Colors Come Out Muted Whenever I Print

[royphot]

Hi.
I had a look at the Mpix Video, ( it was not streaming well - lots of stops), and I had to give up.
However "See Through" was mentioned, and perhaps that could be what is causing the very slight reduction in density between the images.
Roy

[shreds]

I know this is probably impractical, but wouldn't it be useful in the profile box to have a line or two for:

1. Monitor
2. Date last calibrated

Then at a glance it would be obvious why different people are seeing different results?

Just a thought.

[Shadowman]

Hi.
I had a look at the Mpix Video, ( it was not streaming well - lots of stops), and I had to give up.
However "See Through" was mentioned, and perhaps that could be what is causing the very slight reduction in density between the images.
Roy

I'm not sure which OS you have or browser but on mine running Win7/IE there is a blue or gray icon (circle with a slash mark) which appears frequently, when its blue it means that some Active X content is blocked. I will click on the icon, choose allow Active X content and then videos will stream normally.

[Shadowman]

Hi.
I had a look at the Mpix Video, ( it was not streaming well - lots of stops), and I had to give up.
However "See Through" was mentioned, and perhaps that could be what is causing the very slight reduction in density between the images.
Roy

Regarding the "see through" the speaker was talking about what appears around the Photoshop program panel or "seeing through to the desktop" which he stated could interfere with our eyes as we view color.

[ajohnw]

I don't print much but had the impression that profiles are available for most if not all commercial papers to allow accurate soft proofing. As with most suppliers this is even mentioned. At the bottom of this page

http://www.mpixpro.com/help/help.aspx?id=21

What I am not clear on is how this all works out on a calibrated monitor set up. Normally this will involve a LUT correction in the video card and an ICC file in the processing package which together give say near perfect sRGB. So where does the paper ICC file come in? The one in the processing package is tied to the LUT so is there a mechanism for adding the effect of a paper icc file to that? I'm curious in case I ever want to send something for printing.

John
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[royphot]

Regarding the "see through" the speaker was talking about what appears around the Photoshop program panel or "seeing through to the desktop" which he stated could interfere with our eyes as we view color.

Hi.
That's exactly what I was meaning, and could be the source of her problem. The LH image is on top of the main Window containing the original image, and its colours could be getting diluted slightly, by whatever is on that part of the main Window which is underneath. While we don't know what is underneath, we can work out that it is not part of the original image.

Roy

[royphot]

Hi John.
The Paper/Printer Profile can be used in Photoshop to produce what is called a Soft Proof view. The profile usually also holds information about the base colour of the paper which is going to be used for the print. The Soft Proof gives you a fair idea of what the final print will look like on that paper. You can use a number of different Paper/Printer profiles to produce Soft Proofs, and the user can select which of these views to turn on or off.
Roy

[Stagecoach]

I know this is probably impractical, but wouldn't it be useful in the profile box to have a line or two for:

1. Monitor
2. Date last calibrated

Then at a glance it would be obvious why different people are seeing different results?

Just a thought.

Ian,

But would a members eyesight condition not also make a difference with respect to their ability to determine and differentiate colour, contrast and brightness ?

Grahame

[Richard Lundberg]

The OP responded only once at the beginning of this thread, so I guess she lost interest after being inundated with comments that couldn't address the actual problem because she provided no information about her work flow or images. Sic transit gloria mundi. I'd still like to know why Stagecoach doesn't need a calibrated monitor. I guess he's one of those color correct by the numbers guys.

[shreds]

The OP responded only once at the beginning of this thread, so I guess she lost interest after being inundated with comments that couldn't address the actual problem because she provided no information about her work flow or images. Sic transit gloria mundi. I'd still like to know why Stagecoach doesn't need a calibrated monitor. I guess he's one of those color correct by the numbers guys.

Thats a lot of assumptions Richard. The OP only posted on 20th Feb, that is three days ago. Not everyone has the opportunity to be on here everyday particularly if they have other commitments. And I think it is for Stagecoach to tell us about his workflow rather than making such comments.

[Stagecoach]

I'd still like to know why Stagecoach doesn't need a calibrated monitor. I guess he's one of those color correct by the numbers guys.

Richard,

It's good to see that you want to learn how and why others do things but rather than use Chelsea's thread to help you it may be better to start a new one.

If you do start a thread I will be pleased to assist you.

Grahame

[Richard Lundberg]

But the archbishops of color management consider it heresy to even mention not calibrating.

[Manfred M]

But the archbishops of color management consider it heresy to even mention not calibrating.

Your sarcasm aside, I have found, through experience, that our computer screens are the weakest link when it comes to getting images to look right on someone else's computer or preparing an image for print.

Frankly, the problem is more complex that colour management. Variability in screen design and screen production means most screens are not particularly well suited for creating photo quality work. This is more apparent in lower in screens aimed at the mass market, where colour accuracy is abysmal at best. I had this discussion with a Mac user, not long ago; I was told "I have a Retina screen, so my colours must be correct". Retina is all about resolution, which is great, but has absolutely nothing to do with accurate reproduction of colours...

