I am having real issues trying to print what I see on my screen onto print. It's the blues in the shots that are not accurate. I have an Epson 4880, Eizo screen, calibrated with Eye One, using Capture One and Lightroom for raw processing, printing from 16 bit tiffs and Jpegs in ARGB using Epson Exhibition Fiber Paper with Image Print RIP and Pixel Genius Profile, phew! For land based photos the match is almost perfect, what I see on the screen is what I get in print. But as soon as I try to print an underwater shot the blues mess up, any thoughts, tips?
Thanks
Nick
Nick,
Are you working in a sRGB colour space all the way through ?
I had a similar issue when I was trying to use a different colour space than what was embedded in in image.
When you soft proof can you reproduce the shift ?
Have you got colour management turned off ?
Yes you sure have the goods, and with the 4880 your blues should be even better. I assume your topside blues are fine. Is there ANYTHING you do different in topside capture and workflow from underwater?
Is the problem with a hue or a saturation shift?
Also this may be a gamut compression / clipping issue; have you checked whether you have any out of gamut areas, and what rendering intent are you using?
Thanks for the replies, I use ARGB all the way through from raw processing to print and it's the same workflow as land based photos. The shift seems to be towards more yellow, warmer/lighter colors. I've tried using both photoshop to manage the colors (epson print color turned off) using the pixel genius profile and using Imageprint with their profile and both have similar results. Rendering intent is perceptual for both photoshop and imageprint. The landbased photos do seem fine but there just isn't as much emphasis on the blues so it does not show through as anything out of line. Let me do some more checking, have a look at the soft proof and I'll get back. Cheers, Nick
Did some more testing, still can't work it out. I may be being too picky but the blues are not the same as the screen, even using soft proof they are still off when printed and compared to the screen proof, more cyan/yellow than blue. Do you think I would see a better match up with a custom profile? If I print with a tungsten profile and view in normal daylight they match up better but still not matching perfectly. For the color settings in photoshop under the edit menu I am using argb 1998 and using the defaults it comes up with in that box. The files are argb 1998 16 bit tiffs. Any thoughts would be most welcome as this is driving me nuts
Have you tried using the Imageprint Epson Exhibition Fiber profile? I have just printed some underwater stuff on my 4800 with the IP RIP and the blues look good. When you do View - Gamut Warning, do you see any out of gamut areas?
yes, using the RF3? (general use one)Image Print profile for Epson Ex Fiber. Tried the tungsten one and that worked better for the blues. I haven't tried the gamut warning yet, thanks for the tip, but I think it is something else as other prints recreate the same blues that are missing in some of the prints. I might try pro photo rgb and a custom profile if I see colors out of gamut. Thanks for your advice.
Out of gamut may be important if there is a big shift from what you see on your monitor to the print, in which case desaturating the out of gamut areas with the sponge tool may be helpful.
Good luck
Well, I looked at the out of gamut, nothing there showing out of gamut (this is on a few different prints) and the print looks different to the soft proof. The nearest I could get was using a tungsten print setting and viewing the soft proof in a daylight setting on screen using Absolute intent instead of perceptual or relative, which to me suggests I have something wrong in the set up but I just can't see what Not sure where to go from here, Loftus, can I pay you for a one on one over the phone session to try and trouble shoot what I may have wrong as you seem to really know about color management.
You may want to try a custom profile. I used to always have a slight variation with blues on my images till I got my HP Z3100 ps. Since it can generate custom profiles I've had no issues whatsoever with my colours.
There are quite a few out there who do provide custom profiles for a very reasonable amount.
Not sure where to go from here, Loftus, can I pay you for a one on one over the phone session to try and trouble shoot what I may have wrong as you seem to really know about color management.
