I had colormunki photo and quickly got rid of it , terrible bit of useless equipment, printing 2 sample sheets on expensive photographic paper every 2/3 weeks for one reason cost a small fortune,
That was unnecessary. So long as you use the same inks and media, it should be sufficiently accurate... then you print a test strip first before roasting an entire sheet of paper.
second you had to alter your computer profile which sods up the original computer manufactures own
No you don't. You create your own profiles, both for monitor, and print media. The color munki will create a custom .icm profile for your screen, which should automatically be set as the default system colour profile for the screen.. this does not alter, or delete your original profile. The custom ICC profiles for print media are individual profiles you select in Photoshop or Lightroom's output dialogue... nothing has to be set in the computer's OS.
and 3rd you can never ever get an exact copy anyway from screen to printer and one is back lighted and the hard copy isn't.
Sorry, but I can get a perfect match of colour from screen to print. Obviously one is lit and one isn't, but viewing the prints in a proper viewing booth next to my monitor reveals an almost exact match.
One top of that scanning each correctional copy takes for ever unless you have quick drying photo paper and again you have to reset for different papers be it matt or glossy etc. To sum up you actually spend so much time setting up ColorMunki photo and worry about getting it correct it just is not worth bothering with.
Once you've created your profiles for each paper, and assuming you use the same inks all the time, once created, their created. Yeah, if you use 100 different types of paper, you'll have to crate 100 profiles, but assuming most people use around 3 to 5 at most, so what?
Think of it, first you want to print on gloss photo paper, you have to calibrate/profile for that then someone want the same photo in matt so recalibrate yet again.
No you don't. You only have to calibrate once for each media type, and if you want to print on matt, you print using your matt profile, and with gloss you select the gloss profile. With all due respect, it sounds like you're not using the system correctly. You only have to create profiles once in a blue moon, and once created, selecting what profile you print from is as easy as selecting it in your print output dialogue in either LR or Photogshop. All printer's colour management should be disabled... you manage the colours using the ICC profiles only.
So you have to scan for gloss taking 2 sheets of photo paper to do a print then same again for matt and other 2 sheets of expensive photo paper, oh and if you switch on a light start all over again. Opps forgot has to be done on A4 photo paper as well. you are bound to mess up several times before getting it nearly right anyway
Sounds to me like you're making a meal of it. I scanned once, created a profile for each paper I use, and that's it. I've never had to scan again for ages.
Quote from Jim "
My advice is to avoid it like the plague and get a good IPS monitor/printer and save the hassle, calibration is old hat now with modern monitors its only those sticking with the old ways calibrate anyway.
Utter and complete nonsense!! A good IPS monitor means nothing unless calibrated. You simply have no idea what you're talking about, and giving extremely bad advice. High end monitors are designed to be calibrated.. High end Eizo monitors even have built in auto calibrating hardware now. Even the so called "factory calibrated" ones are miles out, and besides, monitors drift with age... a lot! Even if it WERE calibrated well at the factory, it won't stay calibrated. What's your idea of a good IPS monitor anyway? A £300 Dell? Dell's factory profiling is woeful. Last "factory calibrated" Dell I tested had n average Delta E of around 4.. which is pathetic. ALL monitors need profiling. My screen here is pretty much as good as it gets, but without profiling it's terrible. It's designed with the tacit understanding and agreement that it's a professional monitor, and it needs to be kept in calibration... like most precision tools.
I spent a good couple of days and no end of photo paper to get just one decent print which I could have produced far easier by other means
Then you've clearly got no idea what you're doing. You need to go spend some time at a commercial printers.. see how they operate... perhaps tell them "calibration is old hat now"
How come you spend 2 days a shed loads of paper to get a decent print, and I can just print.. one print.. perfect. I guess I'm not using things correctly then huh...
It does NOT need calibrating each time. Who would invent, and market a system that requires that??? I've calibrated my media and inks ONCE and once only in the past 9 months. Yes, you disable the printer's colour management... of course you do, as you're using an ICC profile to colour manage. Sounds to me like you need to do some research on how to print properly. Unless you change the brand and type of papers you use, or the brand or types of ink, you don't need to recalibrate.
We print around 30 metres of paper a day from 8 separate printers... 5 Epson 4880s, 2 Epson 4900s and an Epson 9900. We've not profiles media since September. We created profiles for each paper type we use (5 different types) and always use original Epson inks. Prints are perfect every time. If a student wants to use their own paper, they can create their own profile for it, and then once created, they can just print using that profile from then on, as we always use the same inks.
Bad workman blaming tools I'm afraid.
Jim
I can only say as I find obviously, I have to disagree however about the PC ,if you have a crap engine in a car no matter how its polished up outside it won't work properly. Its the same with computers it doesn't have decent guts then don't expect decent results
What? An old computer will not effect the QUALITY of your images... it may take an age to process them, but so long as you have a well calibrated screen, there's nothing in the cmoputer that can effect teh QUALITY of them
years ago I had a car that needed a new engine so the garage put one in, next the strain on the gearbox was too much and failed so replaced that, next was the rear crown wheel and pinion on the back axle failed.
Its no good having just one item like a monitor if nothing else balances with it,
The age of a PC has sod all to do with anything. Now matter how crap a PC is, it's video output is merely a digital signal.. there's no "quality" loss with an old computer so long as you know your screen is calibrated. It will just do stuff slower and less efficiently.
sequence should be good PC to good monitor to good printer. If all work in tandem then no need to calibrate.
That's the biggest load of nonesnse I've heard on these forums for a while... and there's a fair choice of nonsense to choose from. You clearly dn't understand anything about colour management. ALL monitors will drift out of calibration over time... ALL of them... no matter how accurately calibrated in the factory (which is usually not very well). When I run reports n my own screen it shows the drift starting to happen after 200 hours use... you think it's gonna stay in profile forever.. until you replace it? You're in cloud cuckoo land.
Basically what you're doing is trashing a tried and tested way of achieving consistent colour used by hundreds of thousands of commercial labs and printers worldwide just because you don't know what you're doing.
