Luminous Landscape Forum

Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Colour Management => Topic started by: Rhossydd on March 06, 2013, 04:48:13 pm

Title: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: Rhossydd on March 06, 2013, 04:48:13 pm
I think I need to edit the TDL data field in Profilemaker's reference data to allow my DTP-70 to read charts printed on Windows with Adobe's color printer utility. ACPU resizes charts on Windows systems, so the DTP-70 won't recognise them. I assume this is down to the reference file sending TDL data to the print that expects a 100% print out.

To save the effort of having to work out what all the fields refer to by investigation, does anyone know of a reference to the TDL spec ?
Googling hasn't helped at all on this.

Thanks in advance
Paul



Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: Rhossydd on March 07, 2013, 05:32:02 am
An hour's detective work and editing has created a reference file that scans fine, but it would be nice to know what it's meant to do rather than rely on just guess work.
Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: Rhossydd on March 09, 2013, 05:02:52 am
Having hacked the *.txt files in PMP to cope with ACPU, I'm now faced with the same task with Colorport's *.xml files.
Unfortunately they're a lot more cryptic.

Has anyone managed this before ? or know of a resource that gives the field values ?
Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: Rhossydd on March 11, 2013, 06:28:22 am
X-Rite didn't help at all on this.
So a long evening of wading through files and testing finally delivered the answers.
A significant part of the problem of decoding the format is that the DTP-70 won't read charts unless they're centred on the page. ACPU's asymmetric printing wasn't an obvious source of error in it's self.
Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: l_d_allan on March 12, 2013, 03:39:43 pm
I think I need to edit the TDL data field in Profilemaker's reference data to allow my DTP-70 to read charts printed on Windows with Adobe's color printer utility. ACPU resizes charts on Windows systems, so the DTP-70 won't recognise them. I assume this is down to the reference file sending TDL data to the print that expects a 100% print out.

I've been able to use CS4/CS5 with Image+ImageSize to resize the .tif output of ColorPort (and i1Profiler) to pretty much fill the page. For me, generally a page size of 8.9" x 11.5" works well. Even with a letter-size 8.5x11" paper with ACPU, it doesn't complain about the paper being too wide or too long.

I'm unclear on what you mean by "TDL data field", but I'm ignorant about the DTP-70. My speculation is that it is similarly cryptic to the iSis_INFO line in Tc9.18 RGB iSis(Ltr).txt for PMP5 (which doesn't necessarily work with iSis because the filename doesn't match with the BarCode ... grrr )

Not meaning to hijack your thread to iSis ... but ...

iSis_INFO   "DensityStandard=ANSIA Illumination=D50 Observer=TwoDegree ColorSpace=CIELab Type=0 NumberOfRows=31 NumberOfColumns=30 PatchSizeX=6.00000 PatchSizeY=6.00000 BarSizeX=180.000 BarSizeY=6.00000 DistBarToFirstLine=26.0000 MarkersDistance=195.000 MarkerPatchDistance=10.5000 DistancePaperEdgeToBar=35.0000 ChartSizeX=211.000"

With the ColorPort .xml files, the .xml ends up as one humongous line. If you put in CrLf's, you can uncover several very long lines for iSis:
<TargetConfiguration DisplayName="i1iSis" DeviceClass="iSis">
<DesignSettings AllowMultipleDevPagesPerPrintedPage="False" BlackStarters="False" BottomMargin="0" ColumnLabelType="None" DashedHorizontalSpacers="False" DashedPageOutline="False" DashedVerticalSpacers="False" LeftMargin="12" MaxColumns="300" MaximumPageHeight="483" MaximumPageWidth="221" MaxRows="300" MinimumPageHeight="170" MinimumPageWidth="50" RightMargin="0" RotateOddPages="False" RowPriority="False" SetSlugLinePosition="Bottom" SpacerType="None" TopMargin="0" UseRowLabels="False" Direction="1">
<AlignmentBar IsRight="False" IsLeft="False" IsTop="True" IsBottom="False" Thickness="8" Spacing="6"/>
</DesignSettings>
<DeviceSpecificDesign MinimumGapHeight="0" MaximumGapHeight="0" DefaultGapHeight="0" MinimumGapWidth="0" MaximumGapWidth="0" DefaultGapWidth="0" MinimumPatchWidth="6" MaximumPatchWidth="20" DefaultPatchWidth="6" MinimumPatchHeight="6" MaximumPatchHeight="20" DefaultPatchHeight="6" MinimumTrailerLength="25" MaximumTrailerLength="40" DefaultTrailerLength="25" MinimumHeaderLength="32" MaximumHeaderLength="40" DefaultHeaderLength="32" ColumnSeparatorName="" RowSeparatorName=""/>
</TargetConfiguration>