I use a two-screen setup for my post-processing work; a larger, high end IPS one where I do the actual edits and a lower end (TN technolgy) one where I park my tools. Just as an aside, both screens come from the same manufacturer. Both screens are profiled and calibrated (and are set to the colour temperature and gamma settings), but the lower end one has a blue cast, that I simply cannot get rid of. Same thing goes for my laptop; basically a blue cast, so when someone views the images on a properly profiled and calibrated screen, the images I do on it will have a slightly yellow colour cast.

The second issue is really what I will refer to as personal tastes. For things other than post-processing work, in my experience, people like to set their screens to display bright and punchy colours. Unfortunately, bright and punchy are not "accurate" colours.

All that being said, the great equalizer is calibration and profiling, because that will at least get you as close to being accurate as your hardware can come; we at least have a common, standarized baseline. If you are having issues with colour reproduction, it's really the first question that should be asked, because it is impossible to accurately diagnose an issue without this baseline work having been done.

That doesn't mean your particular screen / video card combination is not reproducing colours accurately, the real issue that we don't know if it is or is not.

[loosecanon]

And when calibrating a screen one has to decide what colour temperature it is to be set at - and that makes a lot of difference, as does the ambient light in the room where one is viewing the screen.
Despite all this we all see colour differently, and different eyes respond to a spectrum of colour differently. A lot of men have some degree of colour blindness.
After all the colours in the original will depends upon the light source and also reflected light onto the subject, and so are not a constant.
In other words - we can seek perfection, but rarely find it. I work on the basis that if the results seem ok to me and to some others then I am not too far from right. Oh, yes I calibrate my monitor monthly and also my scanner and printer.

[ajohnw]

Manfred is 100% right on screens. I started with one I used and adjusted to my tastes and then calibrated and later chose a monitor with the view of calibrating it. All have met the tastes I had previously adjusted by guess work but there was a large difference on image processing. Even something as mundane as sharpening. Where things really show up are that aspect and detail in shadows and situations where things like saturation are played with.

More recently than these 2 I bought a Dell pre calibrated one. While this probably wont be perfect in terms of recognised ideas on the subject it will be close enough for effective work. As per a post I made recently it will be better still if it's calibrated properly.

A good site for picking monitors is tftcentral uk. They actually measure what was supplied and then show what can be obtained with calibration. They tend to review monitors for people who want accurate responses. Some are expensive and some are cheap. They all tend to contain particular panels. If any doubt they dismantle and have a look. Basically there are plenty of monitor manufacturers but not so many panel manufacturers.

John
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[Richard Lundberg]

I think that the weak link is still printing gamut, not monitors. Printing tech is held back by the inertia of the industry, while displays are driven by consumer demand and many new techniques are in the pipeline. 4k tv, quantum dot, multicolor LED etc.

[Manfred M]

I think that the weak link is still printing gamut, not monitors. Printing tech is held back by the inertia of the industry, while displays are driven by consumer demand and many new techniques are in the pipeline. 4k tv, quantum dot, multicolor LED etc.

I'm not quite sure of where you are coming here. Printing, at least with the non-consumer photo printers is quite mature, with good profiles for paper ink combinations, excellent quality control of the manufacturing processes for both inks and paper. Archival quality of both black & white and colour pigment inks is outstanding, and frankly even the dye based inks have gotten a lot better over recent years. Colour managed workflow is one of the cornerstones of this business.

The real issue I have with screens is that they are the one area of the image (and for that matter video) process where there are no standards. 4K TV is really targeted for very large screen TVs, I suspect; other than marketing hype, there is little or no role in computer screens. QD technology is having problems reproducing deep blues and I'm getting tired of holding my breath for improvements in LED technology for screens.

[Macmahon]

I think that the weak link is still printing gamut, not monitors. Printing tech is held back by the inertia of the industry, while displays are driven by consumer demand and many new techniques are in the pipeline. 4k tv, quantum dot, multicolor LED etc.

Hmmm.

Typical, current, monitors have: lower resolution, smaller colour gamut, and are more subject to calibration and profile drift than reasonably inexpensive photo printers.

It seems to me the weakest link in the camera to print chain is the monitor. But because it's our only pre-print 'window into the image' it's the one that's most important to get right.

Let's hope the monitors that are 'in the pipeline' deliver all they promise.

[Richard Lundberg]

The info I have says that high end printing can produce about 800 thousand colors, the best monitors 1.2 million, and the human eye can discriminate 1.7 to 2.5 million.

[Manfred M]

The info I have says that high end printing can produce about 800 thousand colors, the best monitors 1.2 million, and the human eye can discriminate 1.7 to 2.5 million.

We must have different information sources;

1. Pro photo printers can do a few hundred thousand colours (around half or even less than half of your numbers - the numbers I saw varied from around 250,000 to around 375,000). I can't find the article where I saw these numbers (thought it might have been at Luminous Landscape, but I can't find it right now;

2. According to some sources human eyes can see close to 10 million distinct colours http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2006/...erLeong.shtml; and

3. The best monitors (including dithering techniques) are at least 16 million distinct colours, and potentially much higher than that. At least that is what the manufacturers claim, but as their techniques are proprietary, that would be hard to validate. IPS monitors are natively 8-bits per channel and in theory can emulate 10-bits per channel.