Pages: 1 [2]   Go Down

Author Topic: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.  (Read 3032 times)

Mark D Segal

  • Contributor
  • Sr. Member
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 12512
    • http://www.markdsegal.com
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #20 on: March 08, 2019, 04:45:02 pm »

Andrew -  I recommended that Dan try Printer Manages Color only for diagnostic reasons - to see whether the mismatch was coming from an ICC profiling issue or elsewhere.

Dan - when you said above "That did not work" - were you referring to the use of Printer Manages Color? I assumed so. If so, that means the problem is not with the profile or the Rendering Intent. Something else is going on. That's when I got interested in paper and Media Type. You are using Canson Etching Rag in an Epson printer. You didn't tell me what Epson Media Type you are using for that paper. What is it? The wrong Media Type could be setting the White Point wrong for the paper whether you are printing with ICC colour management of printer colour management.
Logged
Mark D Segal (formerly MarkDS)
Author: "Scanning Workflows with SilverFast 8....."

digitaldog

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 20630
  • Andrew Rodney
    • http://www.digitaldog.net/
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #21 on: March 08, 2019, 06:43:24 pm »

Rodney, did you look at the pictures they are going from a off white/very light gray  to a very medium gray.
I guess the best I call do is lighten them up a little?
No, that's a hack. We need to get to the actual root of the issue. Like LR settings or the profile.
Logged
http://www.digitaldog.net/
Author "Color Management for Photographers".

dgberg

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2753
    • http://bergsprintstudio.com http://bergscustomfurniture.com
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #22 on: March 08, 2019, 10:57:41 pm »

Andrew -  I recommended that Dan try Printer Manages Color only for diagnostic reasons - to see whether the mismatch was coming from an ICC profiling issue or elsewhere.

Dan - when you said above "That did not work" - were you referring to the use of Printer Manages Color? I assumed so. If so, that means the problem is not with the profile or the Rendering Intent. Something else is going on. That's when I got interested in paper and Media Type. You are using Canson Etching Rag in an Epson printer. You didn't tell me what Epson Media Type you are using for that paper. What is it? The wrong Media Type could be setting the White Point wrong for the paper whether you are printing with ICC colour management of printer colour management.

Still printed the gray edge in Printer Manages Color.
Media type is Velvet Fint Art.
What I am trying to wrap my mind around is that the edge turns dark gray as soon as you click on the print module and shows the dark gray border in print preview.
So this is before any final choices are made in the print module.
Same result in Photo Shop CC.

dgberg

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2753
    • http://bergsprintstudio.com http://bergscustomfurniture.com
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #23 on: March 09, 2019, 08:51:27 am »

Looks like I have found the issue.
Went back and shot several of the images at 1 and 2 stops brighter. That turns the muddy darker gray border to a light gray.
That photographed edge now has a RGB value of 224/202/208.
Took the image into Photoshop, new adjustment layer, selective color. Selected white and took the black from 0 to -100.
The numbers are now 242/227/231 which pretty much matches the actual edge color.
Except now the overall exposure of the image is pretty over exposed so back in and adjust a little and it prints a real soft nice realistic looking edge now.
25 more to go. Now the fun will be getting all those edges pretty close to the same color which shouldn't be that difficult.
I guess I should have know earlier it was a studio issue and not software/printing.
Not a professional studio guy, just do some for friends in the local art network.

Pushing that 70 number pretty hard and still learning, a good thing.
Thanks to all that responded.
« Last Edit: March 09, 2019, 10:45:48 am by Dan Berg »
Logged

Alan Goldhammer

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4344
    • A Goldhammer Photography
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #24 on: March 09, 2019, 11:55:00 am »

Have you checked the White Balance for the lighting you are using?  If you have a Color Checker Passport you can hang it next to the image you are copying and then use it to get an accurate white balance.  You can also check individual colors as well this way.  I've not done a lot of art repro but when I've done some, that's my approach.
Logged

faberryman

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4851
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #25 on: March 09, 2019, 01:10:47 pm »

Why are you printing a border instead of cropping the image to the art work itself?
Logged

Doug Gray

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2197
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #26 on: March 09, 2019, 01:23:11 pm »

Reproduction work is normally done with a scene referred image (colorimetric capture) and printed using Abs. Col. on a printer/media where the repro'ed work is within gamut. Here's some links that address some of the issues:

http://www.color.org/scene-referred.xalter
https://www.ludd.ltu.se/~torger/dcamprof.html
http://www.lumariver.com/lrpd-manual/#icc_repro
Logged

dgberg

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2753
    • http://bergsprintstudio.com http://bergscustomfurniture.com
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #27 on: March 09, 2019, 02:39:20 pm »

Yes custom white balance and profile.
That wasn’t it. as stated slightly under exposed image caused the issue.
All good now.

