Color Calibration

[DWayne27]

Anyone an expert on this? I am pretty much clueless on the issue, and it is driving me absolutely nuts. Let me explain...

So a few weeks back, I uploaded some pictures to the fall colors album. When I looked at them online, they did not look nearly as good looking at them on Bogley as they did on my computer. This had me a little confused because I figured a calibration issue is with the monitor, so why would it look good (or at least look how I want/expect it to) through my monitor one way, and look different another way, but whatever, I just forgot about it.

I have a big group of images that look just how I want in Photoshop, Bridge, Lightroom, and the Windows Picture Viewer - all of those appear exactly the same. However, some of them look totally muted and the colors are just not vibrant when I upload them to this site, or the site I order stuff from, or even just setting them as my desktop background they lose color. I even ordered a 4x6 print to see what it looks like, and the print is bad as well.

I can not figure this out. Recently, I got a new computer and I have CS5 on the new computer, and none of the pictures I worked on before the new computer are having the issue at all, so I thought maybe it is something to do with that. I also got a new camera, but some of the pictures from my old camera are still having the issue. So, with the old camera and the old computer, no issues. With the old camera and the new computer, some issues, but only a few, even from the same hike some work fine and some do not. With the new camera and the new computer, same thing - some with issues, some without.

I was just about to order a bunch of calendars for people for christmas, and all my pictures look right in the software for this new place I was going to order them from, but I dont want to spend all that money if I am gonna have this problem.

Anybody have any idea what the heck could be going on, or how to test/fix it? Also, I am currently taking a photography class, and I brought some of the pictures I am having issues with in to my teacher on a thumb drive. He loaded them up on his Mac, and the pictures looked just fine, how I expect them to on my PC, so that just further puzzles me...

[DWayne27]

Ok, I think I have found a bit of a difference, lets see if this difference shows up.

Do you guys see the difference in color on your monitors, or is it just me?

[DWayne27]

How about in these two images?

So these are two separate files. One of them (the good color) was converted from RAW or PSD by a batch export from Bridge, and it is a significantly smaller file that I wanted to keep for slideshows or facebook type stuff. The "bad color" file was saved from RAW in Photoshop to a JPG, and it was a much larger file that I wanted to save for prints if I wanted them. Both files look identical in Photoshop, Bridge, Windows Picture Viewer, etc, but when upload, there is quite a bit of difference. The print that I ordered was off of the "bad color" file...

[oldno7]

You need to calibrate your monitor, I suggest Spyder 3 Elite.

[dioscuriII]

You need to calibrate your monitor, I suggest Spyder 3 Elite.

Exactly. I took a small class on color management just a week back. It is complex. Calibrate and then use profiles from your printer or the printer who will do them for you. Work in AdobeRGB or ProPhotoRGB. Not sRGB.

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tu...hoto-rgb.shtml

[DWayne27]

So it is still a calibration issue, even though it is different versions of the same file and sometimes it looks fine? I did a little more messing around with it last night, and I discovered that when I save pictures in Photoshop CS5 directly, whether compressing it to a JPG or TIFF, I get this issue. Again, even these ones look fine in Bridge, Lightroom, Photoshop, and the Windows Picture Viewer, but uploading to various websites, or setting them as my desktop background, I lose color.

However, if I take the same RAW or PSD file in Lightroom, and I export it to my hard drive as a JPG, those pictures turn out just fine as far as color goes, no matter where I view them. The only problem is, when exporting from Bridge, it leads to a smaller filer with lower resolution, usually between 5 and 12 mb, with 96 dpi. The reason I liked saving them in Photoshop is that doing it that way leads to larger files, around 12 to 22 mb, with 240 dpi. However, it messes up the color.

I am certainly no technical wizard, but I dont understand how it could be monitor calibration when they are appearing differently through different applications. On the other hand, I also dont understand why the way I am saving them turns out to be effecting the color in such a weird way...

[DWayne27]

Alright, a little more of my talking to myself. After reading that link above (thanks dioscuriII) I started messing around with my color profiles. My default in Camera RAW is Adobe RGB. I changed it to ProPhoto RGB, and again, viewing in Bridge/Photoshop/Windows Picture Viewer everything looked fine. However, when I saved it to my desktop as the background, the color was even more off - the picture of sandstone turned really green and ugly. So that was a step in the wrong direction. So then I changed the color space to sRGB, and tried a few more things, and now it seems to be working better in sRGB...

So much to figure out

[dioscuriII]

Each application may be using a different color space. Check and make sure CMYK isn't somehow being applied. I doubt it though.

