Printing for and viewing under non-controlled/standard light sources

[Larry Heath]

Ok, is there a formulaic method or even a rule of thumb to use to produce prints that will be viewed under non-standard viewing conditions?  In this case all I know is that the prints will be viewed on a table under overhead florescent light of totally undetermined quality, brightness or color temp. I am concerned that what I print for standard D5000 light might have some god awful color cast. I have no way before hand of knowing what the light is going to be. I mean even standard commercial building fluorescents can be all over the place as far as I know.

Anybody have any words of wisdom on printing for these conditions?

Later Larry

[howardm]

Ok, is there a formulaic method or even a rule of thumb to use to produce prints that will be viewed under non-standard viewing conditions?  In this case all I know is that the prints will be viewed on a table under overhead florescent light of totally undetermined quality, brightness or color temp. I am concerned that what I print for standard D5000 light might have some god awful color cast. I have no way before hand of knowing what the light is going to be. I mean even standard commercial building fluorescents can be all over the place as far as I know.

Anybody have any words of wisdom on printing for these conditions?

Later Larry

I think you could make some sorta reasonable guesstimates as to brightness based on environment.  I'm kind of assuming overhead flour. may mean office ?  you could estimate what the brightness from perhaps the required standards for office lighting.  probably not more than 120-130cd/m2 I'd think. They'd probably be more cool-white than daylight.

Perhaps the best thing would be to have some custom printer profile made for one of the F illuminants and see what the softproof does and/or go to Lowes and get an inexpensive 2tube fixture and try it.

[digitaldog]

Best you could do is measure the illuminant and build the profile for that instead of D50. Otherwise hope everyone’s eyes adapt to the illuminant which is often the case.   

[bill t.]

Institutional fluorescent light quality is so color-challenged that attempts at illuminant conformity are futile.  Just make D50 your one-size-fits-all illuminant and worry only about room brightness.  I have a cheap lux meter that is useful for getting print brightness right for situations where I know the installation location before making the print, then it's just a matter of adjusting print evaluation brightness to match.

In actual installations the worst sins are too dark, too light, crummy contrast, and awful reflections.  All of those get you much bigger demerits than sub-optimal illuminant settings.

Pray your print doesn't wind up in 2700K Hell, suitable only for pictures of bananas, a print made for that illuminant would be quite bizarre.  Then there is always the issue of what if they move your illuminant-specific print into different lighting conditions.

[Larry Heath]

Thanks gentlemen, sounds like good sound advice all.
 
I guess D50 it is and the devil take the hind most.  At this point I know there will be three, four foot florescent fixtures directly over the table that the judging/viewing will be done under, so light levels should be adequate. Reflections/glare will not be a problem, as I did some tests and settled on Canson Rag Photographique 310. The images look really nice with no reflections or glare under any light that I have had them in. I even went out in the garage under the fluorescents out there and they still look good, so I guess I am just overthinking it.

Thanks for the help.

Later Larry