Color match question

[tgall]

OK, I've got my monitor profiled OK and what I see is pretty well what I print, that's not a problem.
Problem is, the colors I see are off.
I'm shooting fabric so the color needs to be pretty close.
I shoot raw, I do a custom white balance before the shoot and it's under studio strobes.
I've tried setting the camera to both sRGB and Adobe, no help.

I always have to make changes in ACR's hue and luminous to get the colors correct.

I've tried using a black/grey/white card in the image and then using the black/grey/white eye dropper in curves, that sometimes makes it worse.

What am I missing?

Thanks
T.O.

[howardm]

Check out the XRite Colorchecker Passport system.

[Tim Lookingbill]

Not all fabric color (especially synthetics) reflect back their intended hue even with a camera profile and especially with artificial light sources like a strobe. Photograph the fabric in question in direct sunlight and see what you get. If it's the same then your strobe is quite close to reflecting back color equally from its flat color spectrum white light.

You'll do better in the long run creating a custom camera profile shooting Raw where the incamera color space won't matter as it would shooting jpegs.

[Remo Nonaz]

I would include some shots of the subject with a MacBeth color check chart. That will give you a fixed starting point for all your colors and tones.

[tgall]

I found this here at Luminous Landscape:
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/accessories/dig-calib-profil.shtml

I'll try that since the price is right unless someone else has tried it and it's a waste of time. ??

I looked at the XRite Colorchecker Passport. A lot of reports about buggy software, poor documentation and bad support, but for those that got it running right, seems to do a good job.

So what it seems like I need to do is create a profile for the camera/lighting situation that applies the correction when going thru ACR. Just as my monitor profile corrects when going from screen to print.
Any other way or suggestions on how to do this besides using one of the two pieces of software above? (In case they don't work.)

Thanks
T.O.

[Tim Lookingbill]

Why don't you just buy an X-rite Color Checker Chart ($65-8.5x11in.) and use Adobe DNG Profile Editor (free download) which includes a wizard for creating dual and single illuminant profiles and an editor to selectively include manually corrected colors (similar to Photoshop's "Replace Colors..." only much more selective and refined) and embed them as part of the profile.

Don't use the scripts in that LL article you linked to. It's an old article and it's just too much trouble without any guarantees that you'll get that particular fabric to render correctly. Keep in mind the other variables that could be going on that I mentioned above. You may or may not fix this with a custom profile. You need to first rule out the constant, that being your strobe, by shooting under a different light source. If you get two different color renderings with both being wrong then a custom profile isn't going to fix it. I have a piece of synthetic fabric that will not render correctly no matter what I do. I have to use Replace Color in Photoshop. Not saying this is your situation, just saying it's possible.

What I don't understand is why you have to edit the same fabric color on every image and not be able to do it once and apply to the rest. Or maybe you're talking about a number of fabric colors not coming out right?

We also don't know how off your colors are. Digital camera's aren't meant to be exacting scientific instruments so close enough may have to suffice or you're just going to have to do the work to get what you want.

[AFairley]

Why don't you just buy an X-rite Color Checker Chart ($65-8.5x11in.) and use Adobe DNG Profile Editor (free download) which includes a wizard for creating dual and single illuminant profiles and an editor to selectively include manually corrected colors (similar to Photoshop's "Replace Colors..." only much more selective and refined) and embed them as part of the profile.

Don't use the scripts in that LL article you linked to. It's Qan old article and it's just too much trouble without any guarantees that you'll get that particular fabric to render correctly. Keep in mind the other variables that could be going on that I mentioned above. You may or may not fix this with a custom profile. You need to first rule out the constant, that being your strobe, by shooting under a different light source. If you get two different color renderings with both being wrong then a custom profile isn't going to fix it. I have a piece of synthetic fabric that will not render correctly no matter what I do. I have to use Replace Color in Photoshop. Not saying this is your situation, just saying it's possible.

What I don't understand is why you have to edit the same fabric color on every image and not be able to do it once and apply to the rest. Or maybe you're talking about a number of fabric colors not coming out right?

We also don't know how off your colors are. Digital camera's aren't meant to be exacting scientific instruments so close enough may have to suffice or you're just going to have to do the work to get what you want.

+ 1

[Alan Goldhammer]

Color Checker Passport works quite well for me.  I haven't seen any issues with the software.  Also would note that Jeff and Michael use it in the newest Camera to Print video series so it must be good!

[craigwashburn]

This is common... lots of reasons why it might occur and there's little you can do about it.  Certain dyes will fluoresce to a degree under strobes, and then the fine pattern of fabric can cause shifts in a moire-like fashion.    Then you have sensor sensitivities, color profiles and curves that can also introduce subtle changes.  I once encountered a black dye that reflected infrared pretty well and the camera I was using at the time was sensitive to that - the pieces with that dye were noticeably magenta, while other pieces were not.

Adjusting hue/color to one image and applying it to the rest is the best solution.