Getting Correct Colors

[Gary Eickmeier]

This would be a general photo printing question, but the printer being used
is the Canon i950.

I have a picture of some Crocuses of some sort that are a light violet
color. I knew going in that this is a hard color to reproduce, but it
happened again. I have never been able to get it quite right. It comes out
pink, rather than violet in color. The computer monitor shows it the right
color. I tried adjusting some colors in the printer drivers, but to no
avail.

Is there a secret to this, or is this typical?

Gary Eickmeier

 

[bmoag]

It is seductively easy to get good color using current digital processes: it
is maddeningly frustrating to try to consistently get accurate color.Welcome
to the world of color management.

I would suggest reading any of the many Photoshop books that cover the
concepts of color gamuts, color profiles and color workflow management. I
don't pretent to fully understand it but you get the general concepts.

If you are serious about trying to obtain reasonably accurate color
reproduction it is worthwhile investing in a good quality CRT monitor and a
device to calibrate your monitor. You also need to run some trial prints to
understand what changing the driver settings of your printer does. Whatever
algorithm you develop applies only to that one particular type of paper and
ink (stay with the OEM brand of cartridge). For example, on my Epson 1280
printer the same driver settings yield very different colors using Epson
Color Life Paper versus Epson Premium Glossy (I find it easier to get
accurate colors on the glossy, but sometimes prefer the finish of the Color
Life paper).

One thing I have also found helpful is to invest in a Photoshop plug-in that
performs color correction and see if this does a better job on different
subject types than your efforts with your monitor. This has helped me
greatly to sometimes be able to predict the differences between what I think
I see on the monitor and what comes out the printer.

And sometimes you just have to work hard to get the color you want in a
print if it is important to you.

 

[CWatters]

Not sure about Canon be Epson have some guides on their web sites eg..

http://www.photoexpert.co.uk/UK/EXPERTISE/how_to_icc_page1.htm

 

[Gary Eickmeier]

Not sure about Canon be Epson have some guides on their web sites eg..

http://www.photoexpert.co.uk/UK/EXPERTISE/how_to_icc_page1.htm

Some good thoughts. Thanks to you both. I was hoping it would be simpler.
Add a little blue or something. Hmph. It's really just that one color, all
the rest seeming to be quite accurate.

Gary Eickmeier

 

[Steve B]

It could be that the light violet is outside the printer's gamut so anything
you do will be at best a compromise. You could try printing out a colour
chart with a good range of shades of violet/purple to see if the desired
colour is even approximately available, otherwise you're wasting your time
trying anything really.

You may be able to get the desired effect without profiles by using curves
in a graphics editor like Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro, or in a print program
like Qimage that has curves available. It'll be a lot of trial and error
and only worth pursuing if the above printout shows promise.

 

[Gary Eickmeier]

It could be that the light violet is outside the printer's gamut so anything
you do will be at best a compromise. You could try printing out a colour
chart with a good range of shades of violet/purple to see if the desired
colour is even approximately available, otherwise you're wasting your time
trying anything really.

You may be able to get the desired effect without profiles by using curves
in a graphics editor like Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro, or in a print program
like Qimage that has curves available. It'll be a lot of trial and error
and only worth pursuing if the above printout shows promise.

I just found something called ICM in my printer's settings. I need to read
and study a lot more on this. Might be able to set a profile for my monitor
and my printer.

Gary Eickmeier

 

[Swyck]

It is seductively easy to get good color using current digital processes: it
is maddeningly frustrating to try to consistently get accurate color.Welcome
to the world of color management.

I would suggest reading any of the many Photoshop books that cover the
concepts of color gamuts, color profiles and color workflow management. I
don't pretent to fully understand it but you get the general concepts.

I don't really get this.

If the monitor shows accurate colors, meaning it looks much like the
original object, isn't the problem with the printer not the monitor?
I have the same problem with color and printouts, but they look great
on my monitor.

Swyck

 

[Jerry Schwartz]

If only that were true! Consider this thought experiment:

- You have a scanner that is so horribly out of whack that it scans white as
sky blue.

- You adjust your monitor so that white looks like white again.

- Now, whatever you scan in "looks" right; but internally (i.e., in the
computer's color space) it is grossly incorrect. What you've done is
de-emphasized the blue in everything on your monitor to compensate.

- If your printer is correctly calibrated, then what looks white on your
monitor will come out sky blue!

Granted, that's an extreme example; but the problem is real. All three
devices (the input device, the monitor, and the printer) must be calibrated
to match some common color space if you want good results. It is possible to
calibrate your printer to your scanner, leaving the monitor out of the loop;
in that case, things would look wrong on the screen but print correctly; or
you can calibrate your monitor to your scanner, meaning that the screen
looks right but the printer prints "wrong"; or you can calibrate your
monitor to your printer (most common), in which case your scanned images
might look wrong but at least you can fix them on your screen and then print
them reliably.