Colour Speace/Profiles... again

Simple question really:

My mate and me are puzzling over this one... He calibrated his monitor, which created a colour profile. And he doesnt know whether to use it or not.

I say calibrating your monitor is only for setting the brightness and contrast. he says it creates a new colour profile for you to select and use in PhotoShop/Lightroom etc...

But, if you send it to print, the print place will use an ICC profile they've set up for themselves, wont they? So it's pointless using one you've created for yourself, surely, because when you print it, it will look different?

I said, that he should get a colour profile from the print-shop and use that one (if that's the only printer he will use).

What's the point in calibrating then if when you print it, it will use a different profile anyway then?

it has come to this

basically, the print shop im going to try and use is photobox and they use their own profiles and any custom sRGB profiles will be stripped from the images.

First off: He is wrong: Never, ever use your monitor profile as a working space..
Have a read in the link from my sig... In particular the bits about converting profiles and softproofing.

hey rene, thanks for that, I tried to follow that guide, just a lot of info

reason why im saying this is that im basing my profile on my spyder2 pro... it has changed the way my monitor looks and has given me a customised sRGB profile

So, am I right is thinking that:

The monitor profile is just so that the monitor knows it's displaying the colours correctly. So that the monitor profile from your Spider is so that it can communicate correctly with the profile used in PhotoShop. Hence: The colours displayed on the monitor are the same as what PhotoShop thinks it is displaying.

So that will mean the monitor profile bit sorted, correct?

And, if you get an ICC profile from a print-shop, and select to use that in photoShop, then because the monitor is calibrated, it'll know that the colours are being displayed correctly?

have I got it... finally?

The only place where you set your monitor profile is in the system settings for displays. (Okay, and DPP needs to be told where it is located)
That way Photoshop knows what the monitor profile is.

Photoshop will then look at the profile embedded in the image, look at the monitor profile, and 'translate' the RGB values of the image so the monitor displays them correctly.

The ICC profile you get from the printshop can be used to softproof an image in PS, and you can convert (a copy of) the image to it, to send to the printshop (depending on how they handle profiles).

While Rene's thread may be long it certainly is shorter than reading Fraser's book. And it has all the answers to the questions posted above.

But here is the short of it.

The monitor profile created by the Spyder is to get your monitor's colors accurate. To use this profile you should go into your monitor settings and choose the profile under color management tab to the Spyder's profile that you created during calibration and set it to default. This will load the Spyder's profile into your video card upon startup.

Now Photoshop already knows the profile being used so you don't have to do anything to Photoshop (however you need to make sure you have your settings under Edit > Color Settings correct).

Next the printer profile. The printer profile is used during soft proofing to make sure that your image will print as it looks. The purpose of soft proofing is to make sure that your colors all fit within the gamut of the printer and to correct any color shifts you may have. To soft proof your printer's profile go to View > Proof Setup. Here you will select your printer's profile. Make sure you save it so that you can access it easier next time. Now when you go to View you should see a check mark next to Proof Colors and your image should look slightly different (or drastically is also possible). Now you can make any changes to your image.

Now you need to convert your image to the printer profile by choosing Edit > Convert to Profile and selecting your printer's profile. Some printers require the profile to be embedded in the file, some don't so check with your printer on the proper way to save your file.

Perfect. Thanks folks.

im sure i will take this in as my head is all over the place, thanks guys

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