that I actually enjoyed holding in my hand for the first time.
William Turner
Outback Print Printer Evaluation Image - William Turner
This was my paper of choice for the Treehouse print I sent to Hahnemühle for review. The texture of the paper just reminds me of the feel of the wood of the cabin, so it just felt so right to print this image on this paper. It's ironic too because this photo was a huge commercial success for me, but I had never printed it. As soon as I touched this paper, that immediately changed and it immediately became a favorite test print for this series as the detail of the reds on the wall behind the light really showed the characteristics of the reds for a given ICC profile.
Usage Instructions / Tutorial
In this section, which is a bit redundant if you review the whole section, I try to get you pointed in the right direction about how to set your application (e.g., Photoshop) to use the correct ICC profile and media type so you can get the best results with these papers.
Canon PRO-2000 from Photoshop (Mac)
Printing using these papers from Photoshop is easy as long as you remember to set Color Handling to "Photoshop Manages Colors" and then set your Printer Profile to the appropriate paper as shown here (Photo Rag profile shown):
The ICC profile you use will come from the Hahnemühle Download Center for your specific printer, but in this case for the Canon PRO-2000 I had the following choices:
- German Etching paper uses HFA_CanPro2000_MK_GermEtching.icc
- Photo Rag Matt Fine Art Smooth uses HFA_CanPro2000_MK_PhotoRag.icc
- William Turner paper uses HFA_CanPro2000_MK_WTurner.icc
and I made sure to use my desired rendering intent and checked black point compensation.
If you click "Print Settings..." you'll see the printer settings dialog where you can specify the media type "under Quality & Media" which can be Heavyweight Fine Art Paper for all of these papers as shown here:
Epson SureColor P800 from Photoshop (Windows)
Printing using these papers from Photoshop is easy as long as you remember to set Color Handling to "Photoshop Manages Colors" and then set your Printer Profile to the appropriate paper as shown here (Photo Rag profile shown):
The ICC profile you use will come from the Hahnemühle Download Center for your specific printer, but in this case for the Epson P800 I had the following choices:
- German Etching paper uses HFA_EpsSC-P8000_MK_GermEtching.icc
- Photo Rag Matt Fine Art Smooth uses HFA_EpsSC-P800_MK_PhotoRag.icc
- William Turner paper uses HFA_EpsSC-P800_MK_WTurner.icc
and I made sure to use my desired rendering intent and checked black point compensation.
If you click "Print Settings..." you'll see the printer settings dialog where you can specify the media type which can be Velvet Fine Art Paper for all of these papers as shown here:
Be sure that Print Quality is set to "Max Quality" and that Mode: is set to "Off (No Color Adjustment)" to ensure that you don't get an ugly double color managed print. Epson will also force you to use the Front - Fine Art paper settings source so if that's a problem then you should use the Epson Print Layout software as shown in the Mac section (works for Windows too).
Canon PRO-2000 from Photoshop (Windows)
Printing using these papers from Photoshop is easy as long as you remember to set Color Handling to "Photoshop Manages Colors" and then set your Printer Profile to the appropriate paper as shown here (William Turner profile shown):
The ICC profile you use will come from the Hahnemühle Download Center for your specific printer, but in this case for the Canon PRO-2000 I had the following choices:
- German Etching paper uses HFA_CanPro2000_MK_GermEtching.icc
- Photo Rag Matt Fine Art Smooth uses HFA_CanPro2000_MK_PhotoRag.icc
- William Turner paper uses HFA_CanPro2000_MK_WTurner.icc
and I made sure to use my desired rendering intent and checked black point compensation.
If you click "Print Settings..." you'll see the printer settings dialog where you can specify the media type which can be Heavyweight Fine Art Paper for all of these papers as shown here:
Don't forget to set Print Quality to Highest and choose "Color Settings..." where you can go tot he Matching tab as shown below and set "Color Correction" to "Off" as shown here:
This step makes sure you don't accidentally do double color matching which might sound good to the uninformed but looks horrible when you print.
Epson Print Layout Software (Mac & Windows)
Epson Print Layout Software is handy software that works on both Mac and Windows that helps you to get great prints without having to use Photoshop. While I won't give a tutorial on how to use this product, I will point out that you simply need to set the Media Type to "Velvet Fine Art Paper" and specify the correct ICC profile in the Color Settings section as shown below (for German Etching):
The ICC profile you use will come from the Hahnemühle Download Center for your specific printer, but in this case for the Epson P800 I had the following choices:
- German Etching paper uses HFA_EpsSC-P8000_MK_GermEtching.icc
- Photo Rag Matt Fine Art Smooth uses HFA_EpsSC-P800_MK_PhotoRag.icc
- William Turner paper uses HFA_EpsSC-P800_MK_WTurner.icc
and I made sure to use my desired rendering intent and checked black point compensation.
That's it - super simple and it works great, so this is an easy way to get great print results from your Epson SureColor printer.
Conclusion
Overall, I was extremely satisfied with these papers. You can see, and more importantly feel, the hundreds of years of experience Hahnemühle has in making truly special fine art paper.
These are papers for the print master who wishes to add the third dimension of a sensory experience to their prints and/or leverage papers that complement the texture of their image.
I highly recommend these Hahnemühle papers as the top premium papers on the market.
Where to Buy?
At B&H you can get these papers using these links:
At Amazon you use these:
Other articles you may enjoy
If you enjoyed this article, you may also enjoy these:
- Printing Series - tons of great info!
- Canon PRO-2000 Review
- Epson SureColor P800 Review
- Epson SureColor P600 Review
- ColorByte ImagePrint 10 Review
- Ron's Recommendations
Disclosure
If you make a purchase using links found in this article, I may make a commission. It doesn’t cost you a penny more, but it does help to support future articles like this.
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