Snow Leopard 10.6.3 - Colour Management Fix ?

[Wayne Fox]

Hi

I downloaded 10.6.3 today, have just profiled some paper, done a print and.... it works perfectly!

(iMac, Colormunki, CS4 and epson 3880)

I am looking forward to hearing about everyone else.

William

Quick question, was the munki set to make a version 4 profile (default) or did you have the preferences set to make a version 2 profile.

Just curious if 10.6.3 resolves the problem with v 4 profiles as well.

[na goodman]

I'm wondering the same thing about V4 Profiles. Now that a few people have given it a go and I just finished a job I think I'll do the download and hopefully I'll be pleasantly surprised and everything will work just fine. Thanks for reporting your results.

[William Walker]

Hi Wayne

Good question!

I am at work now but will check when I get home, I've got a sneaking suspicion that I set it to Version 2 some time ago (unless it defaulted back to Version 4)

I will let you know in about eight hours.

Cheers
William

[Wills]

I down loaded 10.6.3 and running my first test print from my Epson 9600 and it's looking good so far - fingers crossed.

[William Walker]

Quick question, was the munki set to make a version 4 profile (default) or did you have the preferences set to make a version 2 profile.

Just curious if 10.6.3 resolves the problem with v 4 profiles as well.

Wayne, it is set to Version 2!

Will I need to make new profiles in Version 4 or can I simply change it to Version 4 a print with current profiles? Or should I let sleeping dogs lie?

[Ryan Grayley]

I down loaded 10.6.3 and running my first test print from my Epson 9600 and it's looking good so far - fingers crossed.

What settings are you using?

I have just tried a few tests with my trusty Epson 9600 and nothing works consistently with MacOSX 10.6.3 as follows:

1. Untagged profiling chart
CS2 and CS4 identical and correct when printed from Windows XP.
CS1 and CS4 on MacOSX 10.6.3 both incorrect and different from each other.

2. Test print tagged with ProPhotoRGB
CS2 and CS4 identical and correct when printed from Windows XP.
CS1 and CS4 on MacOSX 10.6.3 both incorrect and different from each other.

I used standard workflow to produce the untagged prints i.e. colour management turned off in both Photoshop and the printer driver.

I used standard workflow to produce the tagged prints i.e. colour managed by Photoshop and turned off in the printer driver.
The only anomaly is that in order to print from CS1 under MacOSX 10.6.3, I had to first set up a soft proof file in CS4 and then use this in CS1.
Profiles are not directly accessible from CS1 on my installation of MacOSX 10.6.3.

Edit1:
I have now run a more comprehensive series of tests on my Epson 9600 and the results can be seen here:
http://luminous-landscape.com/forum/index....showtopic=42745

[Wills]

CS2 custom icc profile with print colour management off - image used for the test was a target print from colourmanagement.net this matches my print using the same setting printing under Tiger OS. I tried another paper with a canned profile and very acceptable results, tomorrow I'll print the target again on 10.6.3 using the ColorBurst rip to check the accuracy of the actual print. Then some known prints from my own files that should give me the confidence I need if it throws something odd I'll report it here.

[Wayne Fox]

What settings are you using?

I have just tried a few tests with my trusty Epson 9600 and nothing works consistently with MacOSX 10.6.3 as follows:

So your earlier post indicates things are working, are you now saying things are apparently working correctly except with Epson's older printers?  Or are you suspecting perhaps things are not fixed?

I just tested some 7900 targets and untagged targets appear identical to those using Eric's workaround.

[Wayne Fox]

Wayne, it is set to Version 2!

Will I need to make new profiles in Version 4 or can I simply change it to Version 4 a print with current profiles? Or should I let sleeping dogs lie?

i would just continue to use it.  You would need to make a new v4 profile to test it, but no reason unless you are curious ... no affect on image quality.

I may test this here at the shop tomorrow.

[Ryan Grayley]

So your earlier post indicates things are working, are you now saying things are apparently working correctly except with Epson's older printers?  Or are you suspecting perhaps things are not fixed?

My 7900 does seem to be producing my profiling test chart correctly now.
However, I haven't used or tested my 9600 since acquiring my 7900 in November 2008.
As a few people have been recently posting about 9600 problems I decided to run a few of my own tests out of curiosity and because I want to sell it.
I suspect the problem with the 9600 is that the print driver needs to be updated to work correctly with Snow Leopard. Unfortunately I doubt Epson will ever update this driver.

I just tested some 7900 targets and untagged targets appear identical to those using Eric's workaround.

Is matte paper looking ok?

[dsmphoto]

I decided to do some detailed measurements for a baseline, going back to 10.5, before loading 10.6.3. I will then do a test for any changes afterwards.

First, The secret seems to be, as Jeff Schewe and others inferred earlier, to have the printer driver loaded so that its used instead of Apples drivers. In my case, its an Eps 4880, so when you click options for the printer, it should show driver ver. 6.12, which is the latest driver for 10.6 from eps.

