Difficulty in quality

[ericf]

I'm attempting to print out a few photos and can't determine where the problem lies. On monitor the color and contrast look pretty good. When they are printed the story drastically changes. I've tried to print from the raw files as well as the jpg (excellent quality) conversions. both look virtually the same. How can I isolate if it's the monitor, or the printer.
Monitor is an older Dell crt (probably the problem), printer is a new Canon Pixma.
Once printed the colors and contrast appear to be washed out.

[johnastovall]

Is your monitor calibrated? What ICC profile are you using for the printer? Are you working with Photoshop and how are you managing you color? What color space are you using?

It sounds like a color management problem. If you want to get a fully managed work flow you need to get and study this book.

[gpbusa316]

I opened both of these images in Photoshop CS2 and received a color profile warning. It shows both images have an embedded color profile of "Nikon Adobe RGB 4.0.0.3000".

I'm not sure about the Nikon Adobe RGB colorspace specifically... but unless your color management is setup to use an "Adobe RGB" colorspace, images will look a little "flat/muted", particularly if your printer is looking for some other colorspace (usually sRGB). Most monitor's can't display the full color gamut of Adobe RGB either, so your monitor display may look a little off as well.

You really need to look at your overall color management, but for a quick try, change the embedded colorspace of the images to sRGB before sending them to your printer.

[ericf]

I just ordered the book and will look into colorspace being used. thanks

[ericf]

I have been shooting in mode II on camera which should be AdobeRGB,. I just changed it to IIIa, and will try shooting there for a while. By coincidence, I was in Barnes and Noble last night and picked up a mag that identified problems with conflicts between the computer out put ICC and the printer embedded ICC. I have to try adjusting the printer ICC to "off" and allow it to read only the output from the computer. I don't remember having these problems with my older Epson printer.

[jeffkohn]

While I realize it's the "gold standard" of color mgmt books, I think maybe the Fraser et al book is a bit much for someone starting out, and the pre-press/CMYK stuff will be of little interest to most photographers.

Digital Outback has an e-book that I think makes an excellent introduction to color management and printing topics; it starts out with a good bit of background info and has a very accessible format.

[billbunton]

Originally Posted by jeffkohn

While I realize it's the "gold standard" of color mgmt books, I think maybe the Fraser et al book is a bit much for someone starting out, and the pre-press/CMYK stuff will be of little interest to most photographers.

Digital Outback has an e-book that I think makes an excellent introduction to color management and printing topics; it starts out with a good bit of background info and has a very accessible format.

Andrew Rodney's book is pretty good too. It's more practical than theoretical, and includes some actual excercises and tutorials.

[jeffkohn]

Originally Posted by billbunton

Andrew Rodney's book is pretty good too. It's more practical than theoretical, and includes some actual excercises and tutorials.

I haven't read his book but I know he's a regular in the Printing forum at DPReview, and he definitely knows his stuff. Seems to be a really helpful guy over there, I'm sure the book is worth a read.