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Author Topic: Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?  (Read 4381 times)

walter.sk

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Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?
« on: January 08, 2009, 02:15:42 pm »

In Andrew Rodney's book, "Color Management for Photographers" (2005) he states on p. 408 "To see a soft proof and have any hope of judging its overall lightness correctly you must have 2 inches or so of white around the image on screen..." and goes on to describe how to turn the gray background in Photoshop into white.

Since then, he as well as Michael Reichmann and Jeff Schewe talk about doing away with any white, and viewing the softproof in full screen mode so as to avoid adapting to brighter white than the softproof.

Is the quote in the book outdated?  I assume everybody including Andrew Rodney was referring to the Simulate Paper White, or Paper Color being checked for the softproof.

I bring this up because I posted a thread in which I referred to a woman's practice of using a white background on screen, and the consensus was that while it may work for her, it was not good practice.

I am not trying to "catch" anybody here, but I was surprised to see the quote from Andrew's book.
« Last Edit: January 08, 2009, 02:16:52 pm by walter.sk »
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John.Murray

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Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?
« Reply #1 on: January 08, 2009, 02:32:40 pm »

The procedure being described isn't actually his, it describes Joseh Holme's approach
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tony field

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Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?
« Reply #2 on: January 10, 2009, 10:12:23 pm »

I don't really see this as confilicting information.  I do think you have to use some common sense in this matter.  I don't think there is only one way to view and present images. The white border may or may not be appropriate.  Here is part of my argument....

If I were displaying my images on a while wall as in a photo gallery, I do use a "slightly off-white" background in photoshop (actually, I change the canvas size and have a fill colour of 240,240,240).  This gives a very good visual approximation to how a viewer would see the image and sort of shows if you have a good tone range for gallery display.  

If I am putting the images in my study (which happens to have cedar walls) or if I am selling an image to a client, I have the photoshop background set to RGB 50,50,50.

If I am printing an image for my monthly print club (which uses overly bright viewing lamps), I tend to print darker - and then, since I know the horrid viewing conditions, I don't really care about the photoshop background.

In other words, nothing is cast in stone - not even book written by experts.  They provide good direction - however, you have to be able to interpret their word in "the manner they intended" - which is really tough unless you are also an "expert".
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neil snape

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Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?
« Reply #3 on: January 15, 2009, 06:09:29 am »

If there were a problem with soft proofing with a white surround it would be with the viewing angle when soft proofing screen to print. The change in  colour with pigment inks will usually be less than an LCD monitor, especially if it is an LED backlit  screen.
I do trust CRT for better overall viewing angle but the drift on most CRT throughout the day can be high enough to reduce the trust for whites back to using a grey surround.
Since ICC profiles don't take into account OBA and cannot assume the response from the viewing lights ( well you can measure the white with an i1 Pro in Profile Maker and correlate to THAT white point if you really want to) soft proofing to a grey surround makes sense for colour. Perhaps relative density is best still with a white surround if the gallery would have white supports....
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nik

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Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?
« Reply #4 on: January 19, 2009, 01:08:44 am »

Keep in mind that the 'white' in this case is the photoshop UI white (paint bucket set to white and shift-clicking the grey area around the image turns it to white) and it is NEVER color managed, even during softproofing, only your image is color managed. If you put a white border around your image by extending the canvas in PS and then softproof, THIS white will simulate paper white but the white in the UI will remain unchanged as it falls outside your IMAGE area. Don't get your whites mixed up, there are now 2 you're dealing with.

And yes, Joseph Holmes taught me this too.

-N


Quote from: walter.sk
I assume everybody including Andrew Rodney was referring to the Simulate Paper White, or Paper Color being checked for the softproof.

I am not trying to "catch" anybody here, but I was surprised to see the quote from Andrew's book.
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neil snape

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Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?
« Reply #5 on: January 19, 2009, 01:28:50 am »

Applications' UI are colour managed by the Vcgt LUTs loaded into the video card, which may or may not have a discrepancy with the gamma or power curve in that LUT.
They are not colour managed in the sense of an ICC profile mapping colour in the UI.
Of course the white in the background is not coloured managed for soft proofing for output profiles but the white should be the base of the white made while calibrating and profiling the said monitor.
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sandymc

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Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?
« Reply #6 on: January 19, 2009, 04:49:13 am »

Quote from: neil snape
Applications' UI are colour managed by the Vcgt LUTs loaded into the video card, which may or may not have a discrepancy with the gamma or power curve in that LUT.
They are not colour managed in the sense of an ICC profile mapping colour in the UI.
Of course the white in the background is not coloured managed for soft proofing for output profiles but the white should be the base of the white made while calibrating and profiling the said monitor.

It's an interesting question that I hadn't thought of before - window background colors aren't actually part of the UI - so an application can either color manage them or not as it sees fit. However, I just checked Aperture, and indeed, it's background/image borders are NOT color managed.

Sandy
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digitaldog

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Contradiction in A. Rodney's book?
« Reply #7 on: January 19, 2009, 09:59:57 am »

The UI can't be color managed/controlled via the application. That's why when you load a soft proof and turn on the paper simulation, you should be editing in full screen mode (hit F key until invoked). Its explained on page 97/98.

Quote
An important consideration when using Simulate Paper Color is to
ensure that no other user interface items, such as palettes, are seen onscreen
when viewing the document. These items do not undergo the
paper white simulation so their whites are as bright as the display can
produce. Your eye will adapt to the brightest white of the monitor white
rather than the simulated white you see when the Simulate Paper Coloroption is on.
Therefore, when you want to view the document with Simulate
Paper Color simulation, view the document in full screen mode and
with a black background and no rulers showing. Press Tab to hide all the
palettes and then press “F” until the entire image is surrounded by a black
background.

The UI in say Lightroom is far kinder to this kind of work. I hope in LR3.0 we get it, then it will be THE place to apply such edits (since they are metadata only) and we have that fantastic print module. Photoshop's idea of a print workflow is seriously lacking.
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