Dual-monitor color management?

So I've got a dual-monitor setup running OS 10.7 on a Mac Pro, and color management in Bridge CS5.1 on my second screen is a mess. Both monitors have been individually calibrated with a Pantone Huey Pro (not perfect, but generally pretty consistent across screens).
Viewing an image in Bridge on my first screen, I have no problem. But the same image, when viewed on my second screen, appears heavily oversaturated. When I open the image in Photoshop or Preview, the color is accurate and is consistent across both screens. The below image illustrates the problem: the colors shown correctly in Photoshop (foreground) and incorrectly in Bridge (background). The Creative Suite color settings in Bridge show the settings as "synchronized" with the "North American General Purpose 2" default.
I'm sort of out of my depth here when it comes to color management. Do I have something set wrong? Is this a Lion-related bug? Any help would be appreciated.

The way I have it set up is this: I have two synchronized windows, one on each of my two displays. In one I have a content panel, metadata, collections, etc. In the second window I just have a preview panel, supplying me with a full-screen (almost) preview of any thumbnail I select from the content panel in the other window.
Content (assuming thumbnails as well) panel preview on one display and the Preview panel preview on the other display are both being generated by one application and that is Bridge. Like I said above, I don't think, in fact I'm almost certain this is impossible for Bridge to pull off because of the dual matrices (mathematical formulas) written into each custom display profile that occupy the same video chip to calculate and control hue/saturation appearance in color managed images. Think of the complexity involved. Now Adobe is known for creating workflow miracles with their programming but I doubt they'ld be able to pull that off with Bridge.
Photoshop can pull this off having one image on one display and dragging to the other where it makes the adjustment on the fly. I've seen the quick shift that occurs doing this. But I don't think Bridge can do this because of it's caching structure. I hope an Adobe employee chimes in to correct me.
Now this dovetails into your mentioning forcing a display into the sRGB space during calibration and profiling of each display. This is not what happens doing a hardware calibration. I'm assuming you pick your target Luminance (120 cd/m2 +/-), Gamma (2.2. gamma-usually native) and Color Temp (6500K). It doesn't matter if you did anyway, but what the hardware calibrator does is measure each display's RGB colorant and density range and write the data into the final profile that allows applications like Colorsync Utility to display a 3D gamut model and color managed applications like Photoshop to show colors as intended.
Your display may be close to sRGB but never exact to it because sRGB is a synthetic (made up) color space. Your display has physical anomalies that must be measured and written into the profile to properly display the intended appearance of color referencing the CIELAB color space which is based on human vision. Everything about computerized color in a color managed workflow is based on mapping color to display properly according to gamut size. A computer is a dumb machine and has to be told everything using math. You actually do have to draw it a map to follow.
Bridge's Preview pane looking different may be either referencing the other display profile or is stuck referencing the other and what's happening is the equivalent of Assigning one of the display profiles to the Preview like you can do to an image in Photoshop. Try it. Take your image and convert to one of your display profiles and assign the other display profile to it. Check if you see a slight shift. If Bridge's main Preview pane is stuck showing pixels mapped to (synthetic) sRGB then the same assigning of the display profile effect takes place.
And/or the thumbnails aren't color managed and the Preview pane is and maybe a bit of the above is compounding things. If you aren't confused now can you imagine trying to mathematically write the thumbnail previews on one display and the main Preview on the other both controlled by one application on top of caching and managing a large image database?
Keep the Preview pane and Content pane on one display. Edit your images in Photoshop/ACR/Lightroom on the primary display.
The Color Settings where you select North American Prepress...Web...General Purpose...etc. only applies to how images are handled and previewed that don't have an embedded profile. Are your jpeg images embedded with a profile? If so then this is not the issue. This doesn't apply to Raw captures because their previews are generated by the default Adobe Camera Raw settings.
Omke, no more Version Cue? That's welcome news!

