Luminous Landscape Forum
Raw & Post Processing, Printing => Colour Management => Topic started by: walter.sk on March 21, 2018, 07:15:33 pm
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I have been processing and preparing image files to upload to Costco for my wife, and ran into a problem. Here is my workflow in Photoshop CC 2018 and Lightroom Classic:
1) I optimize the raw file in LR, then edit it in PS, and save it as a Tiff.
2) After opening the edited tiff again in LR, I softproof it using the downloaded Costco profile for the Fuji Frontier with Luster paper, making the softproofed version a Proof Copy, adjusted to look as close to the original Tiff as possible.
3) I send the Proof Copy back to Photoshop, where I make the canvas about 2% bigger so that when Costco makes the image a bit larger for full bleed I don't lose any of the actual image I want. I then switch from 16-bit to 8-bit, and Convert to Profile from Prophoto to the Costco profile.
While I did this with two files last week, and they were printed by Costco and came out fine after specifying "No Automatic Corrections," or whatever the actual term is, I repeated what I thought was the same procedure this week, with horrible results, looking way oversaturated and as if I somehow had double profiled them.
The question is, if I softproof an image in LR using the Costco profile, and adjust it to best resemble the original, and then convert the image to the Costco profile, is this actually causing a problem such as double profiling?
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I don't believe you are double profiling with the procedure described in your last sentence. The softproof happens in the Develop Module using the Costco profile as the device being simulated. It isn't doing anything to your image file; it is only simulating your edits within that space; presumably you have paper white and black ink being simulated with the Costco profile. When you export the edited file from Lr I assume you have that Costco profile embedded. Then you bring it to Costco asking them to print it without adjusting anything, right? I think that's where the problem starts and perhaps first thing is that you need to have a conversation with them asking them exactly what they did.
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...Then you bring it to Costco asking them to print it without adjusting anything, right? I think that's where the problem starts and perhaps first thing is that you need to have a conversation with them asking them exactly what they did.
Fortunately, I didn't have them print it. I just uploaded the file to my wife's "album" and clicked on the image to view it. It was horrible. I checked her account preferences, and she has set as a default "Auto Correct Off." I opened the same file in LR and it was garish, although it did look a lot more reasonable when I checked the Softproof box again.
I dunno...maybe I was over-aggressive when doing the softproof optimization. However, I've been softproofing for many years and printing myself, and haven't run into this phenomenon, at least in this century!
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Ahah - the Costco profile is probably a smaller colour space than Lr's working space, so when you first put it under soft-proof you probably ramped-up stuff like Clarity and Vibrance to better simulate what it looked like without softproof. So then if you turn softproof OFF with those adjustments done, the non-softproofed version should look hyped, because you intentionally hyped it. No problem there.
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Hmmm...
I'm going to have them do a test print and see what happens. Maybe the way to go would be to convert to sRGB and 8 bits, and then convert to the Costco profile. That may be what I did last week when it seemed to work OK.
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Actually I was in the back of my mind wondering about a working space mismatch (because I remember from my scanning days that SilverFast performed better in aRGB(98) than in ProPhoto), but then thought perhaps the embedding of the Costco profile should over-ride this. Maybe not - I forget. Why not give them two versions - one worked-up in ProPhoto and the other in sRGB, both with the Costco profile embedded and see how they compare after printing.
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Hmmm...
I'm going to have them do a test print and see what happens. Maybe the way to go would be to convert to sRGB and 8 bits, and then convert to the Costco profile. That may be what I did last week when it seemed to work OK.
I wouldn't do that. Especially if your original image is in a larger gamut like Adobe or ProPhoto RGB. You would be likely to clip the more saturated colors and get bad results.
I don't use Lightroom for conversion to Costco Profiles. But this process works whether you convert to the printer's profile with either Photoshop or Lightroom.
Give an image tagged in a Costco (or any other) printer's RGB space:
If you want to check how an image will look when printed then, from Photoshop, convert the image you would send to Costco and is tagged with the Costco profile, to a standard colorspace recognized by whatever app your wife is using. Usually they can handle standard RGB profiles.
Do it like this: From the tagged Costco image, convert to ProPhoto if the app can handle ProPhoto, otherwise sRGB using Colorimetric without selecting BPC. Important. Don't select BPC here. This produces what is, in effect, a soft proof image of what Costco should print, adapted to the display white point. Looking at it is the same as viewing a soft proof but without showing paper color and should give a good match to what Costco prints when sending the Costco tagged to Costco printers w/o color management per DryCreek's instructions.
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Do it like this: From the tagged Costco image, convert to ProPhoto if the app can handle ProPhoto, otherwise sRGB using Colorimetric without selecting BPC. Important. Don't select BPC here. This produces what is, in effect, a soft proof image of what Costco should print, adapted to the display white point. Looking at it is the same as viewing a soft proof but without showing paper color and should give a good match to what Costco prints when sending the Costco tagged to Costco printers w/o color management per DryCreek's instructions.
Sounds like a plan! I printed this out and will try it.....
I tried it and need to ask: did you mean Relative Colorimetric or Absolute Colorimetric?
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Actually I was in the back of my mind wondering about a working space mismatch (because I remember from my scanning days that SilverFast performed better in aRGB(98) than in ProPhoto), but then thought perhaps the embedding of the Costco profile should over-ride this. Maybe not - I forget. Why not give them two versions - one worked-up in ProPhoto and the other in sRGB, both with the Costco profile embedded and see how they compare after printing.
I’ve been following this thread with much interest. Since I do all my own printing, exporting files for printing at a lab is something I don’t understand well. Andrew Rodney helped me in another thread quite a bit, BUT in following this thread I find myself confused. “Embed, convert, tag . . . “. Are these synonyms? I think I understand well the soft proofing using Costco’s ICC profile. (We’re talking LR Classic CC here.) Now I’m ready to export the soft proofed version of the file from LR so that I can take (or upload) to Costco for printing. What EXACTLY do I do in the export dialog in LR with the file? Convert, embed, tag... with Costco’s ICC profile - what the heck does this mean? I feel like there’s a huge hole in my understanding and would be very grateful for some education here. Thanks in advance for any help in getting me straightened out. Apologies to the OP for hitch-hicking on the thread.
Rand
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I’ve been following this thread with much interest. Since I do all my own printing, exporting files for printing at a lab is something I don’t understand well. Andrew Rodney helped me in another thread quite a bit, BUT in following this thread I find myself confused. “Embed, convert, tag . . . “. Are these synonyms? I think I understand well the soft proofing using Costco’s ICC profile. (We’re talking LR Classic CC here.) Now I’m ready to export the soft proofed version of the file from LR so that I can take (or upload) to Costco for printing. What EXACTLY do I do in the export dialog in LR with the file? Convert, embed, tag... with Costco’s ICC profile - what the heck does this mean? I feel like there’s a huge hole in my understanding and would be very grateful for some education here. Thanks in advance for any help in getting me straightened out. Apologies to the OP for hitch-hicking on the thread.
Rand
Yes, it's easy to get confused with jargon so don't be too hard on yourself.
Now my understanding: specifically in Lr, when you export a raw file using CMD-SHIFT-E (if you are on Mac) CTRL-SHIFT-E (Windows), you can select in the File Settings Section for the Color Space what profile to include with the photo so that the onward processing device (in this case a Costco printer) will know how to interpret the colours. So you select the Costco profile and once exported the file will have the Costco profile embedded. But then the photo is purposed to that one onward processing option: the Costco printer.
The more flexible approach would be to export it in either ProPhoto or ARGB(98) depending on how much gamut the image needs, then open it in Photoshop and in the Edit menu go to Assign and assign the profile corresponding to the output process that will then handle the Photo. You can always go back and re-assign any other profile for another purpose afterward. By assigning a profile, the image is "tagged" with this profile and the onward process knows how to interpret the file colour values.
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Sounds like a plan! I printed this out and will try it.....
I tried it and need to ask: did you mean Relative Colorimetric or Absolute Colorimetric?
Relative intent. It makes the whites match.
Warning. When you convert an image to a printer/paper profile, how it looks depends on the settings and assumptions of the application. This is because the image does not carry information about how the image was converted but only the raw rgb values that would go to the printer. This can be pretty wrong depending on assumptions the application makes about what options to choose to interpret the device rgb values. To see how the image, when printed, will actually look, you have to first convert it back to a "regular" rgb colorspace using either Relative Colorimetric without selecting BPC or Absolute Colorimetric. Absolute will decrease the brightness in an attempt to show the actual paper color when printed which is usually shifted somewhat in tint and reduced in brightness because paper cannot go all the way to L*=100.
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Yes, it's easy to get confused with jargon so don't be too hard on yourself.
Now my understanding: specifically in Lr, when you export a raw file using CMD-SHIFT-E (if you are on Mac) CTRL-SHIFT-E (Windows), you can select in the File Settings Section for the Color Space what profile to include with the photo so that the onward processing device (in this case a Costco printer) will know how to interpret the colours. So you select the Costco profile and once exported the file will have the Costco profile embedded. But then the photo is purposed to that one onward processing option: the Costco printer.
The more flexible approach would be to export it in either ProPhoto or ARGB(98) depending on how much gamut the image needs, then open it in Photoshop and in the Edit menu go to Assign and assign the profile corresponding to the output process that will then handle the Photo. You can always go back and re-assign any other profile for another purpose afterward. By assigning a profile, the image is "tagged" with this profile and the onward process knows how to interpret the file colour values.
Mark,
Thanks a ton! The “Ah ha!” light has come on. The bit I was missing was the Photoshop step and “assign” =‘s “tagged” concept. For my purposes, the LR export method will be better, as I will just keep those files separated out from my LR catalog and re-named for easy ID. But for sharing w/ others in the camera club, this fuller explanation is also VERY helpful. Thanks again . . .
Rand
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Yes, it's easy to get confused with jargon so don't be too hard on yourself.
Now my understanding: specifically in Lr, when you export a raw file using CMD-SHIFT-E (if you are on Mac) CTRL-SHIFT-E (Windows), you can select in the File Settings Section for the Color Space what profile to include with the photo so that the onward processing device (in this case a Costco printer) will know how to interpret the colours. So you select the Costco profile and once exported the file will have the Costco profile embedded. But then the photo is purposed to that one onward processing option: the Costco printer.
The more flexible approach would be to export it in either ProPhoto or ARGB(98) depending on how much gamut the image needs, then open it in Photoshop and in the Edit menu go to Assign and assign the profile corresponding to the output process that will then handle the Photo. You can always go back and re-assign any other profile for another purpose afterward. By assigning a profile, the image is "tagged" with this profile and the onward process knows how to interpret the file colour values.
I don't believe that's correct. If the exported image was in a regular RGB space you would want to convert it, not assign it. Assigning the image to the printer colorspace just tells the application to interpret the RGB values as printer space RGB values and they can be quite different colors. The only reason ever to assign, vs convert, is when the image is untagged and you know what the tag should be, or when the image tag is incorrect. The latter sometimes occurs when importing an untagged image which is automatically tagged on import. Otherwise one shouldn't assign a colorspace.
General rule. Anytime you find yourself in the Assign->Assign Colorspace menu stop and ask yourself why? Is this really what you want. It rarely is.
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Hmmm...
I'm going to have them do a test print and see what happens. Maybe the way to go would be to convert to sRGB and 8 bits, and then convert to the Costco profile. That may be what I did last week when it seemed to work OK.
