Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Printing: Printers, Papers and Inks => Topic started by: kenben on October 24, 2010, 08:29:04 am
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When I print on matte paper I lose detail in the darker areas on the print.On screen the detail is there.As a matter of fact it just becomes a mass of black.Are there any ideas to correct this problem.
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Do you use "Black point compensation" option or not? Try it.
Do you use soft proofing? What does it display?
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The only matte paper I've used is Epson Velvet Fine Art and it can be a complete cow when it comes to coaxing detail out of the shadows. When you softproof, you could try gently blending in a shadows/highlights layer, or a curves adjustment layer, or brush in white on a low opacity with the blend mode set to overlay or similar. Go too far and you can get an unpleasant HDR look, but on the other hand to get a final print with the look you want may involve having a softproofed image on screen that looks a little over the top in the shadows.
The rendering intent can sometimes also make a difference.
David
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Matte paper doesn't have as much printable range as glossy paper, so it's not uncommon to see blacks bunch up. Have you checked to make sure your image isn't too dark to begin with? Here's two blog entries I wrote on the subject of dark prints:
http://danecreekfolios.squarespace.com/blog/2010/2/17/monitor-brightness-and-dark-prints.html
http://www.danecreekfolios.com/blog/2010/5/10/monitor-brightness-and-dark-prints-part-2.html
Neil
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On screen the detail is there.As a matter of fact it just becomes a mass of black.Are there any ideas to correct this problem.
After the good answers made here (screen calibration to a low enough luminance, black point compensation and intent), I'll also add that :
- the media settings may interfere, particularly if one is selected that lays too much ink (see http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/media_settings.html eg)
- the profile itself may play a role ; some give a bit more shadow detail than others, depending on the software used.
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Thank you for all your comments.One of the biggest problems lately is I have been photographing bog and lake areas where the shoreline consists of heavy dark green evergreens which when reflected in the water also becomes dark.I work a lot with back lighting and side lighting so creating some interesting problems.I am trying out Museo Portfolio rag at the moment Another problem I found with this paper is that reds become too red.
From this discussion I will pay more attention to my histrogram.For that I thank you Neile.
I have my monitor brightness set at 5 and my monitor is calibrated with Spyder Pro
When using Museo Portfolio Rag the instructions tell you tell you no black point compensation
Ken
http://kenben.wordpress.com/
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Ken,
You've got the same calibration device I have. Try reading out the cd/m2 measurement of the brightness with it on the calibration test patch screen and see what you come up with. Even with your monitor set to 5 it may still be too bright (mine set to 0 is actually brighter than I'd like!)
Neil
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Neil my red,Green,Blue are set to 50.What should they be.
Did you do a review of Moeb Portfolio Rag.
The reds are too intense.
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Setting monitor cd/m2 is a situational thing, which depends on the ambient light of your editing environment, so the numbers that are right for one person may not be right for you. I got there by trial and error (I have a controlled editing environment), tweaking cd/m2 until my prints "matched" the soft-proofed monitor view.
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When using Museo Portfolio Rag the instructions tell you tell you no black point compensation
Try it with BPC anyway, it may well solve a bit of your problem, but...
The reds are too intense.
That could point to the profil being less than optimal (or, especially if you got a wide gamut display, the display profile being a bit off too).
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This is a very common problem (the one the OP posted about). The most likely culprit is the paper. Buy a small package of Ilford Gold Fibre Silk or similar Baryta-based gloss paper, make a print or two and compare. Beyond that: (1) make sure your monitor is not too bright. I can't relate to numbers like "5" - it's meaningless. Proper monitor calibration deals in cd/mm2. Try a value no higher than 110. (2) Your printer profile is most likely not the main source of problem, provided it is a good quality generic profile, or a custom profile you had made or made yourself for your printer/paper combination. (3) There is a "hard fix" to this problem which works amazingly well to bring out hidden detail in dark areas of a great many images: add a Curves Adjustment Layer, set the Blend Mode of the Curve to Color Dodge (less radical) or Screen (more radical); then, mask out the areas you don't want affected by making sure the Layer Mask for the Curve is activated, your paint brush is Black, soft, and you paint out the unwanted adjustments by painting Black on the image, and for the remainder you adjust the RGB Curve and the opacity to tone the dark areas to taste.
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Neil my red,Green,Blue are set to 50.What should they be.
You need to look under the RGB bars, where it tells you the luminance rating. As someone else mentioned about, around 110 or less is good, but it depends on your lighting conditions where you print and where you plan on hanging the image.
There's a screen shot in my first blog entry that shows where you need to look, I highlighted it with a big red box.
Neil
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I would not blame the paper. I have used lots of Museo Portfolio with no problem with shadow separation or reds. I agree with most that has been said, especially re adjusting monitor brightness. Mark's suggestions re curves blending modes are very helpful. There is no easy (read cheap) way to solve this type of problem properly. What you need is a reliable , accurate monitor able to be hardware calibrated and properly made profiles. Bite the bullet and get an Eizo monitor , calibrate and profile it using a top professional service if necessary. Have a set of custom profiles made including one that valorises luminosity when used on perceptual intent. If your profiling service does not understand this, find one that does.
If you are framing prints a luster type paper could be considered . Their blacks are deeper (by about 2 zones) which gives much more shadow tonality to play with . Lots to choose from. Apart from suggestion made Museo Silver Rag is a good option with a slightly crystalline appearance. Baryta papers are very sharp and smooth with a traditional darkroom look. The latter scuff easily, but then all inkjet prints are fragile . That's another topic.
A matte paper with a smooth surface and quite a long tonal range is Canson Rag Photographique.
Good Luck
Brian Gilkes PhD
www.pharoseditions.com.au
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We have all fought issues with things like this.