Similar Messages

Dual monitor color settings seems to be messed up cs4

Hi
My daughter has this setup
AMD 9550 quad 2.2mhz machine, Windows 7 ultimate. latest updates
ATI Radeon HD 5700 gpu card (latest driver)
Two LCD monitors
          1. LG 2361V HDMI (main)
          2. Cintiq 21UX (Extended)
Both monitors are calibrated, and have the latest driver updates. It does not matter which monitor is the main one.
PS cs4 also has the
1. If i load a photo in fireworks and drag the application back and forth accross the two monitors, the image looks virtually identical.
2. If i load the same photo in PS (cs4 11.0.1) and do the same, the image looks perfect in the LG but immediately darkens when on the Cintiq.
          a. The darkening is not instantanious. It looks good for about one second before it changes.
          b. If I hover the image between the two monitors, then the darkening only is applied to half of the image.
3. If i change the preferences to not "color match" (in the performance->open GL) then the image does not darken and it remains loyal to the color profile in place. But!!!! the navigator and color selection tools remain darkened while on the Cintiq. So if she chooses a color from the tool, it paints a different color on the canvas.
          a. If I modify the color settings, then the modification affects both monitors display and the difference issue does not go away.
Ideally we want to be able to select a color from the palette and have that color be what is painted onto the canvas. We also want the image to appear as similar as they do in fireworks.
While Color Matching is checked:
On the cheaper monitor, the image and the navigation pane always has the same color appearance. when i change the color profile, the change is reflected in both the canvas and the navigation pane.
The same is true on the Centiq, but the image and navigation pane is always darker than on the other monitor.
While Color Matching is UNchecked:
The color selection tool and the navigation panel are affected but the canvas is not. But the two monitors canvases match.
So. in order for the navigation and color selction tool to match the canvas, the color matching needs to be checked.
But this creates the darkening on the cintiq. No matter what profile i choose, the cintiq is too dark. and photoshop is doing it because fireworks does not do this.
How can i set it up so that all the colors are true to the profile, and match the nav and color tools?
Thank you
Any ideas will be appreciated.
Jerry C

Thanks
@Noel
It sounds as if the monitors are using two quite different profiles, which may indicate the calibration is off a good bit on one of them and the profile was generated to compensate. The clue here is that you see a change when you move a document from one to the other, and that temporarily (while an image crosses both monitors) you see quite a difference in it.
If you drag an image in a non-color-managed application across both monitors, so that specifically part of it is shown on one and part on the other, how different do they look?
Using fireworks or MSpaint or IExplore, an image looks pretty much exactly the same on either monitor as well as when spanning accross both.
The two monitors are clibrated so that all colors match on both monitors.
http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/
The Cintiq has a better contrast ratio so the whites are slightly brighter.
But!!! If the moitors were not calibrated, then a fireworks image would look different on each screen. In fact they look exactly the same on both.
Even when the image spans accross the two screens.
It is only Photoshop that darkens the part of the image that hangs onto the Cintiq. And it is very dark.
Even in the famed "Monitor mode", the image is much darker than is is in IIE or MSPaint or Fireworks.
I dont want to disable the color profiling, as it is important to see what the target will look like.
But i do want to see what the target will look like! right now it is way to dark. No matter what profile i choose.
Also my examples are more to demonstrate the comparrison between the two monitors, but the goal is to get PS CS4 to work on the centiq. It would be nice to have the navigator and some panels on the other monitor and have the colors match, but more important is to have the colors on the cintiq look normal at all!
Thanks so far. but we are still messed up.
Jerry C

2nd monitor color management: Ps v Lr

Please help me understand the following problem ... but first, my hardware: Macbook Air (mid-2011) with OS X 10.8, with a NEC wide gamut P221W monitor connected as a secondary display. The NEC display is calibrated with Spectraview and an X-rite eye-one display sensor.
I usually work with Lightroom 4 exclusively, but I will on occassion turn to Photoshop CS5 for working with layers. I've configured Lr for using Ps as a alternate editor and Lr is supposed to create a PSD file, 16bit and embed ProphotoRGB as it working color space. The problem is, these exported PSD images appear undersaturated on the NEC display ... but examining the PSD data implies PpRGB. Ps is configured for AdobeRGB, but appropriately asks about the mismatch, and I select use PpRGB These undersaturated colors are in contrast with how Lr displays the same image on the same monitor. Also, if I put both images on the Macbook primary display (Lr in the background, Ps in front), the colors appear to be the same. Also, if I quit both programs and open Ps only and then load the recent image, the colors will appear with correct saturation ...
I can only conclude that Lr interferes with Ps properly compensating via the NEC's display profile ... and therefore I'll need to close Lr when editing with Ps. Has this behaviour been verified by anyone else? Is there a remedy??
TIA & Cheerios from the Avalon