NO, don't do that. Pointless and only useful to clip colors you possibly produced and can output (but maybe NOT see on-screen).
See:
The benefits of wide gamut working spaces on printed output:
This three part, 32 minute video covers why a wide gamut RGB working space like ProPhoto RGB can produce superior quality output to print.
Part 1 discusses how the supplied Gamut Test File was created and shows two prints output to an Epson 3880 using ProPhoto RGB and sRGB, how the deficiencies of sRGB gamut affects final output quality. Part 1 discusses what to look for on your own prints in terms of better color output. It also covers Photoshop’s Assign Profile command and how wide gamut spaces mishandled produce dull or over saturated colors due to user error.
Part 2 goes into detail about how to print two versions of the properly converted Gamut Test File file in Photoshop using Photoshop’s Print command to correctly setup the test files for output. It covers the Convert to Profile command for preparing test files for output to a lab.
Part 3 goes into color theory and illustrates why a wide gamut space produces not only move vibrant and saturated color but detail and color separation compared to a small gamut working space like sRGB.
High Resolution Video: http://digitaldog.net/files/WideGamutPrintVideo.mov
Low Resolution (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLlr7wpAZKs&feature=youtu.be
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“Embed, convert, tag . . . “. Are these synonyms?
No. Embed and tag mean the same thing; place the actual ICC profile inside the document to define it's color space. If you use the Assign Profile command in Photoshop as an example, you tag the document with that new profile. The profile is embedded and saved inside the document. If you convert from say sRGB (ugh no!) to a printer output color space, the data does change from one color space to the other and, the output color space in this case, the printer profile, gets embedded (tagged) in this document.
BIG difference between Assign and Convert!
Photoshop CC's Color Settings & the Convert to Profile and Assign Profile command.
This new video covers everything you thought you wanted to know about the Photoshop Color Setting dialog. It also discusses the Convert to Profile Command and the Assign Profile Command. Photoshop CC 2017 is used in this video and it updates the video on this subject I Published on June 28, 2012.
High Rez: http://digitaldog.net/files/PhotoshopColorSettings.mp4 (http://digitaldog.net/files/PhotoshopColorSettings.mp4)
Low Rez (YouTube): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JaHOGDK5OI (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JaHOGDK5OI)
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I don't believe that's correct. If the exported image was in a regular RGB space you would want to convert it, not assign it. Assigning the image to the printer colorspace just tells the application to interpret the RGB values as printer space RGB values and they can be quite different colors. The only reason ever to assign, vs convert, is when the image is untagged and you know what the tag should be, or when the image tag is incorrect. The latter sometimes occurs when importing an untagged image which is automatically tagged on import. Otherwise one shouldn't assign a colorspace.
General rule. Anytime you find yourself in the Assign->Assign Colorspace menu stop and ask yourself why? Is this really what you want. It rarely is.
I'm not so sure about this. The context here is dealing with a service bureau or external photo processor. To prepare photos for these outfits you would anyhow softproof your file with their profile (if they are serious enough to give it to you) so that what comes out of their process is what you expect. So then remains the question of what you send them. This depends on their instructions. If they tell you they want the photos in sRGB or ARGB(98), that means their process will tag the image with their output profile for printing. If they tell you to assign their printer profile, that means they are expecting to receive a print-ready file that they don't need to do anything with other than process it. I've never seen instructions in this context asking people to Convert.
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I'm not so sure about this. The context here is dealing with a service bureau or external photo processor. To prepare photos for these outfits you would anyhow softproof your file with their profile (if they are serious enough to give it to you) so that what comes out of their process is what you expect. So then remains the question of what you send them. This depends on their instructions. If they tell you they want the photos in sRGB or ARGB(98), that means their process will tag the image with their output profile for printing. If they tell you to assign their printer profile, that means they are expecting to receive a print-ready file that they don't need to do anything with other than process it. I've never seen instructions in this context asking people to Convert.
Mark,
This is true for most all external processors that expect sRGB or Adobe RGB but Costco is a different critter. They allow you to send them RGB images in device space. So conversion to device space using whatever options are desired (Perc. Rel. Col, BPC, Saturation, or even Abs. Col.) is done by the customer and the converted file is uploaded along with instructions not to do auto adjustments. DryCreek has extensive instructions on how to do this and maintains a database of profiles for a variety of locations and printers Costco uses. It provides customers an unusual level of control for those that choose to use it.
https://www.drycreekphoto.com/icc/index.html
That said, I can't imagine a print vendor asking to assign an image created in a standard RGB space to a printer's profile. That would usually produce bad results.
To further expand on why assigning a printer profile to an sRGB image is bad, there exists no printer than can print the sRGB gamut, let alone the large number of printable colors outside of sRGB which would presumably be clipped. The only way it would begin to work is if the printer profile was severely malformed as there is no way the colorimetric tables could fit sRGB. Correction. It's possible to double profile a printer such that the profile the printer uses is restricted to sRGB. For instance make a normal printer profile then create a second profile but print the target in sRGB using the first profile to manage coior (instead of color management off). This profile could then be assigned to the image. It would, of course, limit colors to those printable in sRGB. But doing something like that is weird, to say the least.
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All . . .
I'm really glad I was moxie enough to expose my ignorance on this more fully. This discussion has been VERY helpful. Doug, thanks for the explication of the Costco situation, Dry Creek's instructions in this regard are far from clear to me. Probably because I was reading my ignorance into the situation.
As I said, I do all my own printing on my SC P600 and SC P5000 printers. When I need to go BIG for someone, I have access to, and the ICC profiles for the papers I use for, an SC P20000 printer. I soft proof here as normal and take the soft proofed files to the location where we print them in the same way I do here in my own digital darkroom.
But this subject has been one of great confusion for folk I've been trying to help in our local camera club who only use labs of one sort or another. I've been educated enough (thanks to Andrew) to steer them away from the "one size fits all labs" (e.g. one who will remain nameless that has a single ICC profile for all their papers/printers! LOL), but I've not been savvy enough to be able to provide really good direction for Costco (especially) and some other labs that have multiple, paper-specific profiles, and instruct to soft proof "to" but not convert the file on export.
So again, thank you for this discussion and any ongoing insight that may/will be provided. If you genuine experts have to nuance your responses to get me to "get it" - then I don't feel so bad about not getting it on my own! ::)
Best regards,
Rand
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Having referenced some guidance material on preparing images for an external processing lab, I think some clarification of the details of what to provide them may be helpful here. If you have the lab’s profile and if you know which RGB colour space they want the photos to be in, you set-up a proof condition in Lr or Ps to soft proof your photos with their printer/paper profile. If the lab ONLY specifies the working colour space in which they expect the photos (e.g. sRGB, ARGB(98)) you should convert the photo to that working space. If the lab specifies that the image should be in a colour working space such as sRGB or ARGB(98) AND still provides a paper/printer profile for soft proofing, then you should work in the requested colour space and in the soft-proof condition dialog you should select both the printing service’s profile and “Preserve RGB Numbers” option, which for soft-proofing purposes will simulate what the print would look like if these RGB numbers were sent to this printer/paper combination. If the lab allows you to send the photo for printing readied with their printer profile, you should convert the image to that profile using the Convert to Profile procedure in Photoshop, but tell them you’ve done that so they won’t make any further adjustments. This is supposed to be the surest way of getting back what you expected. (ref. Tom Ashe, "Color Management and Quality Output", Chapter 16).
Having done this, I would observe the photo is now purposed to that one output condition.
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Having referenced some guidance material on preparing images for an external processing lab, I think some clarification of the details of what to provide them may be helpful here. If you have the lab’s profile and if you know which RGB colour space they want the photos to be in, you set-up a proof condition in Lr or Ps to soft proof your photos with their printer/paper profile. If the lab ONLY specifies the working colour space in which they expect the photos (e.g. sRGB, ARGB(98)) you should convert the photo to that working space. If the lab specifies that the image should be in a colour working space such as sRGB or ARGB(98) AND still provides a paper/printer profile for soft proofing, then you should work in the requested colour space and in the soft-proof condition dialog you should select both the printing service’s profile and “Preserve RGB Numbers” option, which for soft-proofing purposes will simulate what the print would look like if these RGB numbers were sent to this printer/paper combination. If the lab allows you to send the photo for printing readied with their printer profile, you should convert the image to that profile using the Convert to Profile procedure in Photoshop, but tell them you’ve done that so they won’t make any further adjustments. This is supposed to be the surest way of getting back what you expected. (ref. Tom Ashe, "Color Management and Quality Output", Chapter 16).
Having done this, I would observe the photo is now purposed to that one output condition.
Mark, could you talk a little bit more about "Preserve RGB Numbers" is used for and what it actually does? It looks to me like it shows a preview of the transformation without a rendering intent. Are you saying that a commercial printing service would print without applying a rendering intent, and that we should re-adjust the image with a curve to apply a rendering intent by eye? I'm not trying to make an argument here, just trying to learn about this :)
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Mark, could you talk a little bit more about "Preserve RGB Numbers" is used for and what it actually does? It looks to me like it shows a preview of the transformation without a rendering intent. Are you saying that a commercial printing service would print without applying a rendering intent, and that we should re-adjust the image with a curve to apply a rendering intent by eye? I'm not trying to make an argument here, just trying to learn about this :)
Typically, one does not use this setting for soft-proofing, except in the case of sending photos to an outside lab for printing. If the lab specifies the colour space (which you use for this purpose) and the lab provides their printer/paper profile, when you use this for soft-proofing, by checking Preserve RGB numbers it will simulate what the print will look like if you send those RGB numbers to that profiling combination.
It's often considered best practice to edit the photo using a colour working space (ARGB etc) before doing conversions to printing lab profiles. You can softproof for Rendering Intent and in the case of Relative whether or not to use BPC as well (usually recommended to use it).
However, when you convert, which should be one of the last steps in your preparation procedure, you are presented the choice of Rendering Intent and for Relative Colorimetric Intent, whether to also use BPC. The choice between these Rendering Intents is a matter of taste. It's what makes the photo look better. If you choose Perceptual there is no option to select BPC because it's supposed to include for that adjustment internally. If you choose Relative, it's usually best to also use BPC as it will help maintain shadow detail. Once the photo is converted, it is of course purposed to that printing set-up, and you may wish to amend some of the edits already done. Perhaps best to use a duplicate photo or keep it all on Adjustment Layers so the photo can be easily repurposed down the road.
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The Preserve RGB options are not useful really. It shows a soft proof of what you would get if you sent the image to the output device with out the print profile which is rather ugly.
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The Preserve RGB options are not useful really. It shows a soft proof of what you would get if you sent the image to the output device with out the print profile which is rather ugly.
Not useful in general, but according to Tom, in the specific case of preparing the photos for a service bureau who tells you the colour working space and gives you their printer profile, it's useful for predicting, under softproof, what will come out of their printer - which in that particular case would seem to be useful.
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Not useful in general, but according to Tom, in the specific case of preparing the photos for a service bureau who tells you the colour working space and gives you their printer profile, it's useful for predicting, under softproof, what will come out of their printer - which in that particular case would seem to be useful.
