p.1 #1 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
So, I had another order from WHCC where the colors and density were not correct. They are telling me it's my monitor but it's freshly calibrated from a spyder4 pro and when I softproof from the monitor to the paper, I see the paper being a 1/2 stop brighter than the monitor, yet the print is a 1/2 stop darker than the monitor. I have a very hard time believing my minolta meter, my camera meter, my monitor and my personal printer are all a 1/2 step brighter than the "reality" of their output device, assuming their icc profile is correct.
And I don't understand how when soft-proofing using their icc profile, the image appears to be almost a stop brighter than the print I'm getting.
p.1 #2 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
It's either too bright a monitor, too dim a viewing light, a bad monitor calibration/profile, a suspect printer profile, or the calibration on the printer itself or the chemistry - or some combination of one or more of the above. If you're going to keep using an outside lab, you might consider sending in with each order, a known file and compare it to previous prints from the same file. You'll quickly see how much the printer can shift from day to day, week to week.
p.1 #3 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
Thanks peter. WHCC claims they recalibrate multiple times daily so, there should be minimal drift.
The other issue is that I'm using a calibrated minolta meter in incident mode and it matches the camera's meter on a medium gray target so I'm puzzled about why the prints are coming out 1/ 2 stop dark when I am doing no adjustment in photoshop? I mean...I could understand if I were doing color and density adjustments in photoshop but i'm not in this particular case.
p.1 #4 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
If I were you I would stop relying on the meter. Meters were and are great for film, but they're almost an anachronism for digital, plus, it's too easy to point the dome in not quite the right direction and have a reading that's off by half a stop or more. In addition, many digital cameras and their meters are not calibrated to the same standard as hand held light meters are. The manufacturers often cheat the exposure downward to help insure against blown highlights - something that looks far worse in digital than it ever did with film.
Without revisiting everything you've written in other threads, it would still be interesting to know the ambient light levels, the luminosity of the monitor, the viewing light conditions, etc. I might also be inclined to take a look at the high end X-Rite Pro calibrator. There is always a chance that what you're using is screwy.
p.1 #5 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
gotta disagree with you peter. A properly calibrated meter is essential. You can't tell the exposure of an individual element in the frame looking at a histogram. and i've already verified my meter is calibrated for medium grey and white detail with my 5d MK II.
Again, I don't buy that my meter, my camera, my monitor and my histogram are all lying and it's only the print that's "correct". And, i'm pretty good at getting that little dome in the right place. Plus, it's essential for studio and multi light setups.
p.1 #6 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
With digital, in the studio or not, you simply don't need a meter at all. I've been shooting high end digital for what - about a dozen years now, and literally the ONLY time I use a meter is when I'm shooting copywork and have to have the illumination within a couple tenths across the artwork. Other than that, a meter just doesn't matter. The best exposure for your shot may not actually be what the meter tells you. You may want to cheat the exposure to not clip either the highlights or the shadows, knowing that you're going to pull the middle back in post and keep those precious highlights or shadows.
You meter many indeed me lying to you, and just because you say you're using it correctly, doesn't mean you really are. Histograms are completely useless for judging overall exposure, but very very good at telling you whether you're clipping, and that's all they should really be used for while shooting. They have almost no real use once you get to Photoshop.
But let's get to the part where you completely skipped the questions I asked you regarding your monitor luminosity levels and editing room ambient light levels. That shit matters, and matters a lot. And I missed where you mentioned what your viewing conditions for your darkened prints are. I've been using Solux clamp lights for about ten years now and have not found anything better. What are you using? And what are the intended viewing conditions of your prints? It's also possible that the print profile needs to be redone to accommodate a different viewing condition, if that viewing condition varies too much from the viewing standard spec'd when the profile was generated. Most profiling packages allow a wide range of lighting conditions to be taken into account when generating the profile, but you can only have one condition per profile.
p.1 #7 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
There are just as many photographers shooting high end fashion and studio who swear by meters. http://www.frankdoorhof.com/site/ for example.
Let's say you shoot a black model wearing a white dress and a white model wearing a black dress. You shoot the picture and you're looking at the histogram. Where in the histogram does it tell you which parts of the image are the black model's skin or the white model's skin? Where in the histogram does is show the white dress and the black dress?
That's not to say that through trial and error and looking at the image in photoshop or lightroom while shooting live you can't make the corrections interactively but i don't always shoot with my laptop tethered and if I'm in bright sunlight I don't want to be chimping and depending soley on the tiny image on the back of the camera.
