color management question

Hi everyone,
most of my final "products" are prints (I'm thinking yours are the same too). So, how do you make sure what you see in your monitor is what the client will see? I know that you have to calibrate your monitor and so on..., but what about the printer (lab)? Say we spend $2000 for a super monitor and all. The picture looks great on the monitor. BUt then if the printer doesn't keep up then what's the point. I guess my questions are:
- what is your set up for the color management?
-where, how do you do all your printing?
-what kind of monitor do you use and calibration tool?
- What exactly is the monitor profile and does the lab need to know about it?

Thank you very much. I have been trying to figure this stuff out for awhile, but can't find the answer I need. Problem I have is that the picture always looks good on my monitor, but the print is different.

Really appreciate any input you have.

LT

Have a read of this thread. To answer your questions:
- I run a color managed workflow, I change the settings depending on what my final output is.
- Queensberry labs, Auckland.
- Samsung LCD, midrange consumer model, calibrated with Optix standard.
- The lab doesn't care what monitor you have, that's to make sure you can see the colors accurately. Your working space should be sRgb if you don't understand color management, and files sent to the lab should be sRgb.

That's a misnomer Tim. Your working colour space should be the widest gamut possible whilst editing. It's no different as to the theory behind 16bit workspaces. A wider gamut gives you shoulder room to edit the images without clipping colours.

If you are outputting to a narrower colour space then you should soft proof the images.

I personally use ProPhoto, and yes even with a normal monitor you will get image degradation if you use a narrower colour space. If you want to see a demonstation in action watch the video from Luminous Landscape - from camera to print.

I'm not sure if the thread tim linked has this information but have a read of this page: http://www.drycreekpho​to.com/Learn/profiles.​htm

I think it will answer your questions very well. Every device interprets colors differently so color profiles help the computer to translate everything between devices so that the color appears correctly on your screen and ideally will match what you print visually.

To properly color manage your workflow you must have a profile for each device used that displays or alters colors. Your Monitor, scanner, printer (or your lab should have a profile for their printer and paper) and even idealy your camera should have a profile so that your computer can translate the colors correctly.

Once you have your monitor profiled and you have a profile file for your printer or lab's printer then you can "soft proof" your image to see an approximation of what it will look like printed.

LT.... I struggle with this too. I did get a calibrater but then my pictures still were different. One day I was at a pro lab and seen the some prints they had just made and also seen the monitor they used to prepare them. The print looked different to me but he said everything was the same. He then explained to me about the lumination the screen was putting out and how your print is not going to look exact. I totally overlooked this concept. Call me dumb.. just an idea for you think about.

I checked out all the sigs, I got a calibrating kit from my lab and still couldn't figure it out. Now I use Huey.... Anyway when I prints come back they look nice.

Faolan wrote in post #4178404
That's a misnomer Tim. Your working colour space should be the widest gamut possible whilst editing...

Once people understand color management, gamut's, and profiles then they can do that sort of thing, when people ask basic color questions I always recommend they set everything to sRgb as then they're not going to mess things up.

I tend to work in the output space i'm going to use. For example, Queensberry Albums ask for Adobe RGB files (though they support anything), so I convert from RAW to Adobe RGB JPGs. Consumer labs want sRgb, so if I use them I convert from RAW to sRgb. If I don't know the output space I tend to use ProFoto.

Have you ever compared the same image being printed from an sRgb, aRgb, and ProFoto RGB file? If so can you tell any difference? Or do you use ProFoto just because of the theoretical wider gamut? How does the output color space of your printing device match up with sRgb and ProFoto?

- This website http://www.photobox.co​.uk/static/colour.html has reference for calibrating your monitor to match the print (w/o software, you can try tweaking your monitor to get a close match to the sample print provided.)

Another simple method for calibrating monitor from Cory Parris (well known wedding photographer) is here http://www.coryparris.​com/wordpress/?p=9)

NOTE: If you buy monitor calibration tool, make sure it works w/ your particular monitor (e.g if you have LCD monitor and not CRT).

- I am not a wedding photographer, but I usually order prints from adoramapix.com which offers pretty good paper selection for wedding / portraiture (Kodak Endura Lustra). I think Queensberry is nice, but a bit pricey, as well as Graphistudio and other big places. I'm thinking about ordering photo book from http://www.fotobook.co​.uk as they give both software for laying out your pages, and handle printing, binding the photobooks too (shipping to US is about $26, and price ranges are here http://www.fotobook.co​.uk/prices.html )

- I think any new generation monitor would be good (LCD), but I saw many using Dell and Samsung monitors.

- As Tim said, the lab doesn't care about your monitor profile (as they won't be able to do anything with it.)