Nope. More useful I CMYK workflows with EXISTING CMYK (what does this CMYK look like on THAT CMYK device)
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Typically, one does not use this setting for soft-proofing, except in the case of sending photos to an outside lab for printing. If the lab specifies the colour space (which you use for this purpose) and the lab provides their printer/paper profile, when you use this for soft-proofing, by checking Preserve RGB numbers it will simulate what the print will look like if you send those RGB numbers to that profiling combination.
Mark's last two three posts are comprehensive and accurate. I would like to add why "Preserve Color Numbers" exists in the soft proof menu because it's due to variations in how Photoshop otherwise shows an image after it has been converted to a printer's RGB device space.
After conversion, an image may, or may not, accurately show what it will look like when printed. This is because, after conversion, Photoshop doesn't know (or forgets - it could track this with metadata) what Intent the conversion was done with or whether BPC had been selected so it uses the default settings in the "Color Settings Menu" for display purposes.
Soft proofing with "Preserve Color Numbers" is their way of showing you what the print will look like. When selected the only option you have is to select are "Show Paper Color" or not. If not selected Photoshop will use the printer profile to show colors based on a Relative Colorimetric interpretation. If selected, it will show colors based on Absolute Colorimetric which will slightly reduce luminance and slightly shift the tint to align with the intrinsic tint that would be printed. This avoids variations that occur based on the default settings in "Color Settings" because how the printed image will appear at that point should not be subject to the vagaries of whether it should be corrected for BPC or Perceptual which might have been selected.
This is what happens behind the scenes. If you don't select "Show Paper Color" it will show the same image as if you had done a "Convert Profile" selecting Relative Colorimetric and not BPC to a standard RGB space that encompasses its gamut. When selected, it will show the same as if you had converted using Absolute Colorimetric. Once converted to a standard RGB space these images are not affected by the "Color Settings" Intent and BPC settings. So the "Preserve Color Numbers" is just a quick way to see a proof on an already converted image without having to do the above.
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So, "preserve RGB numbers" is a way to soft proof an image that has already been converted to the printer profile space? In other words, it converts the image back to your display space so that it can again be viewed as "normal"?
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It does what I said it does in Reply #20.
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So, "preserve RGB numbers" is a way to soft proof an image that has already been converted to the printer profile space? In other words, it converts the image back to your display space so that it can again be viewed as "normal"?
Actually, if I convert my image to the printer profile space, and select "preserve RGB numbers" there is no change in the preview. And, photoshop automatically converts the image to my display profile anyways when soft proofing is off.
Therefore, I can't see how this setting would help me, or the original poster, for softproofing at all. Other than some technical issue, that I don't have, this setting doesn't generally apply to printing at home or sending a file to a commercial printer. I can see using it only if I wanted to experiment with performing the color space conversion to printer space by eye, instead of using the printer profile conversion process. An interesting idea, but not for normal printing...
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Didn't say it was for printing at home; I would never use it for that either. I recall saying it's only used when preparing images for service bureaux where they provide the colour working space in which they want the images and their printer/paper profile, for softproofing.
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Love the cinema on your website. Very cool stuff indeed.
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Didn't say it was for printing at home; I would never use it for that either. I recall saying it's only used when preparing images for service bureaux where they provide the colour working space in which they want the images and their printer/paper profile, for softproofing.
I understood that you were saying it's for when the printer provides a profile. I just don't see it working for that at all either. If you've converted your image to the printer profile, it will have no effect in the softproof as long as the image is tagged with the profile. So, do you mean convert to the printer profile and then, in "assign profile", check "do not color manage" to remove the color space tag? Yes, then this works. I think the 2nd step of removing the tag wasn't clear to me in your post.
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Love the cinema on your website. Very cool stuff indeed.
Thank you so much Mark!!!!
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So, "preserve RGB numbers" is a way to soft proof an image that has already been converted to the printer profile space? In other words, it converts the image back to your display space so that it can again be viewed as "normal"?
Yes, but only to display what the image would look like printed. As Andrew pointed out, it's rarely useful. And this has been even more true since Adobe, in their infinite wisdom, decided to disallow actually printing images in device space which requires disabling color management. There are workaround, but I digress.....
Most people just softproof the various options before printing or, more rarely, before converting to send out.
In fact the only things I can remotely think this is good for is: if you save a converted image you sent out for printing and forgot what conversion intent options you chose from the original. In that case you can use Preserve Color Numbers in soft proof and load the original in another window and run it through the Soft Proof conversion options to find out what you had once selected.
Here's another possibility. Say you are making a collage of images on a large size print and some you think look better using Perceptual while others look better using Relative. You can convert the images to the printer space then paste them on the large, blank collage which should have been pre-assigned to the printer's profile space. It might look off until you soft proof it with the Preserve Color Numbers.
It's all a very big stretch to come up with scenarios where the option is useful. That's all I can think of.
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Actually, if I convert my image to the printer profile space, and select "preserve RGB numbers" there is no change in the preview. And, photoshop automatically converts the image to my display profile anyways when soft proofing is off.
It is often the case but don't count on it. As I pointed out, how an image that has been converted to a printer profiles looks depends on the settings in the global "Color Settings" menu. For instance, if you happen to have those settings set to Rel. Col and BPC is not checked you won't see a change. OTOH, if you have BPC you will, especially if you are printing mattes.
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Here's a demonstration of Soft Proofing to a Fuji Frontier Dry Lab inkjet printer that prints in the sRGB space: (meaning printer maintains similar saturation/hue/contrast of an image converted to sRGB given that it was edited on a calibrated/profiled display).
I downloaded from Dry Creek Photo's website a printer profile of the same model as the sRGB Fuji Frontier. Converted my ProPhotoRGB edited image to sRGB and assigned the Fuji printer profile TEMPORARILY FOR SOFT PROOFING (same as choosing Preserve RGB Numbers/PRGBN).
Below is the difference between the Fuji print and the actual source image and a picture of how it appeared on my display Soft Proofing through the printer profile in relation to sRGB space. Note the greenish yellows turned redder. That's about how off what you can expect Soft Proofing EXACTLY as described above.
If you convert to the printer profile Preserve RGB Numbers will not work because the image's RGB numbers are displaying through the printer profile in relation to your calibrated display.
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Actually, if I convert my image to the printer profile space, and select "preserve RGB numbers" there is no change in the preview. And, photoshop automatically converts the image to my display profile anyways when soft proofing is off.
Therefore, I can't see how this setting would help me, or the original poster, for softproofing at all. Other than some technical issue, that I don't have, this setting doesn't generally apply to printing at home or sending a file to a commercial printer. I can see using it only if I wanted to experiment with performing the color space conversion to printer space by eye, instead of using the printer profile conversion process. An interesting idea, but not for normal printing...
I just checked this on the current version of CC. It's quite different than when I last had looked it and your observations are correct. It appears Adobe now uses the fact the image is in a printer's profile space to disable the various Intents in soft proofing. You can select Perceptual, Relative, Abs., Sat., BPC or not and NONE of them affect the softproof! Needless to say, selecting Preserve Color Numbers doesn't either though it does shift the now grayed out Intent to Relative. They all show exactly the same thing. Also, the settings in the global "Color Settings" dialog have no effect.
The only options that change the proof view are Show Paper Color and Blacks.
So in this incarnation of Photoshop Preserve Color Numbers does absolutely nothing because they bake it in.
But only if the image itself has the same printer profile. If, for instance, you select a different printer profile from the one the image has then it becomes unbaked! Suddenly, the various intents work.
So basically the Preserve Color Numbers does nothing normally. But there is one place where it is still necessary. If, after you convert the image to the printer profile and save it but not with the printer profile embedded. Then, when loaded in Photoshop unmanaged or arbitrarily assigned an RGB working space, Preserve Color Numbers will correctly produce a view proof.
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Oh my goodness!! :-)
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The OP indicates he's printing at Costco that uses an inkjet printer that prints RGB data. So he needs to test the accuracy of the RGB profile Costco provided by printing two versions...one with the image converted to the profile and the second converted to sRGB (asking technician to set the printer driver to sRGB space if they can).
If both are off then Costco needs to get their printer maintenance to calibrate the printer. I asked that of Walmart photo dept tech and they soon called the technician under contract to do a maintenance/calibration routine and all was back to normal.
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The OP indicates he's printing at Costco that uses an inkjet printer that prints RGB data. So he needs to test the accuracy of the RGB profile Costco provided by printing two versions...one with the image converted to the profile and the second converted to sRGB (asking technician to set the printer driver to sRGB space if they can).
If both are off then Costco needs to get their printer maintenance to calibrate the printer. I asked that of Walmart photo dept tech and they soon called the technician under contract to do a maintenance/calibration routine and all was back to normal.
Good to know Walmart responded to your observation re the printer being off.
Note that DryCreek requires conversion to printer profiles in their database then submittal to Costco. If you, like the OP, are discussing DryCreek Costco profiles we probably should stick to their process.
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Good to know Walmart responded to your observation re the printer being off.
Note that DryCreek requires conversion to printer profiles in their database then submittal to Costco. If you, like the OP, are discussing DryCreek Costco profiles we probably should stick to their process.
The OP made it clear that Costco's process is not working and that an alternative is to see if they can just print in the sRGB space. The DryCreekPhoto profile soft proofing outlined above is not suppose to give that close a match if the profile is using a process that's FAR AWAY FROM sRGB.
If 'A'-(Dry Creek Photo profile) is not equal to 'B'(unknown Costco processes) but 'B' is equal to 'C'-(Print match to image in sRGB) then what process or color space is the Costco printer using to build the profile? It must be very close to sRGB or else the prints should be WAY OFF.
And the Walmart Photo dept tech told me the printer needed maintenance. I just showed him the prints that had thin white parallel lines in large flat swaths of blue skies in some prints. Kinda' what shows in home printers needing print head alignment.
I was even surprised Walmart Photo dept manager would go to the extent of calling the maintenance tech for what I thought was my being too picky for such a minor flaw considering the 8x10 print cost $3.
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Here's a demonstration of Soft Proofing to a Fuji Frontier Dry Lab inkjet printer that prints in the sRGB space
No, it absolutely does not print in sRGB as no printer does!
http://2.static.img-dpreview.com/files/w/TS560x560?url=http%3A%2F%2Fdigitaldog.net%2Ffiles%2FsRGB_vs_SilverPrinters.jpg&signature=36ank%2BwiYB4k6tcKgbvVORmmoRg%3D
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No, it absolutely does not print in sRGB as no printer does!
Of course, but maybe he meant their profile reflects a gamut that is somehow close to sRGB in size and shape.
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Mark,
Again, I can't thank you enough (and the others a well) for your generosity of spirit in helping with this.
Best regards,
Scott
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You are welcome Scott, much appreciated. This has turned into quite a complicated little topic, from which we are learning stuff.
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You are welcome Scott, much appreciated. This has turned into quite a complicated little topic, from which we are learning stuff.
Mark,
Yes, indeed! And for a lot of folk who don't have the privilege of doing high quality printing themselves, this is where the rubber really meets the road in trying to stay in control of the process, and get the best results they can.
I'm also feeling a little better about my own initial confusion! LOL
Scott
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Tim,
If you identify the Frontier profile (State, Location, printer and exact profile name) you used in your example I'll download it and analyze how similar or not it is to sRGB. Frontier profiles have rather narrow gamuts barely exceeding sRGB in only a few places such as a midrange cyan. And that is only halfway between Adobe RGB and sRGB. Smaller than even a 4 color el cheapo desktop printer.