However, changes I've made to "Thickness" and "Spacing" seem to be ignored. grrrr
Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: l_d_allan on March 12, 2013, 03:42:31 pm
A significant part of the problem of decoding the format is that the DTP-70 won't read charts unless they're centred on the page. ACPU's asymmetric printing wasn't an obvious source of error in it's self.

Somewhat repeating info in previous post, but once you "break the code" you can get the MyTarget.tif pretty much any size you want it to be for ACPU to print a filled, symmetric print.  CS4/5 Image + ImageSize works for me.
Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: Rhossydd on March 12, 2013, 06:47:22 pm
I've been able to use CS4/CS5 with Image+ImageSize to resize the .tif output of ColorPort (and i1Profiler) to pretty much fill the page.
Not an approach I want to follow.
Quote
I'm unclear on what you mean by "TDL data field"
TDL = Target description language
IOW the data the computer sends to the auto-spectro to tell it what sort of target to expect.
It's unlikely the iSis will use the same protocol, but will have it's own system of coding to tell it where and what to read.
Quote
with the ColorPort .xml files, the .xml ends up as one humongous line.
Using an XML editor such as Microsoft's free program "XML Notepad 2007" makes it much easier to make sense of and edit XML files.
I found some helpful templates in the Colorport folder that helped explain the coding for the XMLs, using that in conjunction with different references and comparing the differences revealed enough information to work out what to edit.
Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: l_d_allan on March 14, 2013, 05:53:30 pm
Not an approach I want to follow.
Agree, and I wasn't advocating tweaking the MyTestChart.tif for ACPU. I was wrestling with an off-by-one drifting mis-alignment on my iSis that has been trashing my printer profiles, and thought that might help. I've given up on the TDL contained in the iSis_INFO line of MyTestChart.txt and reverted back to letting the iSis use the Barcode to resolve. That may result in progress. If not, try again with ColorPort, and then maybe ArgyllCms?[/quote]

Quote
Using an XML editor such as Microsoft's free program "XML Notepad 2007" makes it much easier to make sense of and edit XML files.

I'll track that down and give it a try. Very tiresome to use an ordinary text-editor and insert CRLF's between />< to look at MyTestChart.xml. Infuriating, actually.

[Edit] Ok. gave XML editor a try. Seems to work with the default XSLT transform for "pretty printing". [/Edit]

TMI ...
I had thought I'd be able to get ColorPort test-charts compatible with PMP5 and i1Profiler by tweaking the "thickness" and "spacing" parameters, but those seemed to be ignored. The only difference seems to be that i1Profiler / PMP5 expect a 6mm thick alignment bar and 6mm spacing. ColorPort expects an 8mm thick alignment bar, then 6mm spacing to patches.
Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: l_d_allan on April 02, 2013, 07:08:53 am
Using an XML editor such as Microsoft's free program "XML Notepad 2007" makes it much easier to make sense of and edit XML files.

Downloaded and installed it. Useful, but I'm not able to accomplish edits. Operator error on my part?  But I'm mostly interested in viewing the .xml files.
Title: Re: Editing TDL data to compensate for Adobe color printer utility's resizing in PMP
Post by: Rhossydd on April 02, 2013, 07:33:25 am
but I'm not able to accomplish edits. Operator error on my part? 
Click on the field text you want to change to highlight it > type in the new value > click save.
It only just a text editor that shows XML easily.