Hand color correction?

[Karebear98]

Due to a recent order with a customer I have posted about in one of my more recent threads, I am considering having labs such as Bay Photo and Miller's do all my color correcting.
I however, had nothing but gorgeous prints with Miller's but now I am seeing pretty dark images with my first order through Bay Photo. It is perhaps my fault for not ordering evaluative prints when I first switched, so I will take a lot of the blame.

My question is: Do any of you strictly operate your business this way...that is, allow them to hand color correct all of your orders that you send them, for the extra charge of course. Or do you do them all yourself like I have been doing?

[David Whatley]

Is your monitor calibrated? If not, that would be the first thing to check

[Ernst-Ulrich Schafer]

I use Millers and let them color correct. I have yet to calibrate my monitor.
I also have an Epson 3800 at my studio for display prints or my ArtsyFartsy BW
work and I get great prints from it.

[Redneck]

BayPhoto offers a color profile file of their printers which you can install into your Photoshop so you will see the colors on your screen how they will turn out when printed by BayPhoto.

To answer your question, I don't let anybody correct my images in any way.

[BenE]

Some labs offer a test printing service where you send several different files with different color and density corrections, in order to get the results you like best.

I sent my lab 10 different files, and after looking at them I decided which ones suited my personal taste. I kept those digital files in a folder named "colorguides", and simply matched everything to them. I now have many different digital images in that folder. Some for children, teens, various skin tones, outdoor, studio, etc.

I use those as guides for every order, and have only sent about 1/2 of 1% of my orders back for reprints. Of course the lab does not print them free, since I made the color corrections. The return rate is acceptable since I save a lot over the lab corrected prints. The savings for studio correction vs lab are substantial in my opinion. 8x10 is $1.70 more for lab correction, and a 16x20 is $8.50 more.

The other advantage is that I know exactly what my customer's skin color looks like, and the lab only has a "lab standard" that they go by anyway.

If your lab does not offer the test printing service try this. Take a couple of images, color and density correct them but vary them slightly. Maybe have 5 different corrections of each image. Order a 4x5 or 5x7 of each. After you see the paper prints, select the ones you like and use those digital images as guides.

I am sure this sounds too simplistic, but it has worked for me for 10 years, and I am very particular about color and density on my portraits.

Also, most labs have instructions on how to calibrate your monitor for the best results when using their services, and they have samples to download to help.

One final thought. I am still using an older CRT monitor, which I find better for several reasons. The LCD monitors are a bit quirky when it comes to this, in my opinion. It can be done but unless you have a very high end monitor, such as Lacie, it is very difficult.

[BeccaJ]

i calibrated my monitor, do all my own editing/color corrections and had test prints done at Miller's & WHCC. Miller's was a little bright & WHCC's came back identical to what i saw on my monitor.

definitely recommend starting with a calibrated monitor & getting test prints.

[LadyShutterBug]

calibrate your monitor, and if you work on a laptop, be sure you've calibrated for the light you're in at the time... so that the screen brightness doesn't cause your images to vary.

different labs will be different... i mainly use miller's unless someone else is running a deal on metals or some specialty product. the discount, for me, isn't worth the variation. i like to be pretty playful with color, and if it prints too dark or too saturated, it can look awful.

if for some reason i'm processing somewhere other than my desk at home with my calibrated monitor (oh, like a hotel room that's half dark, half bright window light), and need to print quickly, i'll have he lab do the color correction.

as with everything, it's trial and error. find what works best for YOU, and stick with it : )

[Karebear98]

Great stuff guys...my LAPTOP is not color calibrated but prior to switching to BayPhoto, I had done test/evaluative prints with Millers and those were matched very closely to my monitor. I will have to buy one of those calibration things...spyder or whatnot?

Thanks for the info about the color profile...I will snag that from their site and figure out how to put it into my Photoshop.