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Of course, but maybe he meant their profile reflects a gamut that is somehow close to sRGB in size and shape.
Nope too. No printer can produce all of sRGB, the shapes are quite different.
(http://2.static.img-dpreview.com/files/w/TS560x560?url=http%3A%2F%2Fdigitaldog.net%2Ffiles%2FsRGB_vs_SilverPrinters.jpg&signature=36ank%2BwiYB4k6tcKgbvVORmmoRg%3D)
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Tim,
If you identify the Frontier profile (State, Location, printer and exact profile name) you used in your example I'll download it and analyze how similar or not it is to sRGB. Frontier profiles have rather narrow gamuts barely exceeding sRGB in only a few places such as a midrange cyan. And that is only halfway between Adobe RGB and sRGB. Smaller than even a 4 color el cheapo desktop printer.
We've discussed this in the past and as before you've presented the same arguments by splitting hairs over color reproduction color gamuts from high volume consumer grade printers at big box stores such as Costco and Walmart.
You're just making this harder than it has to be. These printers interpret RGB data, not CMYK. So the reproduction of color is going to be a standard that will accommodate regular consumers with digital cameras whose default jpeg color space is sRGB. Their printer is not going to be some exotic or oversized color space. It will have it's own color gamut shape that's not exactly any synthetic RGB working space but by and large it's going to reproduce colors that fall within a common and standard color space and that being sRGB.
I've provided methods a hobbyist can implement if they have Photoshop to do convert/assign testing by simply printing a test target at a Costco printer and check how far off it is from sRGB or Costco's supplied profile. This obsessing over a printer's gamut able to reproduce one color region such cyan isn't going to help a hobbyist.
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Fortunately, I didn't have them print it.
I could be way off base here as I did not read 40+ posts but, study your critical path here. The prints were fine earlier. You have no print yet of the file you've profiled in this instance. The saturation you're seeing is what is required by the printing process but will result in normal print colors if you go ahead and print it. For example; A very bright red in the scene may measure only 160r in sRGB but the print process may require 255r to recreate the same bright red. So, if you convert the sRGB file to the printer profile but turn off viewing through the printer profile, you will see (and can measure) 255r.
Again, I could be mistaken as I haven't read this very long thread. Maybe y'all have already reached this point.
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Here's a demonstration of Soft Proofing to a Fuji Frontier Dry Lab inkjet printer that prints in the sRGB space: (meaning printer maintains similar saturation/hue/contrast of an image converted to sRGB given that it was edited on a calibrated/profiled display).
I think what you might mean to say here is; "The inkjet printer that prints from the sRGB space." As most shops do ask the file be submitted in sRGB. However, realize the actual print gamut falls significantly short of much of the sRGB space.
Below is the difference between the Fuji print and the actual source image and a picture of how it appeared on my display Soft Proofing through the printer profile in relation to sRGB space. Note the greenish yellows turned redder. That's about how off what you can expect Soft Proofing EXACTLY as described above.
I've just taken a look at some Dry Creek profiles for various Costco locations and processes. Many suspect profiles are obvious to me. Most of the profiles I looked at have significant data problems that will result in the matter you experience; The "greenish yellows turned redder" in your soft proof view being a clear alert the process of printing or profiling or both is not controlled. I don't believe its the fault of Dry Creek as they can only generate from the data their provided.
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We've discussed this in the past and as before you've presented the same arguments by splitting hairs over color reproduction color gamuts from high volume consumer grade printers at big box stores such as Costco and Walmart.
I don't recall discussing this with you previously. I consider Frontier printers reasonably high quality printers but with limited gamut. That often isn't a problem. However, gamut size aside, Drycreek profiles should provide good, color managed results with Costco printers. The OP describes a sudden problem in a process that previously worked. Proper use of profiles provides a variety of Intents such as Perceptual and Relative and it can be useful to be able to select the best one. Further, while the Frontier printers RGB mapping appears to be much closer to sRGB than that of a large gamut printer it still needs to be provided a profile converted RGB image to achieve the best match with a soft proof. BTW, assigning the printer profile to an image converted to sRGB and sending it to Costco will result in exactly the same print as just sending the sRGB image and requesting the same settings.
You're just making this harder than it has to be. These printers interpret RGB data, not CMYK. So the reproduction of color is going to be a standard that will accommodate regular consumers with digital cameras whose default jpeg color space is sRGB. Their printer is not going to be some exotic or oversized color space. It will have it's own color gamut shape that's not exactly any synthetic RGB working space but by and large it's going to reproduce colors that fall within a common and standard color space and that being sRGB.
I've provided methods a hobbyist can implement if they have Photoshop to do convert/assign testing by simply printing a test target at a Costco printer and check how far off it is from sRGB or Costco's supplied profile. This obsessing over a printer's gamut able to reproduce one color region such cyan isn't going to help a hobbyist.
People are free to stick to sRGB images and avoid the complexities of color management. If it works for you that's great but this section of the forum would not exist if others didn't want more control and repeatability.
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I think what you might mean to say here is; "The inkjet printer that prints from the sRGB space." As most shops do ask the file be submitted in sRGB. However, realize the actual print gamut falls significantly short of much of the sRGB space.
And why would most shops ask to submit files in sRGB when the Dry Creek Photo profiles of similar print models render a close enough match to sRGB as I demonstrated in the posted image. It shouldn't just slightly make greenish yellows look reddish. It should be WAY OFF! It suggest the color spaces are not so dissimilar.
The green to reddish results in the print vs soft proof results from Dry Creek Photo profile in the image I posted is indicating that profile was not built from the Raw linearized print space (largest gamut possible) but an optimized state of the printer output which can be quite similar to a standard synthetic RGB space such as sRGB.
I've printed an sRGB image to a Fuji Frontier DL6xx at my local Walgreens and told the tech to choose "Printer Space" instead of sRGB in the print driver. The saturation increase of the print was quite noticeable! Similar to assigning AdobeRGB to an sRGB file. I downloaded a DL6xx profile from a European Fuji Frontier site and converted the sRGB image to it which significantly reduced saturation and made it print as if I'ld printed in sRGB set in the Fuji printer driver.
I've just taken a look at some Dry Creek profiles for various Costco locations and processes. Many suspect profiles are obvious to me. Most of the profiles I looked at have significant data problems that will result in the matter you experience; The "greenish yellows turned redder" in your soft proof view being a clear alert the process of printing or profiling or both is not controlled. I don't believe its the fault of Dry Creek as they can only generate from the data their provided.
And thus what is a hobbyist photographer printing at Costco suppose to do if even their processes aren't consistent and controllable. Certainly a custom profile is not going to work if this is the case. My posted soft proofing demo image is providing a way for the hobbyist to do a random test print to see how off it is from a standard color rendering space. It's not perfect but at least the photographer will get an idea what to expect and what to do about it.
Anyone using Costco is not looking for perfect color matching.
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I don't recall discussing this with you previously. I consider Frontier printers reasonably high quality printers but with limited gamut. That often isn't a problem. However, gamut size aside, Drycreek profiles should provide good, color managed results with Costco printers. The OP describes a sudden problem in a process that previously worked. Proper use of profiles provides a variety of Intents such as Perceptual and Relative and it can be useful to be able to select the best one. Further, while the Frontier printers RGB mapping appears to be much closer to sRGB than that of a large gamut printer it still needs to be provided a profile converted RGB image to achieve the best match with a soft proof. BTW, assigning the printer profile to an image converted to sRGB and sending it to Costco will result in exactly the same print as just sending the sRGB image and requesting the same settings.
People are free to stick to sRGB images and avoid the complexities of color management. If it works for you that's great but this section of the forum would not exist if others didn't want more control and repeatability.
Well it's obvious Costco changed something and didn't tell the OP what that change was. Soft Proofing with Costco printer profile and using different rendering intents isn't going to fix it.
Temporarily assigning the printer profile to an sRGB image will soft proof what state the printer was in the profile reflects if it happens to be close to an optimized for sRGB state.
If assigning shows an extremely changed sRGB preview like say over saturation as if assigning AdobeRGB to sRGB then the image from its original editing space needs to be converted to the Costco profile. If doing this renders a bad print then the OP needs to talk to the photo lab technician on what changed.
As for Fuji Frontiers Dry Labs having limited gamut see the Colorsync Utility showing its comparison to sRGB. I converted my ProPhotoRGB test images to that European Fuji Frontier profile to print at my local Walgreens having the tech choose "Printer Space" instead of sRGB in the Fuji driver. Not much difference to just printing an sRGB image in sRGB printer space.
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We've discussed this in the past and as before you've presented the same arguments by splitting hairs over color reproduction color gamuts from high volume consumer grade printers at big box stores such as Costco and Walmart.
You're just making this harder than it has to be. This obsessing over a printer's gamut able to reproduce one color region such cyan isn't going to help a hobbyist.
Hobbyists and everyone else should be provided correct facts. Not misinformation! What you wrote was simply wrong! Again. As we have discussed before. :-X
”The reason there's so much ignorance on the subject of color management, is that those who have it are so eager to regularly share it!” - The Digital Dog
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Fortunately, I didn't have them print it. I just uploaded the file to my wife's "album" and clicked on the image to view it. It was horrible. I checked her account preferences, and she has set as a default "Auto Correct Off." I opened the same file in LR and it was garish, although it did look a lot more reasonable when I checked the Softproof box again.
I dunno...maybe I was over-aggressive when doing the softproof optimization. However, I've been softproofing for many years and printing myself, and haven't run into this phenomenon, at least in this century!
Again, study this critical path by the OP. He is observing the file using the values required by the printer machine until he enables soft proofing when he sees the file as it will eventually print.
" It was horrible." Yes, because you're looking at an untagged file or the viewing software is not color managed.
"it did look a lot more reasonable when I checked the Softproof box again." There you are!
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And why would most shops ask to submit files in sRGB when the Dry Creek Photo profiles of similar print models render a close enough match to sRGB as I demonstrated in the posted image.
Maybe some history will help here...
The machines were developed to use color lookup tables more than 20 years ago and before ICC profiles were in general use. They were scanner-based for printing from film, both negatives and positive films and hardcopy Type-C prints. The machines had / have many lookup tables optimized for many film types and many scene types. I don't believe there was much consideration of "sRGB" at the time.
Eventually, it became a bonus that one could bypass the scanner and have a file printed from outside the loop. sRGB was the only prevalent color space and Adobe 1998 was new (and rare.) What else could possibly be used as a base at the time? Same with digital cameras (again rare) at the time and monitors at the time. Many service technicians did not even know that printing from outside the loop was even possible! Most machines were installed in one-hour shops that had no other computer-based imaging, but the larger shops who had IT staff could simply network into the machine and send files. Surprise. When Photoshop 6 arrived with sensible soft proofing things really took off.
Just really smart, outstanding machines, all engineered before Photoshop could use ICC profiles.
So, with the older silver halide machines, they don't really print in sRGB space. Technically, they print in many proprietary RGB or conceivably "CMY" spaces that, we know, is limited to that particular type of photo process. The newer dry lab process is not unlike any other good inkjet process and thus, has more gamut for the most part and operators and technicians are computer savvy nowadays. Yay.
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Maybe some history will help here...
Excellent and useful history; a keeper and thanks!
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Maybe some history will help here...
