Print preparation

[ahockenberry]

I want to know what specific print-preparation you do with your images?

What I mean is this...the results I experience when printing an image are typically that it loses a bit of broghtness, contrast, colour and sharpness.

How do you compensate for this in order to make the printed image as close to the original as possible?

Thanks

Ashley

[Martin]

What printer and paper are you using and what are you using to calibrate your monitor, what have you done to calibrate your workflow, printer profiles, monitor profiles, printer settings.

Just need to know were your starting from.

Martin

[ahockenberry]

Good questions...

I use:
Canon Pro Paper
Canon I-9900 Printer
Adobe Gamma for calibration
Q-Image Print Software
Photoshop CS2 for Print Profiles
Photoshop CS2 for Colour Profiles
Colour Profile is sRGB, not Adobe

[Harv]

I use the same printer and paper that you do. I have found that in order to get similar results from the printer that I see on my monitor, I have to do my post processing with CS2 set for Adobe RGB. I only use sRGB for web posting.

You will probably also find that if you are upsizing for printing, you will lose sharpness and contrast. I try to use at least 200 - 225 PPI for printing. As an example, I try to crop an image (from the original) for an 8 x 10 print to be 1,600 x 2,000 pixels minimum. This is definitely a case where I believe bigger is better. I also print from a 16bit TIFF conversion rather than a jpeg.

I'm not sure if others share this approach but it works for me.

[Martin]

Okay here is what I do, I have the camera set to adobergb and I leave it there except for the jpegs I put on the web, they are converted to srgb, I print tiffs, argb in Qimage.

Here is my Qimage colormanagement setings, yours will be different of course since you use different printer and paper.

First part is what icc is used if one is not embedded, I have argb embedded so this is ignored.

Second part is your monitor profile, I have a eyeone and it seems to work well, I would recommend a hardware profiler.

Last part is your printer profile for the paper you are using.
http://martind.smugmug.com/photos/198469933-M.jpg

I assume the Canon paper profiles for that printer come with it as I can't find them on the net separately so they should be installed already.

For printer settings, I have icm selected and off(no color management) your screen will look different. Maybe someone with a Canon printer can show there printer settings page.
http://martind.smugmug.com/photos/198479586-M.jpg

Here is the Canon ICC Profiles Guide
http://homepage.mac.com/renard/ls/Canon_ICC_Profile_Guide.pdf

[ahockenberry]

Thanks guys!! I'm putting you both in my will. When I pass on, you get to split my photography gear.

Ashley

[Harv]

I hope this works out for you. Good luck.