Getting The Most From Your Print Files Part 1
I profiled my display.
Why don't my prints match my display?
HINT: ITS YOUR "LIGHTROOM"
Welcome to the first part of our series on how the get the most out of our extraordinary prints beginning with the problems we see most often. We hear this all the time from our clients with dismay. You have profiled your display with the newest state of the art calibrator yet your prints come out too dark or light.
The problem has to be the printer right? I have profiled my display so it can't be me.
Well read on to see the scoop as to why.
Your EDITING ENVIRONMENT is a critical component to your process that does not get nearly enough attention. Back in the days of the darkroom everyone knew that you had to have a controlled room with either a safe-light or complete darkness to allow only the enlarger lamp to expose your papers. I have to give Adobe credit for coining their term of "Lightroom" as it embodies the modern digital editing workflow and really is the key concept of a repeatable editing workflow however we are not talking about the program it's the work space concept we have in mind.
A properly setup editing space is easily as important
as the quality of the display you choose or the power level of your PC.
We have improperly come to believe that we can simply fix anything in post however a grossly & improperly edited file done in a poor environment can be disastrous to get to print well.
YOUR EDITING ENVIRONMENT NEEDS TO DO THESE THINGS:
ELIMINATE COLOR SHIFTS - GIVE A PROOFING AREA - ELIMINATE TUNNEL VISION
•ANY COLOR IN YOUR "LIGHTROOM" WILL CAUSE A BIAS• Regardless of how much you think your monitors neutral wallpaper color is you WILL be influenced by the colors in your editing environment. A neutral grey or white work surface and rear walls will always improve the neutrality of your image edits. Mistake #1 and Mistake #2 are prime examples of poorly setup color biased "Lightrooms".
•YOU NEED A PROPER PRINT VIEWING AREA• This one simple misunderstood aspect IS THE KEY to getting prints that match your display. Your print viewing area needs to accomplish 2 things:
• Give a color corrected light and place to view proofs.
• A monitor with its luminance adjusted to properly match the paper white brightness for print matching.
If your monitor white is brighter than your properly illuminated reference paper white then your prints will never be as bright as your display. Go back and set you calibrator luminance to match your environment.
• YOU NEED AN EVEN ROOM LIGHT SOURCE TO ELIMINATE TUNNEL VISION• Having a consistent level of light at all times is critical to successful editing. If you have windows that get light at one time of day and not at others it will lead to perceptual edits made in vain as you battle the changing light levels in your room. Many people choose to combat this and edit at night with a dimly lit room however this leads to tunnel vision and a loss of perceptual values as you loose your frame of reference for natural illumination and values as in the sample mistakes.
The bottom line is that unless you have a controlled reference AND a monitor luminance that matches printed output brightness you will NEVER GET MATCHING PRINTS, only workarounds.
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