The machines were developed to use color lookup tables more than 20 years ago and before ICC profiles were in general use. They were scanner-based for printing from film, both negatives and positive films and hardcopy Type-C prints. The machines had / have many lookup tables optimized for many film types and many scene types. I don't believe there was much consideration of "sRGB" at the time.
Eventually, it became a bonus that one could bypass the scanner and have a file printed from outside the loop. sRGB was the only prevalent color space and Adobe 1998 was new (and rare.) What else could possibly be used as a base at the time? Same with digital cameras (again rare) at the time and monitors at the time. Many service technicians did not even know that printing from outside the loop was even possible! Most machines were installed in one-hour shops that had no other computer-based imaging, but the larger shops who had IT staff could simply network into the machine and send files. Surprise. When Photoshop 6 arrived with sensible soft proofing things really took off.
Just really smart, outstanding machines, all engineered before Photoshop could use ICC profiles.
So, with the older silver halide machines, they don't really print in sRGB space. Technically, they print in many proprietary RGB or conceivably "CMY" spaces that, we know, is limited to that particular type of photo process. The newer dry lab process is not unlike any other good inkjet process and thus, has more gamut for the most part and operators and technicians are computer savvy nowadays. Yay.
Good analysis. From analyzing a few of the Frontier profiles there is some variation amongst them. It's probably due to machine to machine variance. Printed images, when supplied a straight sRGB image appear to print somewhat like my Canon 9500 II does selecting sRGB and letting the printer manage color. What it prints is "off" from what it prints with a custom profile. Using a profile should provide more consistency not to mention being able to select Intents but just printing the sRGB file directly is vaguely acceptable, especially for those that use no color management at all which is probably 90% or more of people that just buy printers to print their home snapshots. The average dE of my 9500 operated in "Printer manages color" for a wide range of in gamut colors constrained to be in sRGB is about 6 and that is about what the Costco Frontier profiles do as well though the mapping is quite different. The 9500 expands the sRGB gamut where it can and lightens the image as well. The result is oversaturated, especially the greens and not appealing to me but I've used color management so long that these kinds of differences bother me when I print w/o color management.
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A personal experience:
I won a photo book in a contest at a photo event. The book is printed on fuji crystal archive paper and then carefully by hand made into a beautiful hard cover book. This company required that I upload the photos into their website as .jpg at 360dpi and tagged sRGB. (the book company contracts with an outside lab). I asked the book company for the .icc profile used by the lab and they supplied it to me. I used this to soft proof the images in photoshop, but saved the files as sRGB as required.
And... the prints in the book came out as expected. Yes, they might not be the most accurate, but they are accurate enough and the soft proof was a good guide to handling the out of gamut colors and restricting the images to the printer gamut.
So, what I'm saying is that this sRGB process can work well. Yes, there are colors that my Epson can print that this lab can not, but really it's not that big of a deal. The book looks fantastic and very much worth the $200 that I didn't spend myself!!!!
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I can well understand that. The books one gets from Blurb and many other providers are produced on HP Indigo machines or similar and the gamut is not the widest, but many photos don't require huge gamuts or can be squeezed in under softproofing satisfactorily, so the results come back looking OK; and the process you describe for preparing the photos is a good way to go. There is one relatively new machine on the market that I saw demonstrated about a year ago - the Canon DreamLabo 5000; it's an inkjet production printer for making photobooks, etc. and the output is stunning. Unfortunately, this machine is enormous and costs a fortune (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfE5k0wClWA). There are extremely few in operation on the North American continent, so not obvious where to find firms using them, but it's the high-end of the industry and would deserve the best possible "pre-press" colour management of the photos being sent to it.
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Mark,
This link lists a few places with the printer.
https://www.usa.canon.com/internet/portal/us/home/explore/product-showcases/printer-technology/dreamlabo-5000
The specs say it takes image inputs in either sRGB or Adobe RGB.
The 7th one in India was recently installed. Runs a bit over half a million USD.
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Thanks Doug.
Yes - pricing with options goes as high as 700K I think. Needs quite a volume of business to justify that kind of investment.
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I can well understand that. The books one gets from Blurb and many other providers are produced on HP Indigo machines or similar and the gamut is not the widest, but many photos don't require huge gamut...
Keep in mind there are multiple Indigo press technologies, some with extended inks and gamut’s.
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So, what I'm saying is that this sRGB process can work well. Yes, there are colors that my Epson can print that this lab can not, but really it's not that big of a deal. The book looks fantastic and very much worth the $200 that I didn't spend myself!!!!
Yes, not that big of a deal for the greater population and a rather easy and rewarding workflow for most. In a more commercial photography or commercial printing field however, using identifiable stress-test colors such as some Pantone's and corporate colors, etc., the limits of gamut readily become noticeable and then the necessity of good color management is indispensable. Alas, there are still limits.
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Rough data chunks?
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I can well understand that. The books one gets from Blurb and many other providers are produced on HP Indigo machines or similar and the gamut is not the widest, but many photos don't require huge gamuts or can be squeezed in under softproofing satisfactorily, so the results come back looking OK; and the process you describe for preparing the photos is a good way to go. There is one relatively new machine on the market that I saw demonstrated about a year ago - the Canon DreamLabo 5000; it's an inkjet production printer for making photobooks, etc. and the output is stunning. Unfortunately, this machine is enormous and costs a fortune (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfE5k0wClWA). There are extremely few in operation on the North American continent, so not obvious where to find firms using them, but it's the high-end of the industry and would deserve the best possible "pre-press" colour management of the photos being sent to it.
The company that made my book uses the fuji photographic paper process as they fold the sheets in half to make the book. In this way one can, sort of, successfully span the fold with a photo that takes up facing pages. And the facing pages lay flat to the viewer. I don't think inkjet papers would survive the fold so well without extensive cracking. The RC photo paper seems to do quite well with this. I had just wished that the lab that they used also provided the true monochrome papers for b&w, but alas, only color prints of the b&w. They look ok, but the color changes quite a bit with the viewing lightsource...
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NO, don't do that. Pointless and only useful to clip colors you possibly produced and can output (but maybe NOT see on-screen).
See:
The benefits of wide gamut working spaces on printed output:
This three part, 32 minute video covers why a wide gamut RGB working space like ProPhoto RGB can produce superior quality output to print.
Thank you, Andrew. The video was highly useful for me. I highly recommend that anyone doing color management and softproofing view all three parts. The presentation is meticulous in approach, with surprisingly good examples. I was surprised that after at least 18 years of my using color management techniques on my prints that I still would have missed some of the not-so-subtle differences in color rendition that you pointed out.
Nowadays it is rare to have a person who is not only knowledgeable but able to present the material in such a clear fashion.
How about running for president? ;)
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Rough data chunks?
I looked at the gamut taking slices through L*. It has some unusual shapes but nothing that suggests anything significantly wrong with it. The printer is relatively wide gamut and assigning the profile to an sRGB image will fail badly but processing it in accord with DryCreek's instructions should work fine and you get a large gamut.
Examining the profile, it has larger 3DLUT sizes (37 grid points - same as high quality I1P) than most of the Costco profiles and was likely made with a large patch set though spectral data isn't included in the profile.
What I find completely mind boggling is that the ink set is four CYMK but, rather than LM and LC it has "pink" and "Sky Blue." This could be harder to smoothly combine than traditional ink sets. I'm guessing this has to do with getting longer print runs out of ink because mixing a bit of pink with sky blue could cover a lot of the sky areas that are common in retail photos. Most unusual.
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I highly recommend that anyone doing color management and softproofing view all three parts. The presentation is meticulous in approach, with surprisingly good examples.
Yep. Best color management videos on the web. I've said this before and it remains true today. And I'm a nitpicker.
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This might be of interest. To get an idea how close the different printers were to sRGB skipping the profile conversion for in gamut colors I picked 6 profiles randomly from the DryCreek database which are all close enough to sRGB that most non-picky consumers wouldn't notice unless they had prints made in different places and looked at them side by side. Even then, most aren't far off.
Norit-CA-Yucaipa-SwansonPhoto-Gloss_09-11-03.icc
Costco-CA-Alhambra-Photo Satin: 12-Feb-2018
Costco-CA-Carlsbad-Gls (Noritsu 3411): 04-Apr-2016
Costco-CA-Danville-Gls (Noritsu 3411): 19-Oct-2015
Fuji_Frontier5-sRGB_CA-HD_V3a
Isgo-Fuji-390-Lustre.icc
Assuming these profiles accurately describe their machines, I created "soft proof" images of the prints based on processing them straight as sRGB. This would be the same as tagging them with the printer profile and soft proofing in Photoshop using "Preserve Color Numbers." The image used was a standard KodakPhotoDisc in sRGB These were then converted colorimetrically to AdobeRGB. This was done because some of the printed colors are expanded and go outside sRGB and I didn't want to clip them.
The images are arranged on layers in a Tiff file so you can load it in Photoshop and see the differences that would occur from prints with each printer by just selecting the highest layer. The base layer is the original.
It's attached as a zip file.
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Rough data chunks?
What color space did that Fuji Frontier print the color patches to build the profile? Was it "Printer Space" or "sRGB"?
This needs to be known if that profile is to be useful for soft proofing. And the Costco printer interface software is different than the Fuji Frontier DLxxx at say another Costco or a Walmart or Walgreens. A photo lab tech at Walgreens couldn't find the tabbed interface to locate selecting one or the other space. I had to get the store manager to find it and set it and her husband ran the local one hour photo now out of business.
And Walmart's photo lab tech said he couldn't find it either and he was moonlighting at Walmart to his primary job as a radiologist at our local hospital.
This not being able to choose the space the profile was built from may be what the OP is experiencing when he said the PRINT looked horrible...
While I did this with two files last week, and they were printed by Costco and came out fine after specifying "No Automatic Corrections," or whatever the actual term is, I repeated what I thought was the same procedure this week, with horrible results, looking way oversaturated and as if I somehow had double profiled them.
The question is, if I softproof an image in LR using the Costco profile, and adjust it to best resemble the original, and then convert the image to the Costco profile, is this actually causing a problem such as double profiling?
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What color space did that Fuji Frontier print the color patches to build the profile? Was it "Printer Space" or "sRGB"?.
Fuji Frontier RGB color space. Download a profile, you'll see this fact! It WAS NOT sRGB. Or perhaps you can explain how neutering the color space to that and producing a profile could result in a LARGER color gamut. You can't as the question illustrates you need to study a bit more how profiles that define color spaces are created.
This needs to be known if that profile is to be useful for soft proofing.
That's wrong too.
And Walmart's photo lab tech said he couldn't find it either and he was moonlighting at Walmart to his primary job as a radiologist at our local hospital.
Better I guess than someone moonlighting as a poster here discussing color incorrectly (again).
This not being able to choose the space the profile was built from may be what the OP is experiencing when he said the PRINT looked horrible...
Nope:
“There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.”
― Søren Kierkegaard (http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6172.S_ren_Kierkegaard)
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What color space did that Fuji Frontier print the color patches to build the profile? Was it "Printer Space" or "sRGB"? This needs to be known if that profile is to be useful for soft proofing.
Actually, either one is just as useful as the other providing the production file(s) is imaged the same way as the targets. No?
This not being able to choose the space the profile was built from may be what the OP is experiencing when he said the PRINT looked horrible...