Test profile- My own before snow leopard for Ilford Gold Fiber Silk from I1 TC 9.18 test charts, I1 Match 3.6.3, I1 Pro, rev. D. It has a few lumps but gives reasonable prints.

Test print- Eye ones lab_test_image.tif, which has the standard test chart imbedded.
 
From PS CS4, PS col. Mgt, rel. colormetric; Pr. col. Mgt. off. In case the post doesn't format correctly, I will try to correct it ( you may have to count the entries). In any case the important numbers are the dE's and the absolute comparison with the testchart orig. nos. Measured w/i1 share.

Patch no.           Before SL (L*,a*,b*)      After SL              dE
1                        38.2, 15.2, 17.7           38.2,14.8,16.2     dE1.5
2                        66.9, 16.1, 18.5           66.2, 15.8, 17.0   dE1.7
13(blue)              29.4, 17.5, -53.4         29.7, 16.8, -52.8  dE1.0
14(gr)                 56.0, -39.7, 36            55.0, -39.8, 34.4  dE1.9
15(red)               42.3, 56.6, 27.8           42.0, 55.7, 26.9   dE1.3

So- two possible conclusions- Getting the printer driver loaded correctly gets you past the snow Lep. problem, or------
Its uses the Apple driver no matter what it says its doing(which I don't believe to be the case).

As an aside, the dE between CS4 and LR2 prints goes up to between 4 and 7.

Scott McRae

[Wayne Fox]

Is matte paper looking ok?

Yes, I specifically tested using matt paper because I remember it seems to be the most problematic.

[Wayne Fox]

I decided to do some detailed measurements for a baseline, going back to 10.5, before loading 10.6.3.

I didn't read the rest of your post in detail(will later), but just a thought ... 10.5 is where this problem began and we began having to work around the problem.  So not sure going back to 10.5 to achieve a "baseline" will work.

From all the testing I have done and seen Ryan do, the best work around was printing from CS2 on 10.4.  Other combinations worked, (I think CS3 worked OK on 10.5) but Ryan seemed to have the most success getting his baselines printing from a Windows system.

I didn't measure my targets, I would assume some variance. However, problematic targets were easily differentiated visually when compared ... it was quite obvious is some color patches.

I hope to test this a little more thoroughly with my 11880 over the weekend, but it does appear that using 10.6.3, CS4, and the most recent epson drivers has resolved the problem in printing unmanaged targets on my 7900.

[na goodman]

I'm still wondering if anyone has printed with a v4 profile with success. I mean no gray borders on the print.

[William Walker]

i would just continue to use it.  You would need to make a new v4 profile to test it, but no reason unless you are curious ... no affect on image quality.

I may test this here at the shop tomorrow.

I am curious - will check it out tomorrow and see what happens.

Thanks

[ErikKaffehr]

Hi,

I guess that the latest software sets default to V2. I had V4 on my Color Munki but it's now set to V2 without my doing. My old profiles seem to have gray borders while new ones seem to work. Unfortunately I'm not experienced enough to observe subtle issues.

I essentially moved from Leopard to Snow Leopard when switching computers, so I have been trough a transition with a few issues.

I'm a bit confused that Apple is messing up color management, it was my belief that CM was one of the strong selling points of Mac OS/X.

Best regards
Erik

Wayne, it is set to Version 2!

Will I need to make new profiles in Version 4 or can I simply change it to Version 4 a print with current profiles? Or should I let sleeping dogs lie?

[Wayne Fox]

I'm a bit confused that Apple is messing up color management, it was my belief that CM was one of the strong selling points of Mac OS/X.

Not sure Apple is "messing it up", but they have tried to improve the printing pipeline as well as the functionality of ColorSync within the OS.  Some of the changes are actually good ... you can actually apply a profile to about any document from any application ... for example you can print from iPhoto and actually apply color management.

No doubt there's been some glitches as they've moved to the new pipeline requiring applications and printer drivers to be updated.

[loonsailor]

I'm still wondering if anyone has printed with a v4 profile with success. I mean no gray borders on the print.

I can't speak directly to printing v4 targets, because I've held off on updating to 10.6 for the system I use to print until the dust settles.  However, I'm on 10.6.3 on my laptop, and according to the test images on http://www.color.org/version4html.xalter, it still doesn't support v4 profiles.  Maybe it does for printing but not for display, but that would surprise me.

[jerryrock]

I can't speak directly to printing v4 targets, because I've held off on updating to 10.6 for the system I use to print until the dust settles.  However, I'm on 10.6.3 on my laptop, and according to the test images on http://www.color.org/version4html.xalter, it still doesn't support v4 profiles.  Maybe it does for printing but not for display, but that would surprise me.

Downloaded and opened in Adobe Acrobat Pro, the test PDF file from the linked website does indicate (on my system) that both versions 2 and 4 icc profiles are supported by OSX 10.6.3.
The html file displayed on the website viewed in Safari does not seem to support version 4.

[Wayne Fox]

The html file displayed on the website viewed in Safari does not seem to support version 4.

So the html file doesn't support v4 or Safari?