Soft Proof and printing

[martyns96992618]

Hi.

I have just got myself a Canon Pro 100 printer and have an issue with the soft proof compared to the print. The issue is that the print not an accurate representation. I have what I believe to be the correct paper profit and have calibrated the screen through windows 10. Is there any settings I need to set with regards to Lightroom classic CC to have full control with printing.

Thanks in adavance

Martyn.

[JP Hess]

What do you mean when you say you have calibrated the screen through Windows 10?

[martyns96992618]

Hi Jim

I just carried out the "calibrate display colour" in the control panel. I know probably wont be the most accurate calibration, but its all I have at the moment.

Martyn

[JP Hess]

And it's kind of what I suspected. That's all that I have as well. I have the same printer that you have. I'm glad to tell you how I "calibrated" my monitor. The printing experts are going to tell you that it is absolutely the worst way you can possibly do it. It's unreliable, it's not a good way to do it and shouldn't be done. But it has worked for me.

Go online and search for something like "printing calibration photo". There are several of them available. Download a couple of them and load them into Photoshop or some other software and print them without doing any adjustments whatsoever. Then use your monitor adjustment buttons or any software you might have to adjust the monitor  to match the print. I call this the poor man's method of calibrating a monitor for printing. I know, it's not scientific, and it's much better to get a hardware calibration device. But I haven't ever purchased one and despite what the naysayers will argue, my prints match as close as I would ever expect them to.

Just going through the Windows 10 calibration exercise isn't going to produce satisfactory results. It's probably going to produce a monitor rendering that is going to be too bright. At least that has been my experience. Anyway, you can try my method if you want. Or, if you really want to do it the right way you can purchase a Spyder or other hardware device and do a "real" monitor calibration.

You also indicated that you have what you believe is the right profile. What you mean by that? Did you get the right profile for the paper you are using? And, did you make sure that you either turned off color management for the printer or for Lightroom? Double color management will create all kinds of problems.

[martyns96992618]

Thanks for your help.

I will try the test image way.

The paper profile I used were for the sample pack that came with the printer, so used the one that were there when installed. There were two that were for the Pro Platinum, one with the number 3 and the other with 1/2 in the title? Not sure what the difference is so tried both.

As to the colour management side I haven't turned any off, LR or Pro 100. Which is better to turn off? and not sure how, any help would be appreciated.

Once again thanks for your help.

[JP Hess]

The profile with 1/2 is to be used with the high quality setting, the one with 3 is to be used with the standard quality setting. As far as which color management to turn off, it doesn't matter. I usually turn off color management on the printer. I have tried both ways and haven't been able to see any difference. Here is how to turn off color management in the printer driver. Very brief, I know. If you have more questions, feel free to ask. In Lightroom, call the page setup. In the first dialog that appears click on the Properties button. When you do, this dialogue will appear:

Make sure that Photo Printing is highlighted (as illustrated) and then click in the highlighted Color Intensity Manual Adjustment box. It "might" be necessary to click twice to make the next dialog appear. When it does, click on the matching tab and then choose "None". Then click OK. Be sure to pick the right paper according to the profile instructions packaged with your paper. Then, in the Lightroom print module, be sure to choose the exact paper profile you are using.

If you really want to learn how to use your printer, go to YouTube and find the Joe Rodriguez channel. This guy has something like 20 different printers. He has three printers like yours. He has created several videos on how to set up the printer and how to use it and profile it. In my opinion he's a little fanatic. But if you watch a few of his videos to get an idea of how the printer works and how to use it, then take the rest of what he says with a grain of salt I think it will help you a lot.

[martyns96992618]

Thanks Jim

I will give this a try tomorrow, It is something i have not done so might solve the issue. I will also have a look on YouTube and the Print test Image.

I have only done little 4x6 printing from a cheap little Epson so this has now opened a whole new world of printing to me. Hopefully get this sorted and get some cracking images printed.

