Still Going Nuts – Color Management

DF
Posted By
David_Fuccillo
Aug 21, 2007
Views
418
Replies
8
Status
Closed
Hello!

I’ve spent hours for the past 4-5 weeks trying to solve my situation of what I see on the monitor is not what prints out at my local Wal-Mart or Ritz. They both use the Fuji Frontier 390. I was able to do this just fine on CS2 on my other system (slow 500MHZ). I upgraded my hardware (Dell XPS/410) so I could upgrade to CS3. I have Dell’s 2007FP Ultra Sharp monitor. I have my camera set at Adobe RGB and my work space at RGB. I have tried running Adobe Gamma and even purchased Spyder2, which did not solve the problem. The prints I get back have are darker and have a yellow green appearance.
I tried unsuccessfully to get the icc profile for the printer Fuji’s LP2000SC after speaking to Fuji and Wal-Mart Tech. The Tech suggest printing a test print (he sent me), bring it home and adj my monitor(using the monitor settings)to match the print. This did not work to well.

I know it will never be perfect, but its off enough that causes me to be unable to make the adj in camera raw that I want.
Yesterday a guy at Ritz camera said I should be setting my camera on sRGB and run them through Photoshop with a work space of sRGB since there printers are set for sRGB. I took some photo’s today as a test and noticed I didn’t have the adj capability as with Adobe RGB (256 colors). It appeared I could only adj the greens and blues.. I have not brought them to be printed at Ritz yet, but will tomorrow.

Is setting my camera at sRGB the answer?? I don’t want to give the the adj capability in camera raw…

Sorry, for the length.

All input would be greatly appriciated!!!

Dave Fuccillo
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PF
Peter_Figen
Aug 21, 2007
First, take your Spyder and calibrate your screen to D65 or 6500Kelvin and make sure the luminence is not over 110 cd/m2 if it’s an LCD. Work on your files and adjust them to taste. Then make a copy of the file and convert that to sRGB and take it to the lab. If that print doesn’t look better than what you’ve been getting, try looking at drycreekphoto.com to see if they have a profile for your lab. If they do, download that and try converting a copy of your original file to that and printing. If that’s still not acceptable, then you can always have a custom profile made that will probably solve your problem. It all depends on how picky you are and how much you are willing to spend. The advice to adjust your monitor to their print was circa 1996 or thereabouts. The idea today is to use a standard monitor calibration and viewing environment and the appropriate output profiles to convert to for your prints. Unfortunately, if you go about it half-assed, you are going to be constantly disappointed. To make it all work well, and believe me, it can, you have to have custom profiles all around and have consistant process control. Every place where there is a possible variable has to be buttoned up. The part you have no control over is, of course, the printer calibration and processor chemistry. Good luck!
DF
David_Fuccillo
Aug 21, 2007
Peter,

Thansk so much for taking the time to reply. I will try your suggestions. One question? Since the Spyder2 didn’t orig solve my problem I was able to return it so I did. How do I check the luminence setting without it?? Do I have to get spyder2 or simular calibration software to check this setting??

Thanks again

Dave Fuccillo\
DR
Donald_Reese
Aug 21, 2007
I wonder if anyone has ever seen any prints from walmart that look great? i know everyone that i see go there, gets stuff that ranges from intense magenta to green and everything in between. remember cheap prices are achieved through skimping somewhere. i know lots of people who use a local cvs that blows walmart away. i say get your own printer,and skip outsourcing it.
PF
Peter_Figen
Aug 21, 2007
Returning the Spyder was probably a good thing. Get yourself an X-Rite/Gretag iOne Display and use that. It’s a better unit anyway. If you’re going to make this work, you absolutely need hardware monitor calibration. That’s where you start, and once you’ve got that nailed, you move on from there, eliminating each variable one step at a time. You also need to control the ambient light in you editing room and you need to have a good viewing light source like a Solux (www.solux.net) D50 viewing light, which are only about $75 and worth every penny.

Once you know you have your monitor and viewing conditions under control, it’s a lot easier to determine whether or not the print profiles are good or not.

While a lot of these types of labs say that they want sRGB, there are no devices that actually ARE sRGB. It all depends on how critical you are, and since most people using the type of vendors you are printing at are not super critical, they generally get away with "pleasing" color. I’ve made my own custom profiles for the local Costco and was very pleased with the prints I had made. The people there were shocked that the prints were so good, but to be honest, the only time I use a lab these days are when I have to make a print larger than my own inkjet printer or there is an unually high quantity of the same print.
RP
Rick_Popham
Aug 21, 2007
I’ve made my own custom profiles for the local Costco and was very pleased with the prints I had made. The people there were shocked that the prints were so good,

Just curious, Peter, about how you make a profile like that? Do you send a non-color managed target through their printer, then scan it with your own spectrometer setup? Or do you use a profile from someplace like Drycreek?

Thanks,

Rick
PF
Peter_Figen
Aug 21, 2007
Rick,

I send a ProfileMaker target to the printer and make sure that they know not to apply any color conversions to the file – just print it as they get it. Toss that on the Spectrolino, feed the resulting data back into ProfileMaker and generate my custom profile. I’ve never used a profile from DryCreek because I’ve been making my own for longer than they’ve been around. I do remember downloading their profile for my local Costco (Culver City, Ca.) and it was definitely not the same as the one I made – y’know, convert to one and then assign the other. If you see a significant shift on screen when you assign the other profile, you know there is a difference.
RP
Rick_Popham
Aug 21, 2007
Thanks, Peter.
DF
David_Fuccillo
Aug 22, 2007
Peter,

I found the X-Rite Eye-One Display 2 at B&H for $229.95. Is this the one you reccomend?? It appears its capable of adapting profiles for any ambient light condition. Will I still need the D50 viewing light??

Also, If you don’t mind I’d like to run by you to verify I have everything in Photo shop setup correctly.

Color Settings
Settings = Custom

Working Spaces
RGB=Adobe RGB (1998)
CMYK=U.S. Web Coated (SEOP) v2
Gray=DOT Gain 20%
Spot=DOT Gain 20%

ColorManagement Policies
RGB=Preserve Embedded Profiles
CMYK=Preserve Embedded Profiles
Gray=Preserve Embedded Profiles
All boxes checked off

Conversion Options
Engine=Adobe (ACE)
Intent=Relative Colorimetric
Both boxes checked off

Proof Setup
View>Proof Setup>Custom…
Custon Proof Condition=Custom
Device to simulate=I assume I would put the printer profile. Can I also use sRGB or RGB?? Black PointCompensation is checked off

At the system level
Control Panel>Color Management
Display: Dell 2007FP-NVIDIA GEForce 7300LE
Use my settings is checked off
ICC Profile
Adobe RGB (1998) I created this from Adobe Gamma utility. Should I use the profile dell sent Dell 200FP file name 2007FP.icm?? In the Advance tab
Window System Defaults
Device profile=Adobe RGB (1998)
Viewing Conditions=WCS Profil for ICC Viewing Conditions ICC Rendiring Intent to WCS Gamut Mapping
Default Rendering Intent=Perceptual
Perceptual(Photo Images=Photography
Relative Colormetric(line art)=Proofing & Line art
Absolute Colormetric(Simulate Paper/Media color
Business Graphics(Charts & Graphs)=Charts and Graphs

I wanted to verify this before I send anything to be printed.

Your time and knowledge is greatly appreciated…

Dave Fuccillo

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