Web stuff is sRGB. It will chop color. Especially yellows. This stuff is hard.

[oldno7]

I calibrate my monitor in sRGB

[dioscuriII]

I calibrate my monitor in sRGB

sRGB is the smallest of all of them. Most printers still use this one.
AdobeRGB is larger and will clips less if a color is out of gamut. I use this one mostly.
ProPhotoRGB is largest. It contains almost all the theoretically possible colors that can occur in nature. It still can clip some colors though.

http://www.earthboundlight.com/photo...gb-debate.html

[DWayne27]

Is there a less expensive way to calibrate rather than spending $200 on Spyder 3 type software?

[dioscuriII]

Is there a less expensive way to calibrate rather than spending $200 on Spyder 3 type software?

Adobe Gamma comes with older versions of Photoshop. This one is free. Try looking around.

http://www.normankoren.com/makingfin...tml#QuickGamma

[spinesnaper]

At the risk of sounding like a color geek, the issue is that you lack appropriate color profiles of your various devices. This has to do with the subject of color management.

Color is subjective. Color spaces are agreed upon descriptions of color determined by parameters of hue, saturation and luminance. Color spaces like LAB, RGB, Adobe RGB, and sRGB, to name a few, are contained in the gamut of that defines the range of human color vision. Certain color spaces are good for certain purposes. For example, sRGB, which is the default for photoshop, is very useful if you are primarily working with web-based images. On the other hand, Adobe RGB is the largest of the RGB color spaces and is a good choice if you need to print digital images. Commercial print service providers work with CMYK devices and need your file in that format. Usually these service providers will have conversion specifications for converting your Adobe RGB files to CMYK.

The dilemma is that all devices have different color gamuts. That is why the color you see on your computer monitor and the color you see when you print the photograph are different. Color management is how you control this process. Color management systems are software solutions that close this loop. There are methods for eyeballing the calibration, such as Adobe Gamma, but they are not very accurate.

As mentioned, the best approach is with calibration devices. The Spyder is one of these devices. However, most agree that it is not an ideal solution. The system in widest use is the Xrite eye one color management system. This includes a software package and a spectrophotometer for measuring your monitor and also color targets that are printed on your printer. The software generates colors for the monitored that are measured by the spectrophotometer. This generates a table of data called a profile. Similarly a sheet of color targets are generated for printing on your printer. These are also measured by the spectrophotometer to create a color profile for the printer. The software then makes the adjustment of the monitor based its profile with the profile for the printer. In photoshop for example one can select the appropriate color profile under color settings.

Multiple profiles are needed for the printer because the color seen in the finished print is determined by both the printer and the actual paper you are using. For your desktop printer, typically you will only have access to a single set of inks. High-end photo-paper manufactures may have on their websites pre-done profiles for a particular paper and a particular printer model. This can get you close. However, it is not as accurate as building your own profiles. If your do a lot of work with a commercial printer, it can be helpful to print color targets for their printers and make a profile for this purpose. Again the profile is affected by the printer, the ink, and the paper.

Generally profiles are not used for cameras unless you are doing commercial photography with very specialized and standardized lighting which will affect the camera profile.

Regarding device and software packages, I would carefully research these devices. Generally it seems that many have trouble with the Spyder system although it is the least expensive option. X-rite has introduced the Colormunki which is spectrophotometery based. The device is not inexpensive. On-line the system can be found for approximately $500, possibly less. This device is very capable and produces excellent profiles that are nearly as good as the X-rite professional system called i-1 photo pro. The professional systems produce more color targets and have some conveniences that are not found on the Colormuki but are approximately $1500. Unless you are a photo professional, it is hard to see that this extra cost can be justified.

Hope that information helps.

Ken

[oldno7]

Nice write up, Ken.. Thanks for sharing your color geekology.

[Ryebrye]

FWIW, I have a colormunki photo and an x-rite colorchecker passport to profile the monitor / printer / camera (can you tell I was raised by a graphic designer and was taught from a young age to be a fanatic about color calibration??)

I could be persuaded to let someone borrow the Colormunki Photo for a couple of days to try it out and calibrate some stuff - but I'm also lazy so you'd have to come to me to get it (in Spanish Fork).

The colormunki photo does does work quite well. It's a very accurate photospectrometer - the limiting factor is that the software is designed to limit uses of it so you can't do remote profiling for people and it's basically designed to be a personal solution. (To get around those limitations, you can use the Argyll open source CMS system to generate and profile based on test sheets - but after spending about 3 or 4 hours scanning a set of a few thousand patches - the resulting ICC profile was not significantly better than the one that ColorMunki did in much less time with far fewer patches.)