Cheers

Martyn

[JP Hess]

I have found the Canon Pixma Pro 100 to be very capable. It isn't the best printer, to be sure. But for what it is it can produce some very nice prints. So if you don't get the results you are expecting I think you should assume that you are doing something wrong. Keep working at it because you should be able to achieve printing results that are quite impressive.

[Bill Sprague]

I don't want to step on Jim's advice but I might be able to add a little.  I'm on my second Pro-100.  Somehow the printhead stopped working on the first one, it was well out of warranty and the sale/rebate price was just too good!

My first frustration was not knowing how to tell the printer not to control color.  I wanted Lightroom to do it.  After a fair amount of practice, I decided that the printer does it better than Lightroom.  Results will be awful if both the printer and Lightroom are trying to do it.

Canon wants you to have good prints bad enough that they provide software, including a plug-in for Lightroom.  If you are not happy with how it is going with Lightroom printing, use the Canon software.  The Canon software is a little clunky, a little slow but, the prints are great.

I've never calibrated either.  The Canon software has a proof sheet style calibration system in it that leads to a form of "preset" system you can use.

Be sure to turn on the print preview in the printer driver.  For me it is a better version of a "soft proof".  It will save you a lot of paper and ink!

Bill

[martyns96992618]

Thanks Bill

Any advice is always gratefully received.

I'm getting the strong message that the printer doesn't like more that on program telling it what colour the print should be.

Martyn

[D Fosse]

JimHess  wrote

use your monitor adjustment buttons or any software you might have to adjust the monitor  to match the print. I call this the poor man's method of calibrating a monitor for printing.

Actually this takes you a very long way towards good display calibration. Setting a white point and a black point to match the paper color/max ink is the essential first step - and it doesn't matter how you do that as long as it matches visually.

Neutralizing color relative to the white point, throughout the entire tone response curve, that's more tricky. It depends on the general quality of the panel. If the unit is reasonably well-behaved to begin with, and well adjusted from the factory, it should be close enough.

The missing part of the equation is the monitor profile - the full description of the monitor color space. That's the color management part.

Even with a standard gamut display, it won't match sRGB and there's no way you can make it. The primaries aren't in the same place, and this affects how individual colors are reproduced. For instance, is sky blue reproduced too cyanish or too magentaish?

In short - with a good monitor you can do the calibration visually and manually, and it may serve its purpose perfectly. But you can't get that last bit, the profile, which is what pins every individual color down. For that you need to measure with a sensor.

[JP Hess]

https://forums.adobe.com/people/D+Fosse  wrote

In short - with a good monitor you can do the calibration visually and manually, and it may serve its purpose perfectly. But you can't get that last bit, the profile, which is what pins every individual color down. For that you need to measure with a sensor.

You'll get no argument from me about that. But I guess I'm just not that much of a perfectionist. The way I described "calibrating" my display has enabled me to get prints that have completely satisfied me and others. I don't print for competitions or exhibitions. In fact, I really don't print that much anymore. But when I do the Canon Pixma Pro-100 consistently delivers what I need as long as I remember to make all the right choices. But you are correct, a sensor calibration is the proper way to do it.

[JP Hess]

Just a little follow-up on this. I took an image and printed it on three different papers using the profiles provided by Red River. Two of the prints were soft proofed and printed from Photoshop although all of the adjustments were done using Lightroom. The third print was adjusted and printed using Lightroom. All three prints were printed using the latest versions as of today (March 8, 2018). The fourth image is the thumbnail of an exported JPEG from Lightroom. All four JPEG's are being displayed in the latest version of Bridge. You can see a difference in the renderings of this different papers, and you can see that my monitor really doesn't match perfectly. However, as I indicated previously, it's good enough for me.

Incidentally, the rightmost image is the one that isn't a copy of a scanned photo. It was exported from the NEF file directly from Lightroom.

[Rob_Cullen]

One Link to test images-

Printer Test Images - colour and monochrome images for testing

[martyns96992618]

Thank you.