Printing Issues
Yesterday, in my first session of printing for some weeks, all my prints were coming out much darker than in the proof. I was of course selecting the profile for the paper I was using in the Print Dialogue, and 'no colour adjustment' in the Preferences for my Epson SC-P700 printer. I have been printing from Capture One with reasonable success for a year or two, withoutt experiencing this before. I have, though, have always been puzzled that I cannot switch between proof profiles when recipe proofing is enabled (which could be helpful for choosing which paper to use). I am also puzzled by the fact that one of my paper profiles is now appearing permanently above the main list, as if it is the one I have chosen, when I have ticked another. This hasn't been so in the past.
As far as I am aware the only changes that have occurred since my previous printing session have been a Capture One upgrade (not the latest, which I haven't yet installed, but the one before) and that I have replaced the calibration device for my monitor with a new Calibrite 'colorchecker Display Pro'. This does call for a slight increase in the brightness setting of my monitor, compared with its predecessor, but I wouldn't have expected this to lead to the present mismatch between the proofs and the prints.
I would appreciate any comments on the points I have made here, and any other advice on printing from Capture One. I have read the relevant parts of 'CaptureOneGuide_v163' and can't see that I am doing anything wrong.
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Since writing the above I have compared the Previews in the Print Dialogue Box for a large number of different paper profiles for two quite different images. I cannot see any difference between any of these profiles. This surely can't be right. I do, though, see a small difference when I switch between Relatiove Collorimetric and Perceptual. I should add that the Previews in the Print Dialogue match my recipe proofs. The mismatch appears to be between the brightness olf my monitor and the prints I am getting, but the absence of difference between all these paper profiles suggests something else may (also) be wrong.
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Basic questions:
Mac or Windows?
If Mac, have you recently upgraded to Sequoia (printing issuers reported)?
If Mac, are you sure you've got Epson's latest printer driver configured instead of Apple's default of AirPrint 3?
If WIndows, sorry but I can't offer anything,..
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Thanks for the suggestions Abbott but I'm on Windows.
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To what brightness are you calibrating your monitor?
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I want to ask the same question. How to solve this problem.
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The brightness is now 40% (for the arrow to be green with my new Calibrite display pro). With my previous device it was in the range 28-32% if I remember correctly, but certainly less than 40%. I suppose this could explain my experience in printing but, if so, I wonder why the calibrator is asking for this level of brightness. Moreover this seems to be problematic only for printing. When I look on my phone at my latest images on my website the brightness is similar to that on my monitor, which suggests that when editing for that application the current level of brightness is correct. This then suggests that I need, when printing, to change the brightness of the monitor to a different level (to be determined by trial and error) at which my proofs will then match the prints - perhaps somewhere around 30%.
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Does the Calibrite software let you choose a specific brightness (candela)? I set mine to 85 using Datacolor Spyder. To get consistent results you need to be able to set your brightness accurately.
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Certainly I can set the luminance/brightness to any level but I have always worked at the level recommended by Calibrite of 120 candela. Your figure of 85 is a long way removed from that.
My previous device showed a green arrow when the monitor brightness (shown as %) corresponded with this luminance. I have now noticed that my new device is behaving a little differently: the arrow is green for luminance values upwards of 120 and that I need a brightness of 37% to get exactly to this figure. This obviously lightens the on-screen image a little from 40%, although the difference is barely noticeable on the sample image for the before/after comparison.
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Why don't you try a print at lower candela? I use 80, which suits my editing and viewing environment. I don't have a proper print viewing lamp but do have a led lamp that produces around 400 lux on the print the way I have it set up. (Have a phone app that measures lux). I got this set up from the guy that runs printing workshops here.
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Thanks for that suggestion but are you say that you use a different monitor brightness when making a proof from which to print, compared with creating an image to view on a screen. I haven't felt a need to do that previously, nor picked that up from any teaching on printing which I have had. And, as I said above, my images at 120 candela seem to be correctly made for screen viewing as nthey look perfectly OK when I view them on my website with my laptop or phone. But perhaps this is because most devices have screens set at around 120 candela, which could be why Calibrite recommend this figure?
I would also be grateful for any feedback on my observation that I couldn't see any difference in the previews in my Print Dialogue box, for two quite different images, for several of the papers for which it offers generic profiles. Surely that isn't to be expected? What am I doing wrong, or failing to do?
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Screens emit light. Prints reflect light and have much lower luminance than screens. This is why you need your screen brightness much darker when editing for print.