>it shows the mismatch dialogue box: Embedded Adobe RGB 1998, Working: Monitor3-7-08.
Ow, this means you have Photoshop set up incorrectly. Go to Edit->Color settings and make sure that the top-profile (RGB) says adobeRGB. You should never have a monitor profile there except if you're a web designer.
>DYP, you can change LR colour space to other than ProPhoto as default.
No you cannot. You can only change the default profile Lightroom uses to send to Photoshop. Lightroom ALWAYS uses a prophotoRGB-like working space internally for every picture.
>I set it to Adobe RGB to sync with camera and PS.
If you shoot RAW, the in-camera setting does not matter and Lightroom will render as wide as prophotoRGB.
>Would changing to ProPhoto colour space not cancel my calibrated monitor profile? Or am I misunderstanding the principles behind monitor calibration?
No, they have nothing to do with each other. Color managed apps automatically translate between their working space and the monitor profile. This capability is the basic meaning of being color managed. They get the information about the monitor profile from the OS. You never have to tell them about it. Photoshop just knows it. You do not have to set it up anywhere.

Dual monitor color issue - oversaturated image in CS4

Hi, I wonder if you can help. I found people having similar issues, but never seen an actual answer, so your input would be greatly appreciated.
My set-up:
MacBook Pro Dual Core intel based 15.4 2.6GHz running OS X 10.5.6 - also my primary display
HP LP2475- secondary display
CS4
Both monitors were calibrated using X-rite Eye-one LT (each with a separate profile)
I've tried calibrating each monitor 3 times and still get the proble,
My problem:
Running in dual monitor mode in bridge or safari/firefox- no problems at all: almost consistent colour between both monitors.
When I open the images in Photoshop CS4, they look fine on my MacBook screen, but when I drag them over to the HP the color is grossly oversaturated - especially in the red. What am I doing wrong? (in fact on the HP monitor, the color looks perfect in bridge but super insanely saturated in CS4)
Does anyone have a clue on how I can fix this?
Thanks!

You say your running 10.5.6? Why haven't you updated to 10.5.8?
FWIW, I never had color issues under 10.5.X, however I have since upgrade to 10.6.
See the thread I started in which Adobe responded:
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/483359

Monitor color management: can somebody help? thx

Strange thing happened today on my PC, I hope someone can help…
Pdf files has strange color shift in Acrobat 8 and Reader 9 as well, Win XP. The change came suddenly. On other PCs the same files look fine. JPGs, video and other files are OK.
I compared settings Preferences/Documents and /Color management and didn’t find any differences - all are defaults. I re-installed both programs, no change.
Have a look at the picture, left is the correct version, right is from my PC:
Thanx for any suggestions
Martin

More than likely a corrupt monitor profile.
Re-calibrate and profile your monitor (which will create a new monitor profile.)

Aperture Dual Monitor Color Profile Problem

I have 'discovered' an interesting problem when using my MBP with a Cintq tablet as a secondary monitor. The displayed colors agree very well in Aperture until I go to full screen and then the laptop monitor develops a greenish tint. I have tried all the different secondary display options, and in all cases where an image is displayed on both monitors the tint develops. It goes away as soon as full screen is exited. The Thunderbolt port is being used to feed the display to the Cintq (with a thunderbolt to DVI (?) adapter. I would guess that the laptop must grap the cintiq profile as soon as it goes to full screen.
In perusing the discussion group I see similar problems were reported in the past. It persists with the latewt MBP and thunderbolt, and latest build of Aperture.

I have no real answer except to say that on an older setup pre-Aperture I never did get the Cintiq 15 color well managed. I used the Cintiq mostly for palettes in Photoshop.
-Allen

Photoshop CS3 doesn't like "Lenovo ThinkPad LCD Monitor" color management profile

When launching Photoshop CS3 Extended, I get a warning:
The monitor profile "Lenovo ThinkPad LCD Monitor" appears to be defective. Please rerun your monitor calibration software.
[Ignore Profile] [Use Anyway]
If this can be confirmed, could it please be the target of a minor update/patch?
This recent T61p 15.4" WSXGA+ notbook's monitor is honestly pretty bad in terms of color accuracy. The overall sense is very blue; yellows show up orange. Is this normal? But that's really a side issue. I do most of my work on an external monitor anyway.
Solved!
Go to Solution.

