Cool prints

[Marselik]

We are finding our prints using HP Advanced Photo Paper Glossy with the HP profile on the cool side. As new comers to digital photography and Photoshop any tips would be very welcome on how to warm up the HP paper prints...

[bez]

Welcome Marselik
Are they all coming out cool, and have you printed them before?
What is the source of the images – digital camera?

Assuming you have a calibrated monitor and all the various Photoshop and printer settings are correct, you may simply have to warm them up a bit in PS.
There are many ways of doing this, but one of the simplest to try as a test is Image>Adjustments>Auto Color. It continually amazes me how often Photoshop gets it more or less correct, even when it has no idea of the image content... or does it?

[barjohn]

Monitor calibration is super critical with this printer. Double check your monitor calibration and gama, should be 2.2 with 6500K.

[Neil Snape]

Any screen to print match has to have a reference. If the monitor is out of cal there will be no match. If your workflow is wrong, same applies.
See my site for tips on ICC and HP workflow.
The 9180 profiles are not cool , if anything slightly magenta.

[Marselik]

We are using Nikon D80 / Canon G3 cameras. Printing from Photoshop with Document profile Adobe 1998 / Photoshop manages colours / Printer profile HP Advanced Photo Paper Glossy / Perceptual black point ticked. Printer settings are Photo with white borders / Max dpi / application managed colours. We find people are coming out pale looking and generally the colours not warm and deep but cool and flat. We have printed on Hahnemuhle paper with their profile and everything was very good. We are wondering if it is such a big issue what kind of paper is used or is there some adjustment we can make with Photoshop. Obviously we don't want to use fine art paper for all our photos but we still want to be happy with them. Thank you for your replies and any further advice much appreciated...

[Neil Snape]

The Nikon Adobe98 is not exactly the same as Adobe RGB. Try converting before Adobe rgb before printing. Also you might want to print with Photoshop color management as it will use the Adobe conversion engine/colorimetry.
The Hahnemuhle papers have in general less optical brightener than photo papers.
Skin tones are less saturated or punchy if you like on any pigment printer compared to dye or photo process like Lambda prints. The 9180 on skin tones with stock profiles are towards the magenta / side with a little less yellow than the original document. It could be the optical brighteners creating a screen to print mismatch, compounded by sub optimal monitor calibrations/profiles and or viewing lighting conditions.
The inter device agreement between 9180 printers is exceptionally good for HP products. The differences are easily within a tight tolerance whereas you would have troubles discerning between prints from different printers.
There is also almost no chance of variation in output due to age or wear that cannot be controlled with the Auto CLC. Did you calibrate the media?

[Marcello]

Neil,

What Marselik is seeing, sounds like what I posted in another thread. The "little less yellow" you describe fits my findings. Would calibrating the printer (for instance with the PrintFix Pro) help out? I'm still thinking about buying one.

Thnx

[Neil Snape]

Sort of . The thing is any paper with substantial Optical Brightener will look blueish to your eyes compared to matte or non brightened papers. If the media looks blue in tungsten light thn something is wrong in workflow. If the print looks reddish in tungsten but still bluer than your screen , your screen is not calibrated.
Yes calibration does help to maintain the validity of the profiles used.

[Marselik]

We have now started to use Nikons Capture NX. The photos display completely differently and print that way too. Our monitor is calibrated and what we see is what we print. Trying to understand what is going on is quite hard... What is Photoshop doing? What is Capture NX doing? If we save the NEF file in Capture NX as a Tiff and then bring it into Photoshop then both Photoshop and Capture NX display the photo similarly. I suppose this means Photoshops raw conversion is very different to Capture NX on the default settings? We are using Photoshop CS3.

[DavidW]

I suppose this means Photoshops raw conversion is very different to Capture NX on the default settings? We are using Photoshop CS3.

That's correct. Every RAW engine has its own algorithms and will produce a different result from the same starting point. You can't move settings between RAW converters, as the engine is different in each.

As of two days ago, when the Lightroom update came out, I'm using Lightroom 1.1 and Photoshop CS3 (with Camera Raw 4.1). These two get the same results with the same settings, as they have the same RAW engine.


If, however, I used Canon Digital Photo Professional (I'm a Canon user) on my shots, or another RAW converter such as Bibble, I'd get different results.

My belief is that it's best to get to know one RAW converter well, as I have with the Adobe one. That way, you become familiar with the tool, just as you become familiar with your cameras and lenses. There are some people that prefer different RAW converters for different shots (or do things like make DNGs with DxO before continuing in Lightroom) - but that comes with time and experience.



David

[Neil Snape]

I agree on the points of conversion.
For me , over many years of testing colour management applications, I found the only way to have the best screen to print match is to have the best calibration possible. For me that is either a Monaco Optix XR or Gretag i1 D2 with Color Eyes or Basic Color Display. Set the monitor CRT to about 85-95 cd/m2 and LCD's to 120cd/m2 , both around 5500 K and gamma around 2.2 for (or L*) CRT and native for LCD. Viewing light should be a 5000 K box like GTI or Just. Then and only then do you have a control situation that you can find colour discrepancies coming from various devices.

[Marselik]

We are now using Lightroom which suits us very well... and are learning / sticking with the Adobe Camera Raw engine. Our workflow is now producing really good prints. We agree the HP profile tends very slightly to magenta but overall the prints are excellent and a very good match to the source. Thank you for all your comments. This forum has been very helpful to us sorting our problems as beginners in the world of digital photography.