Tim, reference Reply #2 post by the OP and maybe my post #54. The OP did not say the print looked horrible. He never had a print made. He was referring to the preview looked horrible.
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“There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.”
― Søren Kierkegaard (http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6172.S_ren_Kierkegaard)
This is a classic! So true in all walks of life.
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What color space did that Fuji Frontier print the color patches to build the profile? Was it "Printer Space" or "sRGB"?
This needs to be known if that profile is to be useful for soft proofing. And the Costco printer interface software is different than the Fuji Frontier DLxxx at say another Costco or a Walmart or Walgreens. A photo lab tech at Walgreens couldn't find the tabbed interface to locate selecting one or the other space. I had to get the store manager to find it and set it and her husband ran the local one hour photo now out of business.
And Walmart's photo lab tech said he couldn't find it either and he was moonlighting at Walmart to his primary job as a radiologist at our local hospital.
This not being able to choose the space the profile was built from may be what the OP is experiencing when he said the PRINT looked horrible...
Tim, there are several problems with this advice.
Firstly, on building profiles: let's go back to what a profile is supposed to do. It's main task is to characterize how a printer lays down colours in response to the patch values sent to the printer. It needs to do that without the distorting interference of any application managed colour (i.e. only the printer's own colour rendition matters without the original colour data being bent or limited by sRGB, aRGB or whatever). That is why we have applications that send unmanaged data to the printer. The operating system's colour management module needs this printer characterization data for doing the math that will send the printer the colour values needed to get the expected results from it. This is a shorthand way of saying a lot that you can further unpack by reading a book such as Fraser/Murphy/Bunting "Real World Color Management", or Andrew Rodney's "Color Management for Photographers" - both excellent resources.
Secondly, on consistency between machines and labs: the whole point of ICC colour management is to achieve inter-device consistency of results. If the profiles are built correctly as suggested just above and the kind of paper being used is the same or very close (especially as between gloss and matte), if you use the profile bespoke to each printer and the printers are maintained to spec, the outcomes should match pretty closely whatever the location of the lab, the name of the company or the location of the outlet doing the printing.
If you are trying to suggest that some of these photo printing departments aren't profiling their equipment properly or maintaining their equipment to do those two things above mentioned, you have a point - it is a possibility. But I think not necessarily the first place I would go looking for causes of the problems being discussed here, because on the whole, these companies do have adequate colour management resources and advice at their disposal - they need to in order to keep the customers happy, as the customers do not need to be imaging experts to know that blue skies should be blue and green grass green. Most memory colours, especially skin tones and the like, are well known to most people and it's easy to tell whether the prints are in the ball-park. They won't be masterpieces of printing accuracy, but I've been very favourably impressed with the quality of what a Costco photo printing department can produce, on more than one occasion. So I think the causes of the issues here are elsewhere.
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Tim, there are several problems with this advice.
+1
I'll attempt to make this even easier for Tim to grasp.
We have three 'pure' color numbers (computers know only numbers) that represent red, green and blue: R255/G0/B0, R0/G255/B0 and lastly R0/G0/B255. There is NO color space, just three triplets of numbers. Three color patches are output on any printer. Each is measured and we end up with three Lab values (again numbers but numbers that define colors in a color space based on how the standard observer is said to see color). Until the numbers are output and measured, there is no color space. Just device values.
The numbers may represent sRGB if and when the output device can create sRGB. NO printer can do so nor does so. Some emissive devices may. We know this when we measure such devices and the measurements confirm that indeed, the numbers (along with other attributes of numbers like a gamma encoding or TRC, a white point) are specified.
What color space did that Fuji Frontier print the color patches to build the profile? Was it "Printer Space" or "sRGB"?
Understand now how the question leads others to suggest you buy Fraser and Murphy's book, read it then ask questions rather than try to answer them first?
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Tim, there are several problems with this advice.
If you are trying to suggest that some of these photo printing departments aren't profiling their equipment properly or maintaining their equipment to do those two things above mentioned, you have a point - it is a possibility. But I think not necessarily the first place I would go looking for causes of the problems being discussed here, because on the whole, these companies do have adequate colour management resources and advice at their disposal - they need to in order to keep the customers happy, as the customers do not need to be imaging experts to know that blue skies should be blue and green grass green. Most memory colours, especially skin tones and the like, are well known to most people and it's easy to tell whether the prints are in the ball-park. They won't be masterpieces of printing accuracy, but I've been very favourably impressed with the quality of what a Costco photo printing department can produce, on more than one occasion. So I think the causes of the issues here are elsewhere.
Didn't say that. I'll repeat for emphasis.
I know for a fact there are two settings set within the driver interface of Fuji Frontier dry lab inkjet printers THAT ARE USED AT THESE BIG BOX STORES including Walgreens and Walmart. Don't know about Costco. And I'm going to have to assume from what I've seen of these two printer driver interfaces at these stores, the differences may also be influenced by their Fuji model DLxxx. Walmart's driver is set in sRGB and the photo lab techs can't change it.
The Walgreen's tech can switch to "Printer Space" or "sRGB" space within the driver tabbed menu (very different driver interface from Walmart's). I did a print test printing an sRGB encoded image in both spaces (having the Walgreens manager set it while I watched her select each in the Fuji driver interface) and the level of saturation between the two prints was VERY PRONOUNCED meaning "Printer Space" has a much larger gamut than "sRGB". The European ICC printer profile whose gamut size is shown in the Colorsync Utility screengrab I had to convert the sRGB image to and print in "Printer Space" fixed the saturation issue.
Because these Fuji dry lab printers have varying gamut shapes according to old vs newer models (newer ones having a much larger gamut) it could be that a Costco photo lab tech may have created a profile by choosing one or the other color spaces and didn't choose the correct color space that the profile was built from.
The OP needs to clarify whether his HORRIBLE RESULTS was from the print or in a Lightroom soft proof using the Costco profile.
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The Walgreen's tech can switch to "Printer Space" or "sRGB" space within the driver tabbed menu (very different driver interface from Walmart's).
Still confused it appears. The printer cannot produce sRGB; impossible. The printer can assume files FOR OUTPUT are in sRGB. The printer, depending on the front end can be fully color managed and accept something other than sRGB. The printer can convert from sRGB to an output color space or from something other than sRGB to the output color space. The output color space absolutely is not sRGB! You don't appear to understand the fundamental basics of color management; the difference between an input color space and an output color space. Or what the tech was actually doing. Hopefully Stephen can attempt to set you straight if possible; Mark and I have not been at all successful. Which isn't surprising but a bit sad. :-[
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The OP needs to clarify whether his HORRIBLE RESULTS was from the print or in a Lightroom soft proof using the Costco profile.
Only for those who are not paying attention! He wrote: I just uploaded the file to my wife's "album" and clicked on the image to view it. It was horrible.
IF you believe this to imply it's the print, it is based on truthful hyperbole, massive assumptions and a lack of reading multiple posts here to be kind.
Stephen pointed this out many posts (#55) ago but you apparently missed the facts provided again: " It was horrible." Yes, because you're looking at an untagged file or the viewing software is not color managed.
"You must stick to your conviction, but be ready to abandon your assumptions". -Denis Waitley
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In further reply to Mark this 2013 Photo.net thread I started concerning what the Fuji Frontier's color spaces do to sRGB data will show the saturation differences and how it will affect an ICC profile build...
https://www.photo.net/discuss/threads/how-are-you-all-liking-your-local-1-hour-photo-fuji-frontier-dry-labs.482851/
And here's the two prints I just shot for those who may have trouble with the PN page.
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I don't understand what this is meant to show, because neither sRGB nor "printer space" are output device profiles. As far as I know, these printers should need a properly created output device profile to render the colours correctly, assuming the upstream colour management is set right.
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I don't understand what this is meant to show....
That makes at least two of us.
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The Walgreen's tech can switch to "Printer Space" or "sRGB" space within the driver tabbed menu (very different driver interface from Walmart's). I did a print test printing an sRGB encoded image in both spaces (having the Walgreens manager set it while I watched her select each in the Fuji driver interface) and the level of saturation between the two prints was VERY PRONOUNCED meaning "Printer Space" has a much larger gamut than "sRGB". The European ICC printer profile whose gamut size is shown in the Colorsync Utility screengrab I had to convert the sRGB image to and print in "Printer Space" fixed the saturation issue.
Hi Tim,
The conditions you have described are very obvious to me and I hope I can explain what you have experienced.
The "Printer Space," (as you've designated it) does not have a wider gamut. What you are seeing is just balls-deep color; a print with no control other than basic exposure and who knows if it was too light or too dark or neutral. Did you include a gray scale in that particular file? If the situation would be compared to an inkjet as an analogy, the print had no ink restrictions, the most basic of calibration (exposure in this case), no ink limits and, as you already know, no ICC output profile. It was the setting that would be used in order to print color targets from which to produce an ICC profile.
The "sRGB Space" print utilized the machine's color lookup tables to make a good print. It's smart that way.
If you actually had imaged a test file with somewhat large, discrete patches of known colors, you would see both color spaces of the machine reach the same color gamut. One no more than the other. You just could not differentiate saturated colors at the time of your study because they were crowded together. A good ICC profile will separate and smooth those clustered colors and even neutralize what should be grays.
I hope this helps. It's clear to me what you have encountered.
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Hi Tim,
The conditions you have described are very obvious to me and I hope I can explain what you have experienced.
The "Printer Space," (as you've designated it) does not have a wider gamut. What you are seeing is just balls-deep color;
How do you know that? Have you operated and profiled that particular model of Fuji Frontier DL printer? Why would a printer manufacturer offer a a color space selection that's useless? If it's not useless, what's its purpose?
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I don't understand what this is meant to show, because neither sRGB nor "printer space" are output device profiles. As far as I know, these printers should need a properly created output device profile to render the colours correctly, assuming the upstream colour management is set right.
Where did I say "printer space" and sRGB are device profiles? I said it is a state to put the printer into to print a color target to build a profile from.
You're referring to optimized state of color rendering. Clearly "Printer Space" or "PD" setting on the Fuji Frontier is a setting that is used for something. I didn't say it was a profile.
Mark, do you have any idea what is the function of "Printer Space" or "PD" setting on a Fuji Frontier Dry Lab printer?
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Why would a printer manufacturer offer a a color space selection that's useless? If it's not useless, what's its purpose?
It's the calibration mode, Man.
I just looked at your image attachment. I would say the machine is perfectly calibrated, unlike so many other machines. Perform the same exercise on your inkjet and then upload the attachment.
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It's the calibration mode, Man.
I just looked at your image attachment. I would say the machine is perfectly calibrated, unlike so many other machines. Perform the same exercise on your inkjet and then upload the attachment.
I already knew it was the calibration mode, but obviously your previous statement wasn't referenced from actually looking at the print depicting the two states the printer can be set at.
Now you know "Printer Space" has a purpose and if you read my entire posts you would've read that the European ICC profile was built from that printer setting. But if you're not going to read what I said, you really aren't giving helpful info.
The Dry Creek Photo profiles were built from the sRGB setting. That compared to the European icc profile are quite different from each other.
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Tim's image attachment from his post #79 is very good example of a machine that is actually calibrated to a known metric, a common gray scale, familiar to photographers. It may surprise many that a vast amount of image printers do not understand the necessity of the tool.