Regarding prints, no i'm not using solux viewing lights for the prints and yes, it's possible the print profile needs to be redone but I don't have that option since i'm not the printer. When I print to my local inkjet printer, using a color managed workflow the colors and density are very close to the calibrated monitor's appearance but when I print using whcc, i'm getting dark prints. That's the current situation. Most of the other pro photographers I know do not do custom print profiles for different viewing conditions so I'm hopeful I can find a workflow that works and doesn't require me to juggle dozens of icc profiles for varying viewing conditions.
p.1 #8 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
have you tried sending jobs to a different lab, just for test purposes? If you ship the same file to 2, 3 or 5 different labs, you'll find out very quickly whether the problem is you or WHCC.
p.1 #9 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
Yes, I have the same test images going to several different labs. The WHCC are the first that come back. If all of them come back dark, I'll know my setup needs re-calibration. Though I re-calibrated after the first set of dark prints came back from whcc and the profile was not significantly different than the first calibration.
I would like to think that if I meter and shoot a medium gray card and can look at the image on my monitor and see it as medium grey next to each other and that if I can print it on my local printer and it's still medium gray but then I send it to WHCC and get back a darker gray that it's not my setup that's wrong.
But i'm happy to be wrong if I can find a workable solution. I just don't want to have to do a 1/2 stop curves adjustment layer prior to printing which is what I'd have to do currently with my setup.
p.1 #10 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
Yeah, I'm not sure. I use WHCC for my wedding prints and a lot of my press printed material, and i've never had a noticeable color shift like what you're describing.
p.1 #12 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
And p.s.
Many of the prints look great if I don't compare them directly to the monitor so in many cases I might not even notice but one of the test prints was a model taken in the shade with just a hint of reflector to provide a catchlight. That print came back unacceptably dark IMO. On the other prints I got back, I might not have noticed they were dark until I compared them.
p.1 #13 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
"Regarding prints, no i'm not using solux viewing lights for the prints and yes, it's possible the print profile needs to be redone but I don't have that option since i'm not the printer. When I print to my local inkjet printer, using a color managed workflow the colors and density are very close to the calibrated monitor's appearance but when I print using whcc, i'm getting dark prints. That's the current situation. Most of the other pro photographers I know do not do custom print profiles for different viewing conditions so I'm hopeful I can find a workflow that works and doesn't require me to juggle dozens of icc profiles for varying viewing conditions."
So again, what ARE you using to view your prints? Room light? What is the ambient light level in your editing room? What are the parameters you used to calibrate your monitor - and I mean the hard numbers both for Luminosity and Black point as measured in Candelas per meter squared? All of that makes a difference.
What printer are you using in house to make the prints you claim match your current setup? Are you using custom profiles or canned ones? What paper are you printing to? What is your in house printing workflow - what OS, print driver, software version - LR or Ps, etc. It's also quite possible that you're in house setup is printing light due to any number of reasons and making you think that WHCC is dark.
One of your problems seems to be that you haven't sorted out and really nailed your entire process. There are too many unanswered questions that you seem to just ignore for whatever reason. Those questions need to be answered in order to point you in the right direction, but, hell, if you don't want to get in the the gritty details or just don't know the answers, there's not much anyone can do to help.
p.1 #16 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
the printer i'm using in house is the pixma pro 9000 and i'm letting the printer manage color when printing. Printing to canon's semi-gloss plus paper which is equivalent to the luster paper i'm using for some of the whcc shots though I did print some prints on whcc metallic.
I will re-calibrate tonight and post the hard numbers.
p.1 #17 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
I have an old Pixma pro 9000 II and I don't let the printer manage the color because the output is wrong. I always use "Photoshop manage colors" under color handling and choose the printer profile whether I use the pixma printer or the ipf 6100.
Can you try printing using your pixma with this setting to see if there's some changes since you use the printer setting and then compare -
- color mgmt: document (profile: srgb IEC61966-2.1)
-Color handling: photoshop manage colors
-printer profile: IGSPP11_CANP9000
I've been using whcc for more than a year and I did not see any problem.
p.1 #19 · Still getting bad color / print density from whcc labs
Peter Figen wrote:
In addition, why don't you post this file that is printing dark so those of us who have known monitor situations can take a peek at it.
that's actually a really good suggestion! I'd love to see it. Accompanied with a picture in which we can see the WHCC print next to one of your prints so we can see exactly where they differ.