What I usually do on new papers like matte or cotton rag is print about 5 or 6 of the same picture with different brightnesses and even saturation levels.
Soft proofing is a must in my opinion on matte or cotton rags. Rc papers usually get pretty close to what you see on the screen if you are calibrated.
Good luck.
Also what printer are you using?
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I've pretty much come to the conclusion that for images where shadow details and/or darker saturated colors are important, I just won't use matte papers. They're too much of a compromise compared to the newer fiber-gloss/baryta papers.
The problem with the matte papers is the limited DMax. This means that the contrast range of the image has to be reduced to fit in the limited range of the paper. You can't just do this with a simple linear reduction in contrast, because if you do the midtones will end up too high and the results looks weak or washed-out. So the profiles reduce the contrast range using a curve that affects the shadows more than other tones, and the result is crushed shadows. It's not necessarily a bad thing (most images will look better printed like this than with just a linear reduction of contrast). But more and more I'm coming to the conclusion that the qualities of matte paper just aren't worth it given the limitations in image reproduction compared to the fiber-gloss papers.
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I am using an Epson R1900.I have adjusted my work flow as I have been shooting a lot of photos dealing with more dark areas than usual.I am dealing with dramatic side lighting through heavy evergreen growth along lake shorelines.
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Ken I have the R1900 too and I think that what may be happening is that you are quite frankly seeing the limitation of this printer paper combination .I ve printed using epson ultra premium matte and was not that happy with b&w prints where there were large areas of shadows. It just came out very dark black almost.
IT will take more work tweaking and softproofing to improve the results.
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That is quite possible Aristoc The photo I want to print is on my blog under Bog Island.
http://kenben.wordpress.com/
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That's a lovely image; I can see why you want an excellent print. But I agree with other posters; when your image is low key and greatly dependent upon shadow density and rich blacks, you'll be better off printing it on a glossier paper that yields a deep D-max. Matte or cotton rag papers are great for airy, high-key photographs. Richard Lohmann's and Tyler Boley's landscapes come to mind. But the lack of rich shadows on such papers will kill the impact of photographs like yours.
One 'cheat' that can resurrect lost shadow detail is described by Uwe Steinmueller in his Fine Art Digital Printing book. You print out a test file with grey squares running from levels 0 to 255 on your preferrred printer with the paper and profile you want to use. Then check to see the darkest square you can just distinquish from the previous square. More often than not, on cotton rag paper even with a decent profile the last 5, 7, even 12 levels go straight to d-max with no detail. Sometimes there's even a density reversal, where the squares start going a tiny bit lighter due to excessive inkload. Once you've figured out the last usable level, you apply a levels adjustment layer that limits the shadow output density to that level. You may of course have to use another curves layer to re-jigger the midtone contrast, but this cheat has rescued prints for me. In a perfect world, the profile and black point compensation would reliably correct this on their own, but we don't live in that world.
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The photo I want to print is on my blog under Bog Island.
Beautiful image, Ken! I popped a copy into Lightroom so I could look at the histogram, and even if you were printing on glossy paper with better dmax I would be concerned that the image is too dark to print effectively. Regardless of the tool you use to make adjustments, I personally would try to get the entire image brighter prior to printing.
To give you an idea, even an exposure adjustment of +1.25 in Lightroom makes a difference. You really don't wind up clipping any highlights of consequence, and it opens the shadows up quite a bit. It will likely look far to bright on your monitor, but once printed you might be pleasantly surprised.
Neil
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I will probably work on the island in camera raw then load into photoshop as a smart object.Then bring it back into camera raw to open the exposure in the background. Bring this copy into photoshop as another layer and brush out the background.I really do not want to change the island much.Then go from there.
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I would love to know what happened with printing this image. Did it work out the way you wanted? I realized you said that your monitor was set to R=50 G=50 B=50 in an earlier post. Seems very wrong.
Thanks
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Hi Arisotoc.I got a beautiful print.I created 2 separate files one of the island and one for the background.I then brought them in to Photoshop as separate layers.By masking and brushing in the background I achieved what I wanted.I then did a test print and from there I made some adjustments a nd I ended up with an excellent print.I am also more aware of the problems matt paper will cause.Especially in thbe dark areas.
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This week I got back to basics and dug out my copy of Scott Kelby's 7-Point System for Photoshop.Due to the fact I was doing a lot of shooting with very dark backgrounds I went back to the basics.Working much better.
I like the darker backgrounds when I get the right lighting in the foreground but plays havoc when it comes to printing.
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...I realized you said that your monitor was set to R=50 G=50 B=50 in an earlier post. Seems very wrong.
For many monitors, this is the default factory settings for R-G-B.
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from everything I read about what the RBG number should be on y our monitor, I definitely have come to the conslusion that if you are that low, then you have the improper settings. My dafault settings on my Dell 2209wa were 100-100-100. AFter hardware calibration the are 100-100-92. Something seems wroing about that and I think it may have added to the difference between monitor and print.
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I print with an Epson 4800 and have long suffered poor shadow rendition on print. Any image data lower than Photoshop level 25 or 30 prints as pure black. I can work around this with layers and masks, but it all takes time.
If I print a colour test chart in colour mode, the chart's monochrome steps are clipped from about level 25 down to zero.
If I print the same chart in Epson's "Advanced Black and White" mode, the blacks are perfect. I see detail right down to about level 5.
For both tests, I use the same printing software (Qimage) same paper, same inks. Only the printer "mode" has changed.
I see the same problem unchanged with several profiles and on several papers, both matt and lustre, but the problem disappears in ABW mode with the same settings and media.
HALP! : )
thanks!
Peter