Color management

[Itchi]

Hi there,

I'm an illustrator recently switched from apple to Linux and I'm darn happy about it!

The only thing that got me a bit worried is the color profile for my screen. The other day I went to print an illustration and the colors were pretty wrong. So to solve that I've looked for various calibration programs and found that only a handfull of old chunk was available, and if you would like to use that then you came into a settings page where you have to be a professional to use it right.

A lot of people are changing these days to donation software -including Gymp, Inkscape and offcourse Linux- but I find a lot of fellow designers and illustrators being a bit of negative about this color-proofing thing, which actually is the only thing they worry about.

To be short: ICC color profiles are -in my opinion- pretty much a useless thing, when I make an illustration it just needs to have the RGB color codes right for the printer to understand, and it would be great that I could go to the printer, print out a red-yellow-blue-black stripe on paper and hold it next to my monitor and THEN have a little handy-dandy program that would be able to set the reds. yellows, blues, contrast and gamma right so it would see just like on the paper. 5 Settings, that's all it needs to take.

I've been looking on the forums and internet but everytime I find a post or article it comes out with no/negative responds or pointing out to the same dificould programs as ever.

If there would be something like that then it would most truly get some awesome responds, most of all from the design peeps.

Thanks!

[xenopeek]

You might have a point; but which desktop environment are you using? KDE for example indeed uses ICC profiles (at least on default install), but it seems to offer a wide choice?


(click to enlarge)

[goshmo]

To be short: ICC color profiles are -in my opinion- pretty much a useless thing, when I make an illustration it just needs to have the RGB color codes right for the printer to understand, and it would be great that I could go to the printer, print out a red-yellow-blue-black stripe on paper and hold it next to my monitor and THEN have a little handy-dandy program that would be able to set the reds. yellows, blues, contrast and gamma right so it would see just like on the paper. 5 Settings, that's all it needs to take.

...and thats all that gives you a hint about Your Perception, Your Monitor and Your Printer, under a specified set of certain ambient light.

If you are going to use only Your Printer by RGB, you can get a sort of calibration via that,
but if you are sending stuff to printing houses, digital or offset CMYK, then you have simple choices:
- You trust to your eyes about what you see on screen
- You check out certain main colours and compare their numerical values to what you see / what you know what is what
(for example, you know how 20% black looks on different papers)
- You get a profile from a printing company house and just "leave the rest to them";
if you know the print job will be done to uncoated newspaper paper with 4 colours offset rotation process,
under european system values (euro cmyk), you choose that profile.

I wrestled a couple of years ago with that "monitor color profile" - thing, then I simply let it go.
If ambient light changes in the space where you look at that monitor - you never see an "ideal picture".

I'd choose sRGB or for some printing jobs that old Adobe RGB (1996),
but at final check, CMYK -values from the file.

I very recently switched from Windows (used macs years in graphic design business) I'm also curious about this subject.
No matter, i've done print jobs with this laptop without external "pro display",
this display looks exactly the same as before, with win XP.

There is no WYSIWYG (in any OS), because a whole lot depends about human physiology and psychology

[Itchi]

Hey sorry for the late reply here and thanks for the answers. Xenopeek, I'm on Cinnemon and can install ICC but that's just trying out stuff with mostly a restart to see the result. I've got a whole bunch of them and differences in colors (not the k's) are very small so that would take a lot of time to find the right one. That's why a simple program would be awesome to just adjust it like a monitor while holding a print out next to it, and you would be done.

Goshmo! Thanks, you seem to know what you are talking about Yes, ambient light can change a lot the colors, as well on the paperprints, but that's a matter of instaling a right type of light in your office and do the proofing when it's daylight. The thing is that I have my own idea about what is who's responsibility between printer and illustrator. Not in a bad way, but more in a way of 'why making it difficould when it can be simple' and especially when it comes to wasting time and money on for example a Spider.

Differences in colour can happen to every monitor, some are made like that to create a market and sometimes it happends because of aging. So the idea is to have a sample of exact colors on standert white paper, adjust my screen to that (so my sceen is a copy of the real colors, like 100% red, blue etc) and then when I send it to the printer in whatever color format they should know that my document is based on the one and only color proof of the colors on that white standert paper. When they have to print it on newspaper paper with 4 runs then THEY have the responsibility to adjust their printers so it looks close to that as posible, which they can. Otherwise I have to go through the usual run of wasting time adjusting my documents, paying for and waiting for their proofs. But this whole topic is more about going into a standerised way of working for over a few decades, so I rather not discuss that too much here

If somebody could make this little app then it would be awesome.