from the begining... "starting over"

windoze

ok, im starting over again...

So i know that one of the things i got to do is get everything "working togther" - of course i want to use my new best friend "CS3" and that involves making sure my camera, monitor, CS3 and the printer get along in terms of color management. Now the 1st real issue is adobe 1998 or sRGB. Listen to Adobe and the CS3 gurus and they tell ya let PhotoShop manage the colors and Adobe 1998 is preference of choice. Listen to Andy he tells ya: yeah 'ok' but Smugmug prints in sRGB. So, im 'ok' with leaving my cam in sRGB, and leaving photoshop in sRGB and recalibrating the iMac to sRGB. I do like to print but I never really do it as much as I think I will. So, i hope my choice to keep everything in sRGB is the right one. With the printer it gets a little more difficult, for me at least.
questions:
1) how important to use ICC profiles or let myprinter manage the colors?
if im using sRGB, does that impact at all on my decision?
2) my printer is not new " canon i9900 " will there be ICC profiles for that or is this ICC a "new thing"? ( im not well read on printers )
3) what if in 6 mos i decide to Print more of my stuff and go to adobe 1998 - what happens to all the images i worked on in sRGB?

troy

DavidTO

Troy. You won't be calibrating your monitor to aRGB, or sRGB. You'll just be calibrating it. Get a Huey. Or, if you do it in the preference pane, make sure you set the gamma to 2.2.

windoze

DavidTO wrote:

Troy. You won't be calibrating your monitor to aRGB, or sRGB. You'll just be calibrating it. Get a Huey. Or, if you do it in the preference pane, make sure you set the gamma to 2.2.

what i meant was i need to recalibrate my monitor. when you use the Huey, i dont think it gives you a choice of what gamma to pic. i believe it chooses 2.1


troy

jdryan3

windoze wrote:

1) how important to use ICC profiles or let myprinter manage the colors?
if im using sRGB, does that impact at all on my decision?
2) my printer is not new " canon i9900 " will there be ICC profiles for that or is this ICC a "new thing"? ( im not well read on printers )
3) what if in 6 mos i decide to Print more of my stuff and go to adobe 1998 - what happens to all the images i worked on in sRGB?

troy

1) Absolutely, positively, after calibrating your monitor, you should get ICC profiles for your paper/printer combo. Do NOT let your printer manage your colors. Doing only one or the other is fruitless. And it's not like you pay for profiles. The paper companies provide them.

2) I'm not sure what paper you use, but there are many profiles for that printer (and older). There are two caveats on the downloadable paper profiles: a) some generic paper you pick up at Costco, Staples, Sam's Club, et al will have printer settings included, but they are across printers. Since you don't know who made the paper, where do you get the profile;

b) getting profiles for Epson paper for a Canon printer (and vice versa) is nearly impossible. In either of these cases, you may have to download something and tweak the printer settings. Trial and error is usually hte only way in these circumstances. Name brand, 3rd party papers (Ilford, Moab, Inkpress) have tons of profiles, so stick with them.

3) Check your Preferences in PS. If you open an image in PS that has a different color space (say sRGB) and your 'working' space in PS is Adobe RGB, it will usually ask <prompt> you how to handle the image.

windoze

jdryan3 wrote:

1) Absolutely, positively, after calibrating your monitor, you should get ICC profiles for your paper/printer combo. Do NOT let your printer manage your colors. Doing only one or the other is fruitless. And it's not like you pay for profiles. The paper companies provide them.

2) I'm not sure what paper you use, but there are many profiles for that printer (and older). There are two caveats on the downloadable paper profiles: a) some generic paper you pick up at Costco, Staples, Sam's Club, et al will have printer settings included, but they are across printers. Since you don't know who made the paper, where do you get the profile;

b) getting profiles for Epson paper for a Canon printer (and vice versa) is nearly impossible. In either of these cases, you may have to download something and tweak the printer settings. Trial and error is usually hte only way in these circumstances. Name brand, 3rd party papers (Ilford, Moab, Inkpress) have tons of profiles, so stick with them.

3) Check your Preferences in PS. If you open an image in PS that has a different color space (say sRGB) and your 'working' space in PS is Adobe RGB, it will usually ask <prompt> you how to handle the image.

i think im getting close..... i just printed two ways:
1) using icc profiles and letting photoshop manage the colors, 2) letting the printer manage colors.

without a doubt the 1st way gives me a better print! Compared to letting the printer manage the colors it looks more vivid.
I just got to work some more on getting the print to actually match whats on the monitor and how the heck do you do that if the monitor ( in my case an iMac is backlit ). wont the image on the screen always look brighter?

jdryan3

windoze wrote:

I just got to work some more on getting the print to actually match whats on the monitor and how the heck do you do that if the monitor ( in my case an iMac is backlit ). wont the image on the screen always look brighter?

On the back lit piece, make sure you set the monitor to its default factory settings - or at least don't change the 'brightness' after you calibrate.

I had a Sony Trintron CRT and Dell LCD hooked up to my PC and found that the LCD was very close in luminance to the actual printout. I now see the same for my MacBook Pro and the same Dell 24" FPW.

One other piece about matching monitor to output is to use View->Proof Setup and choose the profile you are going to use for printing. I have found that using the profile for Ilford's Gallerie Classic Pearl and Smooth Gloss pretty much match my monitor profile. But Canon's matte, Ilford's Fine Art and many others give a signifcant shift from the working profile. Sometimes enough of a shift I have to redo some of the color correction to get the look I want for that paper on that printer.

Hope that helps!

dmmattix

Where to get odd ICC profiles

jdryan3 wrote:

1)

b) getting profiles for Epson paper for a Canon printer (and vice versa) is nearly impossible. In either of these cases, you may have to download something and tweak the printer settings. Trial and error is usually hte only way in these circumstances. Name brand, 3rd party papers (Ilford, Moab, Inkpress) have tons of profiles, so stick with them.

Actually it is pretty easy. http://www.inkjetart.com/profiles/profiles.html
Cost around $50 for a custom profile if you cannot find a standard one that matches closely what you are using. Not a bad site for discussion of ink jet printing also.

Regards,

Mike

jdryan3

windoze wrote:

i think im getting close..... i just printed two ways:
1) using icc profiles and letting photoshop manage the colors, 2) letting the printer manage colors.

without a doubt the 1st way gives me a better print! Compared to letting the printer manage the colors it looks more vivid.
I just got to work some more on getting the print to actually match whats on the monitor and how the heck do you do that if the monitor ( in my case an iMac is backlit ). wont the image on the screen always look brighter?

BTW - I like this related thread you started. I'm glad you are 'getting it'. Once you see how the pieces fit together it makes sense.

And Mike is correct on websites to dig up funky ICC profiles. I was sticking to the paper vendors giving you profiles. Gotta love the internet.