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Colour Management/Profiling
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Anyone in here doing any sort of colour managment, calibration of the screen/printers?
Is it worth while ?
Also what are colour space are you using ? Myself I’m shoot and using Adobe in AdobeRGBI’ve recently bought a new printer (Epson R2400) and have definitely discovered the need for profiling, but as of yet havent invested any time, money or effort into it. I’d definitely be interested to hear any simple tips people would have for simple, cheap yet relatively effective profiling.
i’ve been thinking a lot about that recently, and seeing the rave reviews it got, it looks like the spyder2 suite or pro looks a great little piece of kit. Anyone hear negative feedback on these?
I’ve simply calibrated my eMac screen (CRT, the best) with Apple’s monitor profiling freebie, and always convert to sRGB for web display. Shooting profile is irrelevant to me as always shoot raw.
Hey
Wonder has anybody used the McBeth,know of a few pro’s using it and they swear by it.there is also a cheaper and very effective monitor calibration device called he Huey..only thing is that u got to profile twice monthly for its effectiveness.
Also a big thing i have learnt lately is to leave your monitor on for a half an hour to warm up as it were as screen crystals will change significantly during start up.
Ben 8)Having done a little research into the options available I eventually settled on the Monaco Optix XR monitor profiling solution (I personally have never seen a glowing review of the Spyder). Profiling a monitor with the Monaco XR is a doddle and I now do it about twice a month if I’m turning out a lot of work, otherwise only once a month. Prior to that I had been using Adobe Gamma – what a revelation when I first used the Optix XR. I asked myself why I hadn’t done this sooner instead of trying to do it by eyeballing! A correctly profiled and calibrated monitor is the first step that must be taken if you are to have a colour managed workflow – only after doing this should you consider printer profiling (which is a far more complicated process as you have a different profile for each ink/paper combination!).
As to colourspace, I use them all, depending on requirements (ProPhoto RGB, Adobe RGB and sRGB).
ECP, got to agree with you on the Monaco Optix XR, I’ve been using it for 3 years now and its great.
I also use Monaco EZ Colour to make my own printer profiles. They do not cost the earth either.I borrowed a mates spyder2, and set up my screen with it. It made a really subtle difference, but suddenly all the images I got back from labs started to look correct!! lol
I’m gonna buy one at a later date – it’s really worth it if you value how your prints look. I’ve never bothered calibrating my printer, because I only use that for non critical work.
Tim
The Monaco is great for screens, I was disappointed with the EZcolour for printers. I’ve used the Gretag system for prints, Fantastic!
It’s important to let the test prints dry thoroughly before profiling ( preferably print them the night before), 1 profile for each paper type. Also, you need to make sure “ALL” colour management is off before printing the test prints.
There are many online profile makers, normally ?25 each or so. They’ll send you a test print and you send it back to them, they’ll create a profile and email it to you.
Si
This is an essential part of digital workflow IMO.
I use the shareware SuperCal from http://www.bergdesign.com which is available for Mac only. SuperCal goes through RGB channels at all levels from low to high and allows you to choose your target gamma.
I’m pretty new to the whole colour management thing but I’m happy enough with the results. On a general level in my opinion profiling your working screen is important as it’ll give you a better assessment of how your images will appear on other screens and if printed by a shop/online service (who generally tend to use sRGB). I was frustrated with my screen always being lighter in colours & tones, and getting such dull prints out, or similarly dull when viewed on your average “computer screen”. This is partly to do with the gamma setting on a mac as default which is about 1.8 rather than 2.2 on a ‘normal’ LCD or 2.4 on a tv.
adobe rgb 1998 is fine i use a piece of software called professional profile maker whic works in conjunction with eye one from gretag mcbeth, it is essential to have a well profiled workflow from camera to final product, in fact i would have no hesitation in saying its probably the most important part of digital photography.
There is one thing though (keeping it simple) I would advise u to apply a srgb colour space when u are loading to the web as ur colours will look unsaturated and lifeless in abobe rgb1998
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