Prints Auto vs. True

Michael L · November 16, 2005

If my calibrated workspace is sRGB should I recommend auto or true prints to someone ordering smugmug prints? Also, can I remove the option for a customer to pick auto color correction.

David_S85 · November 16, 2005

Interested to the answer for this question also.

jfriend · November 16, 2005

Help pages on smugmug color correction

Michael L wrote:

If my calibrated workspace is sRGB should I recommend auto or true prints to someone ordering smugmug prints? Also, can I remove the option for a customer to pick auto color correction.

Have you read this page and this page in smugmug's help section? They should be helpful. And, if you look down the left side of that same page, there are a whole bunch of other relevant links to color correction and printing color issues.

Andy · November 16, 2005

Michael L wrote:

If my calibrated workspace is sRGB should I recommend auto or true prints to someone ordering smugmug prints? Also, can I remove the option for a customer to pick auto color correction.

The short answer is yes, but..

9/10 of our returned prints come from when True Color was chosen. If you are very good about calibrating - and I'd recommend getting our calibration print and really seeing how well your monitor matches up to what's printed at ezprints - then yes go ahead and recommend true color.

help page on auto vs. true color

Michael L · November 17, 2005

I have read the smugmug support pages about ordering prints. I cannot keep a customer from ordering “true” prints. From what I gather if my calibrated workflow is sRGB, and a customer orders true prints (vice my auto default) the print will be ok.

I don’t expect a customer to read all the great smugmug support pages about true vs auto and make a decision. I would rather not give the customer the true/auto option.

Andy · November 17, 2005

Michael L wrote:

I have read the smugmug support pages about ordering prints. I cannot keep a customer from ordering “true” prints. From what I gather if my calibrated workflow is sRGB, and a customer orders true prints (vice my auto default) the print will be ok.

I don’t expect a customer to read all the great smugmug support pages about true vs auto and make a decision. I would rather not give the customer the true/auto option.

Thanks for the input, Michael - we really appreciate it. For now, you can set in "customize gallery" the default to True or Auto - and when the customer orders, that will be what shows in the cart - yes they can still change it, but you can gently tell them not to in your gallery description if you like.

All the best,

jchin · November 20, 2005

What about if I've already used DPP to process my images so that the colors look good on my screen (sRGB workspace)? Should I set the default to "True" instead of "Auto"?

Andy · November 20, 2005

jchin wrote:

What about if I've already used DPP to process my images so that the colors look good on my screen (sRGB workspace)? Should I set the default to "True" instead of "Auto"?

I can't see your monitor from here in NY

- but seriously the problem is, everyone's tastes vary so much. 90% of our returned prints are true color, Auto color rarely returned.

That said, we do advise that pros who feel that they are working in a properly calibrated environment that true will be, well, true.

Try a calibration print, and see how good you are

Baldy · November 20, 2005

jchin wrote:

look good on my screen...

True confession time: those words raise a yellow flag in my mind because I've heard them so many times in the same sentence as, "but my prints were too dark, too blue, red..."

We have a lot more luck with this approach, especially if skin tones are involved:

http://www.smugmug.com/help/display-color

Thanks,
Chris

cybercrypt13 · November 21, 2005

Baldy wrote:

True confession time: those words raise a yellow flag in my mind because I've heard them so many times in the same sentence as, "but my prints were too dark, too blue, red..."

We have a lot more luck with this approach, especially if skin tones are involved:

http://www.smugmug.com/help/display-color

Thanks,
Chris

Well, I had a customer order prints from you a few weeks ago and they brought them by here for me to see. When I setup my account with WhiteHouse they forced me to calibrate my system and to run print tests before I could even order from them. The results were the best prints I've ever seen.

Now switching over to the auto coloring used by your printer, the prints I saw of a customer were no where close to as nice as those of WhiteHouse. I would assume because of the profile. The pictures that have any green in them seem to bleed through to a green hue throughout the picture. This is not what it looks like on my screen.

So I would assume that I need to go set all my galleries to be true and things should print exactly like WhiteHouse was prints were being done and I shouldn't see this problem again. At the time I setup my account with them all this stuff was new to me so I didn't really understand what they were doing, however, reading your comments here I'm starting to understand again.

I'd also like to see a way to hide the type from the shopping cart if we've set to override it for our prints. Not an immediate deal but would be nice if you'd add it to your list of things to do...

Thanks,

glenn

Andy · November 21, 2005

cybercrypt13 wrote:

Well, I had a customer order prints from you a few weeks ago and they brought them by here for me to see. When I setup my account with WhiteHouse they forced me to calibrate my system and to run print tests before I could even order from them. The results were the best prints I've ever seen.

Now switching over to the auto coloring used by your printer, the prints I saw of a customer were no where close to as nice as those of WhiteHouse. I would assume because of the profile. The pictures that have any green in them seem to bleed through to a green hue throughout the picture. This is not what it looks like on my screen.

So I would assume that I need to go set all my galleries to be true and things should print exactly like WhiteHouse was prints were being done and I shouldn't see this problem again. At the time I setup my account with them all this stuff was new to me so I didn't really understand what they were doing, however, reading your comments here I'm starting to understand again.

I'd also like to see a way to hide the type from the shopping cart if we've set to override it for our prints. Not an immediate deal but would be nice if you'd add it to your list of things to do...

Thanks,

glenn

Hello Glenn,

Thanks for posting. I can help. The first thing you'll want to do is check your monitor calibration and also get a calibration print. If you email me at help@smugmug.com with a request for one, I'll fire it off asap. Also, would you please provide me the order number (look in your reports in your control panel) of the prints that didn't come out right for your customer, I'll analyze them, look for ways to improve them, and we'll happily reprint them for your customer. That's The SmugMug Guarantee.

All the best,

cybercrypt13 · November 21, 2005

Andy,

Order number and info on the way...

Thanks

cybercrypt13 · November 21, 2005

Andy,

Just making sure you got the email I sent earlier today. never heard back from you and I was having a little trouble with my email so wanted to be sure you got it...

Thanks,

Andy · November 21, 2005

cybercrypt13 wrote:

Andy,

Just making sure you got the email I sent earlier today. never heard back from you and I was having a little trouble with my email so wanted to be sure you got it...

Thanks,

Hello again Glenn,

Yes, as promised, I sent you an email with some advice in it. I did this at 10:17am this morning, eastern time. It was in direct reply to the email you sent us at help@smugmug.com. I'm going to now send it again to your other email address we have on file.

All the best,

cybercrypt13 · November 21, 2005

thanks Andy, I'm sorry about that. been so busy I forgot I sent it from my work account and it has a spam blocker on it. Sorry about that...

The gshutter account would be great...

Thanks,

Prints Auto vs. True

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