This is a project between a half dozen artists spread through out the country.
The blank pages started with my artist friend here in Reading, Pa. and we’re sent
to each artist to add something to the collage. There is no real defined border on the irregular edge of these pages so I was asked to leave most of the border intact. Probably the first time ever that I have been asked to keep a light border.
Part of the issue for sure.
Thanks Doug

Lewando_Images

  • Newbie
  • *
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 25
    • Lewando Images Photography
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #28 on: March 09, 2019, 07:37:37 pm »

    I'm not sure if I'm understanding you right....so if I'm not sorry. But what is probably going on is.....If your photographing a boarder that is plane paper it's still picking up the paper color which for sure isn't 255. You need it to be 255 so your printer doesn't put down any ink....hence new boarder color is what ever the paper color the paper is you are printing on. You are trying to reproduce the paper color of the boarder with your printer.....which is probably possible but you will chase it around forever. It most often tends to make it neutral gray, yes a color balance problem....but one that is really hard to correct.  It's best for any plane paper color in your photograph to be changed to 255 so on your reproduction print it is 255 and your printer lays down no ink.... so it takes on the color of the new paper.
    If I misunderstood your problem sorry and good luck.
Logged
Peter LeWando

na goodman

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 418
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #29 on: March 09, 2019, 07:47:11 pm »

Hi Dan,"211ish" looks likes a very light gray to me.
« Last Edit: March 09, 2019, 07:53:06 pm by na goodman »
Logged

dgberg

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2753
    • http://bergsprintstudio.com http://bergscustomfurniture.com
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #30 on: March 10, 2019, 08:39:38 am »

The artists paper is a very light gray but was printing a much darker gray.
Per the above posts it is pretty well sorted out. I agree very difficult to sort out. I made multiple profiles with multiple custom white balance settings and finally got the border to a soft gray somewhat close to the supplied artwork. Someone that does this every day would have sorted it out hours ago but as a primary wide format printer/ framer it took me abit longer.
« Last Edit: March 10, 2019, 09:07:43 am by Dan Berg »
Logged

Doug Gray

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2197
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #31 on: March 10, 2019, 01:18:25 pm »

    I'm not sure if I'm understanding you right....so if I'm not sorry. But what is probably going on is.....If your photographing a boarder that is plane paper it's still picking up the paper color which for sure isn't 255. You need it to be 255 so your printer doesn't put down any ink....hence new boarder color is what ever the paper color the paper is you are printing on. You are trying to reproduce the paper color of the boarder with your printer.....which is probably possible but you will chase it around forever. It most often tends to make it neutral gray, yes a color balance problem....but one that is really hard to correct.  It's best for any plane paper color in your photograph to be changed to 255 so on your reproduction print it is 255 and your printer lays down no ink.... so it takes on the color of the new paper.
    If I misunderstood your problem sorry and good luck.

This is what many prepress people do every day when making so called "hard proofs." The target paper white is re-created on proof paper. And using Abs. Col. does the job without much effort. Very similar for repro work. If your original has a white point (unpainted or border) of, say, Lab=93,1,2 then your captured image should also have the same or very close  Lab value in the same places. Printing it using Abs Col creates a very close duplicate. With the proper setup, repro work is much easier doing it this way.
Logged

dgberg

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 2753
    • http://bergsprintstudio.com http://bergscustomfurniture.com
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #32 on: March 11, 2019, 07:34:33 am »

Very good info Doug, must give it a try.
Thanks

BobDavid

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 3307
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #33 on: March 14, 2019, 05:37:58 pm »

Reproduction work is normally done with a scene referred image (colorimetric capture) and printed using Abs. Col. on a printer/media where the repro'ed work is within gamut. Here's some links that address some of the issues:

http://www.color.org/scene-referred.xalter
https://www.ludd.ltu.se/~torger/dcamprof.html
http://www.lumariver.com/lrpd-manual/#icc_repro

I often printed repro work in abs color. Keeping the file in gamut and not blowing out the highlights is critical.
Logged

Ernst Dinkla

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4005
Re: Printing reproduced artwork images and borders are turning gray.
« Reply #34 on: March 15, 2019, 04:42:56 am »

The artists paper is a very light gray but was printing a much darker gray.
Per the above posts it is pretty well sorted out. I agree very difficult to sort out. I made multiple profiles with multiple custom white balance settings and finally got the border to a soft gray somewhat close to the supplied artwork. Someone that does this every day would have sorted it out hours ago but as a primary wide format printer/ framer it took me abit longer.

I went through a learning path too for tasks like that. One of the things I do is having one and the same offset paper on the copy table underneath the original and adjust the manual shutter speed that it always gives the same raw values for that paper compared to similar jobs in the past. White base doen do it. Camera profile not to old due to lamps aging. One take with the Color Checker that is proof printed too. One take of the offset paper only for flat field compensation with Cornerfix. Usually at least one to two colors per original still have to be edited after the first proofprints. Paper color usually is alright.

Met vriendelijke groet, Ernst

http://www.pigment-print.com/spectralplots/spectrumviz_1.htm
March 2017 update, 750+ inkjet media white spectral plots
Logged
Pages: 1 [2]   Go Up