From Tim's upload, I can see the machine is balanced. The "Printer Space" (no ICC color management) gray scale is the same as the other "sRGB" space. In other words, the sRGB space does not need to correct for a color cast or density.
In so many other machines and workflows I encounter, I first print a control image without color management to see the state of calibration to known elements of the control. If all is good as far as density, neutrality, gradation and mechanics of the machine, I know the ICC profile has that much less to fix and then the profile can simply concentrate on optimization. On the other hand, I have seen many machines with gross problems of many sorts and it's amazing what an ICC profile can fix, such as heavy nozzle deflections contaminating the image but the ICC can neutralize the color.
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But if you're not going to read what I said, you really aren't giving helpful info.
Tim, have you learned the two color spaces have the same gamut?
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Tim, have you learned the two color spaces have the same gamut?
Learning isn’t a flower that grows in everyone garden.
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And just to make my point more clear here's what assigning to sRGB data a FujiDL profile built from the sRGB printer setting renders color vs assigning the European ICC profile built from the "PD" or "Printer Space" setting.
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And just to make my point more clear
Would you please put your point into a sentence, Tim?
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Topic hijacked at post #35... :(
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Would you please put your point into a sentence, Tim?
OK...You're not helping! How's that?
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I'm involved in a project of some extreme colors for reproduction using the machines mentioned. My searches found this thread. I made these photographs this morning after breakfast. Some of the profiles I find online concern me.
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I'm involved in a project of some extreme colors for reproduction using the machines mentioned. My searches found this thread. I made these photographs this morning after breakfast. Some of the profiles I find online concern me.
Yeah. They depend on the stability of the machine process and how much change has occurred since the profile was made. Quite apart from some profiles looking like they may not be well formed.
I just refined my profile target for the 9800. I make a profile then cross check it with independent colors printed in 16 bit tiffs using ProPhoto. The approach most use is to just run Abs. Col. on the target RGB values and compare against the scanned LAB values. That greatly overstates accuracy because it depends only on the A2B1 tables which are the most precise. It's a tough nut but I've finally come up with a target that produces excellent results in both the neutrals and the rest of the gamut. Neutrals come in at ave dE00 of .33 and colors: ave dE .27. dE00 is more sensitive than dE76 on the neutrals but much less sensitive as the patches' chroma increases. The 9800 has a couple sharp gradient changes in L* and abrupt shifts on a* and b* as well. That extra page of near neutrals helped quite a bit.
It's been quite hard to get the neutrals below .5
I wound up with a target made out of the original, default single page of 957 iSiS patches. Then added 1914 (two more pages) made out of I1Profiler's optimization process. Then I added another 957 patch page of neutrals and near neutrals with 3x redundancy on the near neutrals. The near neutrals had RGB intervals that matched the 37 point I1P grid which I speculate should provide somewhat better accuracy in the A2B1 tables which have evenly spaced RGB points.
This provides a good, 4 page, target set for my 9800. At least on glossy type media.
The general rule of thumb is an average dE76 of 2.5 in a complex image is roughly at the "perceptible" point. It's a lot lower for certain images though and I'm mostly curious just to find out what is possible.
Oh, and the other thing I do is scan the pages both forward and backwards. I make targets with reference bars on the bottom as well as the top to enable this with the iSiS. Averaging these provides significant improvements over just re-reading them in the same direction. Quite a bit more than I anticipated. I have some theories as to why based on some other tests to determine the effective scan area within a patch. That's another topic though.
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I'm involved in a project of some extreme colors for reproduction using the machines mentioned. My searches found this thread. I made these photographs this morning after breakfast. Some of the profiles I find online concern me.
Check out the profiles on this Fuji Color Management page: https://www.fujifilm.eu/eu/support/photofinishing/color-management
The PD/No Convert is the one shown above but I don't know why they would say not to convert because the file will go very saturated if you send it in sRGB. Maybe convert the file to AdobeRGB and test.
Any Pantone color such as the safety yellow you posted that is that high in luminance is going to go dark no matter what custom profile you use but at least a custom one will retain the greenish hue or allow an edit during soft proof in a larger gamut working space to override the reddish shift.
You'll need to find a Frontier that has the PD setting and convert to that printer profile or maybe convert to AdobeRGB and cross your fingers.
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OK...You're not helping! How's that?
Pot calling the kettle black!
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Guys, this conversation is disintegrating. Why not check back to the beginning of the thread and see whether the O/P's initial problem has been addressed and if so, move on; if not, revert to a technical probe of his particular issue.
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Guys, this conversation is disintegrating. Why not check back to the beginning of the thread and see whether the O/P's initial problem has been addressed and if so, move on; if not, revert to a technical probe of his particular issue.
The OP doesn't seem to be engaged in his own thread or even interested in offering specifics and answering questions on where he sees "horrible results" in the print or soft proof preview.
What I've posted is more relevant to the OP's issue concerning Fuji Frontier Dry Lab printers, but the OP doesn't even acknowledge what printer Costco is using.
Hey Walter! How about some feedback here for all those that tried to help you?
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The OP doesn't seem to be engaged in his own thread or even interested in offering specifics and answering questions on where he sees "horrible results" in the print or soft proof preview.
Probably because Ray answered this correctly way back in post #55 (45 posts ago) which was shown again (post #79) to you and which you again ignored. The OP is pretty smart to avoid the later nonsense posted by at least one person here who believes printers print in sRGB, believe that the OP was referring to the print and not the preview (obvious to some here) etc. Why the rest of us are engaged in the hijacking of the thread is questionable but it goes to the heart of this question: what do we own people who are wrong? Repeatedly I would add?
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Andrew, what printer is the OP using at Costco? Can you provide the post number where this is stated by the OP? I couldn't find it in this thread. Also can you confirm if the OP sees horrible results in the print or in the soft proof?
I couldn't find it stated by the OP.
Not interested in third party speculation.
The OP only states Fuji Frontier but doesn't indicate whether it's a Dry Lab or old silver halide printer.
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Not interested in third party speculation.
Then stop posting sir.
The unnecessary questions you ask have answers provided more than once. That you can't find them, even after it was pointed out to you multiple times indicates you're not paying attention and I can't help you with that issue.
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Then stop posting sir.
The unnecessary questions you ask have answers provided more than once. That you can't find them, even after it was pointed out to you multiple times indicates you're not paying attention and I can't help you with that issue.
No, they have not been answered or else I wouldn't have asked. But I can see you're not going to help as usual.
I've given valid information that is relevant to this topic that is based on what I seen happen with Fuji Frontier Dry Labs and not on theory or speculation. But I'ld still like to know why Fuji would implement such a lame approach to Color Management and not provide any data on how to use it.
That info (and lack there of) on that European Fuji site is clearly meant for photo lab operators who may have to know about the inner workings of the Frontier software to know how to use those profiles. That site is clearly not for photography hobbyists. But I did my best to test it on a Walgreens Fuji DL. Walgreens got rid of their Dry Lab and went dye sub. Color looks like it's render from a VHS video feed.
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No, they have not been answered or else I wouldn't have asked.
They haven't been answered to your understanding, that's clear. Not speaking for Mark, speaking for myself and Stephen Ray who answered the question (unlike you did for him), most of us here understand the OP's issue and fix. If you must dig yourself into a rabbit hole, do so yourself sir.
I've given valid information that is relevant to this topic that is based on what I seen happen with Fuji Frontier Dry Labs and not on theory or speculation.
I believe only you think it's valid. If you would read the replies to your posts, you might see that too (including some good info from Doug).
Would your time not be better served working on your 'photography'? Or reading the book(s) on color management, the fundamentals two of us here suggested you work on?
Enough said.
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Andrew, what printer is the OP using at Costco? Can you provide the post number where this is stated by the OP? I couldn't find it in this thread. Also can you confirm if the OP sees horrible results in the print or in the soft proof?
I couldn't find it stated by the OP.
Not interested in third party speculation.
The OP only states Fuji Frontier but doesn't indicate whether it's a Dry Lab or old silver halide printer.
I asked for that as well and the OP didn't respond with the info. His initial post implies a difference between printed images but it turned out the second image wasn't printed but just viewed, presumably in the wife's Costco account. Here's the clarification he posted:
Fortunately, I didn't have them print it. I just uploaded the file to my wife's "album" and clicked on the image to view it. It was horrible. I checked her account preferences, and she has set as a default "Auto Correct Off." I opened the same file in LR and it was garish, although it did look a lot more reasonable when I checked the Softproof box again.
In a subsequent post he said he was going to have Costco print it and see what happens. No update about that since.
One of the very few actual uses of "Preserve Color Numbers" in Photoshop's view proof dialog applies here. The proper way to do a view proof of a file AFTER it has been converted to a printer's colorspace is using this and selecting the same printer colorspace the image is in. It's possible Lightroom does this automatically when loading such an image. I haven't explored that but Photoshop does not though it shouldn't be hugely off.
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Here's the clarification he posted:
Hopefully 4th time's the charm for Tim to grasp that fact. Meaning that exact text has been posted four times Tim!
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Probably because Ray answered this correctly way back in post #55 (45 posts ago) which was shown again (post #79) to you and which you again ignored. The OP is pretty smart to avoid the later nonsense posted by at least one person here who believes printers print in sRGB, believe that the OP was referring to the print and not the preview (obvious to some here) etc. Why the rest of us are engaged in the hijacking of the thread is questionable but it goes to the heart of this question: what do we own people who are wrong? Repeatedly I would add?
Thank you, Andrew. I have been reading the responses with interest, but yes, I received the information I had been asking for and was able to submit properly processed and profiled images, with prints that came back the way I had hoped for. I don't mind the thread being "hijacked," as I found all of the subsequent discussion more or less related to the topic and interesting, if sometimes amusing. I also don't know whether the Fuji Frontier was a newer or older model, and it would not have made any difference to me as long as I had downloaded the latest profile and used it properly.
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Thank you, Andrew. I have been reading the responses with interest, but yes, I received the information I had been asking for and was able to submit properly processed and profiled images, with prints that came back the way I had hoped for. .........
Walter - this whole discussion got so tangled-up - could you briefly review with us what you did differently as a result of various suggestions here that solved the problem for you?
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Thank you, Andrew. I have been reading the responses with interest, but yes, I received the information I had been asking for and was able to submit properly processed and profiled images, with prints that came back the way I had hoped for. I don't mind the thread being "hijacked," as I found all of the subsequent discussion more or less related to the topic and interesting, if sometimes amusing.
Good deal.
As per hijack, mostly text that's colorimetrically wrong but heck, there were plenty of well provided and sound rebuttals from multiple posters to dismiss them. ;)
Over and out....
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Walter - this whole discussion got so tangled-up - could you briefly review with us what you did differently as a result of various suggestions here that solved the problem for you?
I am still not sure just what it was that I did wrong, except that I had reduced the files to 8-bit, softproofed in LR with one intent but forgot to check what the intent was in PS when I converted to the Costco profile. At any rate, what worked now was: Process the files in LR and PS at 16-bit in Prophoto, softproof in LR at 16-bit in Prophoto using the Costco profile, usually with Relative Colorimetric and Simulate Paper Color checked, sending the softproofed and adjusted file back to PS, where I converted the profile to the Costco one using the same intent as I had in the softproofing, and then converting to 8-bit Tiffs as mentioned on the Dry Creek website.
