Lightroom - Bad Colour Printing

Printed a few 4 x 6's on my (admittedly cheap) HP V40 All-In-One, and the colours come out very dull.

On a flower with brilliant pinks/magenta, the colours look as though I used magenta and pink paint, but mixed it with grey paint. This only happens if I print from the Lightroom Print Module. In LR I used the RAW file to print from (seldom save to any other format).

Printing the same image from DPP using the RAW file, the colours are bright and clean.

Saving the image to a JPEG, then loading it into DPP for printing, the colours are bright and clean.

Printing the same JPEG in Windows Picture and Fax Viewer results in bright and clean colours.

The fact that everything but LR can produce good colours eliminates the printer itself.

In all cases, printing is managed by the printer.

I'm baffled. Any ideas?

What Color Management settings in Print panel are you using in LR? Which profile are you using too?

gparvan wrote in post #4037744
What Color Management settings in Print panel are you using in LR? Which profile are you using too?

Under "Profile" I'm using "Managed by Printer".

There are no "Profiles" to choose from if I select "Other". The pop-up screen is blank.

hmmm, I wonder if its a colour profile thing. Consumer printers usually like sRGB as an input and that is the default export profile for your jpg images. Maybe someone knows what profile is used when the printer is doing the colour management.
Have you tried turning off the printer colour management and allowing Lightroom to do it?

jbimages wrote in post #4038827
hmmm, I wonder if its a colour profile thing. Consumer printers usually like sRGB as an input and that is the default export profile for your jpg images. Maybe someone knows what profile is used when the printer is doing the colour management.
Have you tried turning off the printer colour management and allowing Lightroom to do it?

Well, that seems to be the problem. Almost at the bottom of the Print Screen in LR, one can choose "Profile". Clicking on "Managed by Printer" opens up another small box in which there are two choices:
1. Managed by Printer
2. Other.

The choice of "Other" leads to "Choose Profiles". This screen is completely blank with no choices, so that's a dead end, leaving me with "Managed by Printer".

Just below "Managed by Printer" text there is another choice: "Rendering Intent", which offers two choices:
1. Relative
2. Perceptual

Changing these has no effect whatsover.

In DPP, I have been able to choose sRGB, but can't seem to do this in LR.

Then I tried Start/Control Panel/Printers and Faxes, selected the HP, and selected Printer Properties/Color Management, selected Manual, and "sRGB Color Space Profile" was the only option and selected it and set it as Default and selected Apply.

Rebooted the machine and tried again - ugh - what terrible colours.

You need to find and install the printer profiles for your printer. I have a Canon and an Epson printer and a total of 16 different profiles under 'chose profiles' The Canon profiles were on the installation disk. I'm not sure where I found the Epson ones.

Once you have the profiles installed, you can select the ones you want to see in the drop down.

edit: i just did a quick web search - words and pictures
http://www.oreillynet.​com …rint_module_and​_co_2.html

jbimages wrote in post #4041145
You need to find and install the printer profiles for your printer. I have a Canon and an Epson printer and a total of 16 different profiles under 'chose profiles' The Canon profiles were on the installation disk. I'm not sure where I found the Epson ones.

Once you have the profiles installed, you can select the ones you want to see in the drop down.

edit: i just did a quick web search - words and pictures
http://www.oreillynet.​com …rint_module_and​_co_2.html

Thanks, I'll see what I can find and give it a try.

jbimages wrote in post #4041145
You need to find and install the printer profiles for your printer. I have a Canon and an Epson printer and a total of 16 different profiles under 'chose profiles' The Canon profiles were on the installation disk. I'm not sure where I found the Epson ones.

Once you have the profiles installed, you can select the ones you want to see in the drop down.

edit: i just did a quick web search - words and pictures
http://www.oreillynet.​com …rint_module_and​_co_2.html

Correct! Otherwise you are trying to send a ProPhotoRGB image to your printer which likely can not handle that color space. Most printers can convert AdobeRGb images but not ProPhotoRGB. Once you install the printer profiles make sure you turn OFF color management in your printer when printing from LR. Then you can manage from LR and choose the appropriate profile from the list.

In2Photos wrote in post #4043028
Correct! Otherwise you are trying to send a ProPhotoRGB image to your printer which likely can not handle that color space. Most printers can convert AdobeRGb images but not ProPhotoRGB. Once you install the printer profiles make sure you turn OFF color management in your printer when printing from LR. Then you can manage from LR and choose the appropriate profile from the list.

Yeah, that was what I was thinking.

Thanks for the help, I might just get it now.

In2Photos wrote in post #4043028
Correct! Otherwise you are trying to send a ProPhotoRGB image to your printer which likely can not handle that color space. Most printers can convert AdobeRGb images but not ProPhotoRGB. Once you install the printer profiles make sure you turn OFF color management in your printer when printing from LR. Then you can manage from LR and choose the appropriate profile from the list.

I have seen this comment in several threads, but I’m not certain how to do this. I opened “Printers and Faxes” from the Control Panel then right clicked on my Pixma printer and selected properties. I see a tab for Color Management but my options are Automatic or Manual. In the Manual mode I need to select a color profile. I don’t see an option to turn off color management.

Am I looking in the right place?

Have a read in the link from my sig. Some links there about printing.
The option is in the printing dialog. (under 'Color Options' with my Pixma)

Color management can not be turn off on some printers. My all in one brother can not be turn off where as my 2 epson photo printer can.

After selecting printer property select printing preferences.

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction. I followed the link in your signature and read several of the links about printing when I came upon this article on Steve’s Digicams: http://www.steves-digicams.com/techcorne​r/June_2005.html

Since I can’t find the preverbal “On/Off” switch for color management, this may be the way to turn off the printer’s color management within the Canon printer software.

On the other hand, the thread discussing Canon ICC profiles also offered an interesting solution from a Canon PDF Document (here: http://homepage.mac.co​m …non_ICC_Profile​_Guide.pdf )
recommending the user manually turn on the ICM through the Manual Color Adjustment settings.

In any case, my prints look better already – So thank you.