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Thanks, Walter - that makes sense but I'm surprised it's not something I've needed to do before. Can you also comment on the other points I've raised: (1) Is there a reason behind Capture One not allowing the profile to be changed when Enable Proofing is operational? And (2) what am I doing wrong, or failing to do, given that I am seeing no difference in the proofs in the Print Dialogue box for a whole range of different papers.
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1) Recipe Proof uses the profile of the selected export recipe. You can always choose any profile you want via view > Proof Profile provided the profiles you want are installed in the correct folder on your system where Capture One can see them. They have to be there when Capture One starts. If you add them while it is running it won't see them until you quit and restart the app.
2) The print dialog should use the print settings you choose from the print dialog. It has nothing to do with Recipe Proofing or View > Proof Profile.
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Thanks Walter, that's all clear now. I've sort of muddled through with printing from Capture One so far, without fully understanding the set-up. But I'm definitrely moving up the learning curve. I'm checking my screen brightness as I go. I've always known that it varies with the ambient light but I haven't measured those variations before. Editing for screen, I've always verified any work done in the evenings in daylight next morning, but for printing I will now check the level systematically and regularly.
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Do you tell the Display in System Settings to automatically adjust brightness based on ambient light? I disable that, and I disable "Night Mode". You want your display settings to be 100% static based on the color calibration settings.
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The answer to your question, Walter, is 'no', if only because I don't know where to find System Settings for my Display. My previous profiling device offered me the option of 'ambient light adjustment' but recommended that it should be 'off', a recommendation which I accepted. The option isn't included in the software of my new device. My Eizo Flexscan monitor has buttons along the bottom which can be used to make various adjustments but none of them provide for ambient light adjustment.
Meanwhile, your last sentence has me wondering: I use the recommended luminance of 120 cd to calibrate my monitor and take this as correct when editing for screen, but if I change to say 80 cd for printing should I then re-calibrate the monitor?
While writing this I was checking the brightness of the monitor every minute of so. It was varying between 12% and 16%, although the ambient lighting cannot be changing much, if at all - I am on the upper floor of my house in daylight (no artificial lighting), I have windows to left and right of my screen and outside there is at present a uniform layer of grey cloud and snow on the ground, and ikt's only an hour or so after midday locally. But I've now increased it to 20% (80-85 cd) and it seems to be holding constant at that level.
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These settings may only apply to built-in displays for laptops. I disable auto-adjust of brightness and true tone.
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Thank you for that - I was looking in the wrong places. But I'm using Windows 11. System/Display offers a Night Light which is off, and the possibility of HDR (though I doubt if my 12 year old monitor would accept that). But I can't imagine I would want it. It looks to me as if it is intended more for gaming and perhaps for viewing films.
Meanwhile, I wonder about the other issue I raised in my last comment, that while I use the recommended luminance of 120 cd to calibrate my monitor and take this as correct when editing for screen, should I re-calibrate at 80 cd for printing?
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Ignore that the SSL certificate has expired for this site. I'm sure they will remedy that soon.
https://www.cambridgeincolour.com/color-management-printing.htm
Yes I would recalibrate at 80 or 85 candela brightness.
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Thanks Walter. Much in these exchanges for me to work on to get the best out of my images. I don't have the most up-to-date 'rawcaptureguide', only the 2023 version, but none of this can be found there. Nor can I find any suggestion on the Calibrite website that I should ever calibrate except at 120 cd. But what I can do in System/Display is switch easily between the two calibrations, one at 120 cd and the other at 80 or 85; or In fact I could set up three or four and switch between them until I find what works best. I make my own greetings cards from time to time but tend to do my A3 printing in sessions which last two or three days just two or three times a year.
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I still have one more query. My downloaded copy of The Photographers Guide to Capture One (2023) tells me that "the Preview image window in the Print dialog box will change as you select a new profile. Capture One is automatically showing you a soft proofing of the ICC profile, just as if you have selected it from the View > Proof Profile menu." That is exactly what I would have expected. But I am not seeing it. I have tried with a range of images and a range of paper profiles. Have I unwittingly switched something off, or failed to activate something I should have done? What I am seeing, or rather, not seeing, is undermining my confidence in the printing process.
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Capture one soft proofing is not intuitive. This video may help
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Thank you Richard. I've had a quick look at the video. I will need to see it a few times to take it in, but it will certainly give me a much better idea of how to use C1. I am actually going away for 10 days tomorrow, so won't view it again until I get home. When I first used C1 for normal editing I still printed from LR - I had a perpetual licence for LR 6.14. I lost that when I had a new PC built. To install it Adobe required me to use a code which they sent to the email address they had for me - which had long been closed down, so I couldn't receive it. It didn't matter that I could give them my licence key and date of purchase, it was a simple matter of 'computer says no'.
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