Yes, when I viewed these correctly processed files on the Costco website they were a bit garish because, I suspect, they were not being viewed in a color-managed environment. Viewing the Costco-made prints in my Just-Normlicht viewer, they compared very favorably to the files viewed in LR with the softproof checked, on my old NEC 3090 monitor.
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Thanks Walter - all sounds right and as to be expected. Glad for you that it's resolved.
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Yes, when I viewed these correctly processed files on the Costco website they were a bit garish because, I suspect, they were not being viewed in a color-managed environment. Viewing the Costco-made prints in my Just-Normlicht viewer, they compared very favorably to the files viewed in LR with the softproof checked, on my old NEC 3090 monitor.
Note "correctly processed." For the file to have displayed correctly you would have to embed the Costco printer ICC profile in your upload IF Costco's web software and / or your browser is color managed to interpret the colors from the printer space back to sRGB for browsers.
(I have not yet read Dry Creek methods but I hope to do so soon.)
However, seems all is well. Thanks for getting back to us!
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I am still not sure just what it was that I did wrong, except that I had reduced the files to 8-bit, softproofed in LR with one intent but forgot to check what the intent was in PS when I converted to the Costco profile. At any rate, what worked now was: Process the files in LR and PS at 16-bit in Prophoto, softproof in LR at 16-bit in Prophoto using the Costco profile, usually with Relative Colorimetric and Simulate Paper Color checked, sending the softproofed and adjusted file back to PS, where I converted the profile to the Costco one using the same intent as I had in the softproofing, and then converting to 8-bit Tiffs as mentioned on the Dry Creek website.
Yes, when I viewed these correctly processed files on the Costco website they were a bit garish because, I suspect, they were not being viewed in a color-managed environment. Viewing the Costco-made prints in my Just-Normlicht viewer, they compared very favorably to the files viewed in LR with the softproof checked, on my old NEC 3090 monitor.
So this whole thread was started over the OP "Correctly Processing" a file to print on a Costco printer and then speculating why it looked "garish" on a Costco photo account website.
Clearly Walter knows quite a lot about color management processes, but I'm having a hard time understanding why he didn't mention his suspicions about web generated previews.
Thanks to Mark for asking Walter to report back with specifics.
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Note "correctly processed." For the file to have displayed correctly you would have to embed the Costco printer ICC profile in your upload IF Costco's web software and / or your browser is color managed to interpret the colors from the printer space back to sRGB for browsers.
(I have not yet read Dry Creek methods but I hope to do so soon.)
However, seems all is well. Thanks for getting back to us!
While a color managed application will likely show a printer profile tagged file reasonably well, it also may not. The best way to view what a printer tagged print will print is to use the view proof menu in Photoshop. Select the printer profile and "Preserve Color Numbers," then select show paper color and/or show paper blacks. This always correctly displays what the prints should look like and is the same as doing the usual soft proof from a standard RGB space in Photoshop prior to conversion. It also works if the converted file is converted but untagged.
Here's the DryCreek page describing how to use their profiles for printing.
https://www.drycreekphoto.com/icc/using_printer_profiles.htm
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So this whole thread was started over the OP "Correctly Processing" a file to print on a Costco printer and then speculating why it looked "garish" on a Costco photo account website.
Well had you read all four comments specifically stating this, you wouldn't have to ask (again)!
Clearly Walter knows quite a lot about color management processes, but I'm having a hard time understanding why he didn't mention his suspicions about web generated previews.
Yes, he does know, and yes, you are having a hard time understanding. Fortunately three of us didn't. That an image doesn't appear correctly on a web page isn't anything experienced users of color management find at all difficult to fathom. Maybe this will help you assuming viewing video isn't as difficult as reading FOUR copied and pasted sets of text that for three of us, clearly expressed his issue:
sRGB urban legend & myths Part 2
In this 17 minute video, I'll discuss some more sRGB misinformation and cover:
When to use sRGB and what to expect on the web and mobile devices
How sRGB doesn't insure a visual match without color management, how to check
The downsides of an all sRGB workflow
sRGB's color gamut vs. "professional" output devices
The future of sRGB and wide gamut display technology
Photo print labs that demand sRGB for output
High resolution: http://digitaldog.net/files/sRGBMythsPart2.mp4 (http://digitaldog.net/files/sRGBMythsPart2.mp4)
Low resolution on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyvVUL1gWVs (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyvVUL1gWVs)
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Has anyone ever come across a big box store printer such as the Costco mentioned in this thread where the photo lab printer driver actually needed the final image tagged with the appropriate profile where the printer driver uses it to make the conversion or honor the color space to insure a print match much like photo hobbyists and pro's do at home where Photoshop manages colors?
The reason I ask is because in all this confusion in discussion such as this I keep seeing recommendations to tag the image but I don't know for what purpose other than I'm assuming so the Photo Lab tech can view it on their assumed calibrated/profiled display.
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Has anyone ever come across a big box store printer such as the Costco mentioned in this thread where the photo lab printer driver actually needed the final image tagged with the appropriate profile where the printer driver uses it to make the conversion or honor the color space to insure a print match much like photo hobbyists and pro's do at home where Photoshop manages colors?
The reason I ask is because in all this confusion in discussion such as this I keep seeing recommendations to tag the image but I don't know for what purpose other than I'm assuming so the Photo Lab tech can view it on their assumed calibrated/profiled display.
Before asking, going OT once again, just RTFM!
https://www.drycreekphoto.com/icc/using_printer_profiles.htm (https://www.drycreekphoto.com/icc/using_printer_profiles.htm)
Using Printer Profiles with Digital Labs
#17, bullet 3 to focus your attention on the facts from yet another very knowledgeable color management individual!
“Smart people learn from their mistakes. But the real sharp ones learn from the mistakes of others.” ― Brandon Mull, Fablehaven
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Has anyone ever come across a big box store printer such as the Costco mentioned in this thread where the photo lab printer driver actually needed the final image tagged with the appropriate profile where the printer driver uses it to make the conversion or honor the color space to insure a print match much like photo hobbyists and pro's do at home where Photoshop manages colors?
The reason I ask is because in all this confusion in discussion such as this I keep seeing recommendations to tag the image but I don't know for what purpose other than I'm assuming so the Photo Lab tech can view it on their assumed calibrated/profiled display.
Tagging the image is optional and makes the file larger. Since the file is already converted to the RGB values needed for printing it is not used by the printing process. It's main value is that color managed programs like Photoshop can interpret those RGB values and inverse convert them for display purposes. If it's not tagged it will depend on the options selected as to how it interprets the image and results are unpredictable. Even if tagged, it may automatically convert back is some arbitrary manner. Photoshop. for instance, will do a Colorimetric inversion but with BPC selected. This isn't awful but the best way is to use the soft proof mechanism I described a few posts ago and select Show Blacks. Show paper white can be useful if the paper has a lot of OBAs and one will be viewing it outdoors or with window light. This also works fine even if the image is untagged or arbitrarily assigned a working space when loaded. "Preserve Color Numbers" tells Photoshop to use the RGB values only for soft proofing and skip conversions which would occur with normal soft proofing.
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Tagging the image is optional and makes the file larger. Since the file is already converted to the RGB values needed for printing it is not used by the printing process. It's main value is that color managed programs like Photoshop can interpret those RGB values and inverse convert them for display purposes. If it's not tagged it will depend on the options selected as to how it interprets the image and results are unpredictable. Even if tagged, it may automatically convert back is some arbitrary manner. Photoshop. for instance, will do a Colorimetric inversion but with BPC selected. This isn't awful but the best way is to use the soft proof mechanism I described a few posts ago and select Show Blacks. Show paper white can be useful if the paper has a lot of OBAs and one will be viewing it outdoors or with window light. This also works fine even if the image is untagged or arbitrarily assigned a working space when loaded. "Preserve Color Numbers" tells Photoshop to use the RGB values only for soft proofing and skip conversions which would occur with normal soft proofing.
That didn't answer my question, Doug. I asked if you or anyone reading here has come across a big box store printer where they required the final image to be printed be tagged with the appropriate profile? And was told why it needed to be tagged whether for the photo lab tech's use and or printer driver conversion.
No point mentioning Photoshop since I haven't seen any big box store printer have Photoshop on their system.
I'm wondering if there's been an advancement in newer big box store printers where they are clearly able to implement some color managed workflow.
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There you go Doug; a lot of useful info ignored. This push back reminds me of a good movie quote:
"What is your major malfunction, numbnuts? Didn't Mommy and Daddy show you enough attention when you were a child?"
-Gunnery Sergeant Hartman, Full Metal Jacket (1987)
Since the OP has gotten an answer to his question and all is well with him, maybe he'll lock the thread and save us all a lot of time.... ;)
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That didn't answer my question, Doug. I asked if you or anyone reading here has come across a big box store printer where they required the final image to be printed be tagged with the appropriate profile? And was told why it needed to be tagged whether for the photo lab tech's use and or printer driver conversion.
It's entire possible some ill informed person at such as store would require converted, tagged image files. So the question is along the lines of "Are there fools at stores with incorrect knowledge?" It makes no sense. The RGB values in the file are what gets printed. No conversion using the profile is done. The Profile is ignored.
No point mentioning Photoshop since I haven't seen any big box store printer have Photoshop on their system.
Of course not. Read what I wrote. Photoshop provides a way to soft proof a converted image, tagged or untagged, in printer space. It's not used by the printer.
I'm wondering if there's been an advancement in newer big box store printers where they are clearly able to implement some color managed workflow.
Sure, some do internally. The half million dollar ginormous printer Mark mentioned earlier has specs that say they take images in either sRGB or Adobe RGB. Implicit is that they do some color management since there's a pretty big difference between the two. No idea if they have a wider gamut "native" space option. Have to go to the operating manual to find out.
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The RGB values in the file are what gets printed. No conversion using the profile is done.
Exactly and the bottom line! The profile only provides a scale of the existing numbers for a preview or another conversion which isn't necessary as the image IS in an output color space (CMS 101).
Maybe we can start a 'go fund me', fund, get an address and send someone this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Color-Management-Digital-Photographers-Dummies/dp/0470048921/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1522179932&sr=1-1&keywords=color+management+for+dummies (https://www.amazon.com/Color-Management-Digital-Photographers-Dummies/dp/0470048921/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1522179932&sr=1-1&keywords=color+management+for+dummies)
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Thank you, Doug.
You answered my question.
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...............
Maybe we can start a 'go fund me', fund, get an address and send someone this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Color-Management-Digital-Photographers-Dummies/dp/0470048921/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1522179932&sr=1-1&keywords=color+management+for+dummies (https://www.amazon.com/Color-Management-Digital-Photographers-Dummies/dp/0470048921/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1522179932&sr=1-1&keywords=color+management+for+dummies)
Wow - I never knew there was such a book. I clicked the link and got the description alright, along with a notice saying "This item does not ship to Toronto Canada". I guess they know there are no Dummies in Toronto when it comes to colour management - or to the contrary, the situation is so hopeless there's no point even trying :-)
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Wow - I never knew there was such a book. I clicked the link and got the description alright, along with a notice saying "This item does not ship to Toronto Canada". I guess they know there are no Dummies in Toronto when it comes to colour management - or to the contrary, the situation is so hopeless there's no point even trying :-)
Indeed, no reason for such a book there. In the US, in the really big states, a must! 8)