Kai wrote in post #4178592
LT.... I struggle with this too. I did get a calibrater but then my pictures still were different. One day I was at a pro lab and seen the some prints they had just made and also seen the monitor they used to prepare them. The print looked different to me but he said everything was the same. He then explained to me about the lumination the screen was putting out and how your print is not going to look exact. I totally overlooked this concept. Call me dumb.. just an idea for you think about.

I checked out all the sigs, I got a calibrating kit from my lab and still couldn't figure it out. Now I use Huey.... Anyway when I prints come back they look nice.

The thing you have to remember is the light in which you view the photos will affect the color of the photo. To really compare your prints to your monitor you must use a light booth.

tim wrote in post #4178864
Have you ever compared the same image being printed from an sRgb, aRgb, and ProFoto RGB file? If so can you tell any difference? Or do you use ProFoto just because of the theoretical wider gamut? How does the output color space of your printing device match up with sRgb and ProFoto?

As long as you are converting your files to the color space of the printing device it doesn't matter what working space you use really (though you could be clipped by working in a narrow color space).

I think many photographers are switching to the ProFoto color space because print technology is getting better and better and it allows them to "future-proof" their images for better printers in the future.

tim wrote in post #4178864
Have you ever compared the same image being printed from an sRgb, aRgb, and ProFoto RGB file? If so can you tell any difference? Or do you use ProFoto just because of the theoretical wider gamut? How does the output color space of your printing device match up with sRgb and ProFoto?

I have printed in the three major spaces, however that's not at issue here. At the end of the day as long as you have soft proofed your images it would near impossible to tell the colour space of a print. You will notice differences of which those differences are your artistic views and decisions (or sacrifices).

I can see on a image, particulary in reds, pinks and so on that there is clipping going on. This is particularly noticable on prints at 8x12 or larger. Clipping usually looks like posterisation (which is what it can be confused with).

Because I soft proof my images before printing it's pretty hard to say there is a difference as I adjust the image to get as close as possible to the original colour space it's being converted from.

As to being wider gamut it's not theoretical, it's provable. Colour profiling is not just about the colour space you edit in but also what media you're outputting to. So ideally you want to do:

Colour profile your monitor using a puck.
Set up your colour spaces in your editing application.
Calibrate your media with profiles.

Some would also add cameras, but that's a bit like chasing your tail.

The newer Dell monitors (HC versions) support 93% of NTSC colour space, but even a cheap monitor will show clipping.

KennethPhotography wrote in post #4178934
As long as you are converting your files to the color space of the printing device it doesn't matter what working space you use really (though you could be clipped by working in a narrow color space).

Converting to the color space of the output device is unnecessary and will sometimes cause problems. If you convert to the printer color space and send it to the lab, and it's printed on that printer, it should be fine. However if they decide to print on a different machine (one of my labs has 6 printers) then you're stuffed.

In all cases if you send the image in sRgb or Adobe RGB the lab's RIP will convert to the printer color space for you, so the step is unnecessary.

We shoot in Adobe RGB - but convert to SRGB when they are opened from Raw into Photoshop (automatically done). I've noticed on some that havent been converted the Adobe RGB can look flat in some programmes other than photoshop... having sent some Adobe RGB images to our local lab - they also came out flat.. I send everythign in SRGB and also have colour profiles from our labs loaded in so I can see what it will look like... I've found a lab now that is pretty close to how I see it on my screen and I'm happy with that.

tim wrote in post #4179229
Converting to the color space of the output device is unnecessary and will sometimes cause problems. If you convert to the printer color space and send it to the lab, and it's printed on that printer, it should be fine. However if they decide to print on a different machine (one of my labs has 6 printers) then you're stuffed.

In all cases if you send the image in sRgb or Adobe RGB the lab's RIP will convert to the printer color space for you, so the step is unnecessary.

Well, I'm specific about telling my lab which printer to use so there's no issue for me.

I don't quite understand how the RIP interprets the colors correctly if it doesn't know the color space. Are you embedding the SRGB profile as well? I strip the embedded profile away since apparently it will crash some lab printers and really, it just takes up space. Perhaps you can share more or point me to some additional reading?

I use techniques similar to the instructions outlined on dyrcreekphoto.com

You'll be fine working like that Kenneth, it's just not necessary and could cause confusion for people who don't understand color management. I have never, ever stripped EXIF from a file going to print, and I never will, without the exif the numbers in the file could mean anything. 25kB in a 2MB file isn't important.

With EXIF embedded the RIP knows everything it needs to to convert from sRgb/adobe RGB to the printer profile.

There are two books on color management in the book thread linked from my sig. I've read "real world color management" and it's very informative, and quite technical in parts, but invaluable for photographers.

Thank you everyone for your inputs. I'm trying to read through and get something out of all this incredible information. But looks like the Monaco Optix XR Pro is a good choice for the calibrator with maybe a Dell 24" Ultrasharp or the Samsung 244t yeah?

LT