Thank you very kindly, Erik; my searches hadn't found that. However, my T61p appears to already have that software -- not surprising as that was released in December and this notebook was built about a month ago.
I tried the instructions given, but Windows said my computer was already up-to-date. I suppose I could try uninstalling what the computer came with and reinstalling the download...
[Edit 1]
Ah, wait... I retried it from the device manager instead of display properties -- here, I could be sure I was picking the proper "monitor" (the display properties showed only my external monitor). It did instal... said I had version 4.0 and v 4.1 has the "fix" according to the readme.
It wants me to reboot. I'll post again if somehow that didn't do it.
Message Edited by davidhbrown on 04-21-2008 09:36 AM
[Edit 2]
Yes, indeed... Photoshop no longer complains. So, I wonder why this isn't in the software build or at least in the updates I've been faithfully downloading. But thanks again, Erik.
Message Edited by davidhbrown on 04-21-2008 09:47 AM

MacBook Pro, dual Monitor color shift with Photoshop CS4, OS 10.5.5

I'm observing a strange behavior: With PS CS3 i could just drag an image from
the laptop monitor to the external Eizo and the color would adjust instantly, with
consistent color (All monitors calibrated, no settings have changed). The same applies to Lightroom
2.0 too. Now when i do the same move with the same image opened in PS CS4 the color does not
adjust to match but stays the same and the result is a oversaturated image on the external monitor.
Any thoughts? Thanks, Mark

It should adjust to the display the same as CS3.
Have you tried turning off OpenGL image display?
(it could be a bug, or a driver issue)

Photoshop CS5 Mac Dual Monitor color problems

Hi all,
I know this problem has been raised before, but I can't seem to find a definitive answer - there is a lot of conjecture and opposing opinions so I'm trying to get to the bottom of this once and for all.
Gear: MacBook Pro, Photoshop CS5, Wacom Cintiq 12WX as second display, Mac OS X 10.7.4
Problem: Photoshop seems to only use the Monitor Profile of the main display (i.e. the one with the menu bar in System Preferences>Displays>Arrangement) - some people say yes, this is the case, some people say no, Photoshop uses independent profiles for each display.
Manifestation: If I set my MacBook screen to the main display, color looks good in Photoshop on the MacBook and terrible on the Wacom and vice-versa. However, in Lightroom and other applications changing the main display makes no difference to the output on each display.
Preferred solution: I would like to have my MacBook as my main display with menu bars and dock etc, but then I want the Cintiq to be the display I use in Photoshop, for obvious reasons. In my workflow, I would like to have my image open in 2 windows, one on the Cintiq for retouching and one on the MacBook to check progress and color etc
Curveball: I have a trial of CS6 and the problem seems to be fixed (maybe, my eyes and sense of reason are fried)
Many thanks for any help anyone can shed
Simon

Make sure you have all the updates installed for Photoshop.
Apple introduced new bugs in their display and window update pipelines in 10.7, which we didn't get a chance to completely work around until Photoshop CS6.
We tried to work around them as best we could in the dot releases for CS5.

Dual monitors screen management after disconnecting 2nd monitor

I have a 2nd monitor attached to my iMac and if open an app Window on the 2nd monitor the next time I start the app the Window always defaults to the 2nd monitor (even if the 2nd monitor is turned off). Since I don't always remember that the app was opened on the 2nd monitor I would like a way to force the app to default to the primary monitor so I don't always need to turn on the 2nd monitor to move the Window to the primary monitor.
I have tried using spaces for this but it does not seem to work.

Oups.. I got it Just switched the menu bar, when I shoud have switched displays... Mouse was moving to second monitor from left instead of right... Fixed.

Dual monitors, ICC profiles, color management...problems

Problem:
An image displayed in Safari and then pulled off the web into Photoshop shifts colors noticeably. This is esp. apparent in a side-by-side comparison on the same monitor with the Safari window open next to the Photoshop file window…they look very different.
Possible clues?
When I drag an image in Photoshop from one monitor to the other it shifts color after I release the mouse. In my two-monitor setup one is a large LCD (that's the "main" one) and the other is a MacBook Pro laptop. Even though they both have ICC profiles the laptop is slightly more saturated than the LCD…and Photoshop seems to mirror this but exaggerate it. For example: I pull the same image pulled off the web into two separate Photoshop files and then I display one on each screen: the one on the laptop will be /much/ more saturated than the one on the LCD.
In the end, if I have 4 windows open of the exact same image (2 on each screen: one in Photoshop and one in Safari) I am looking at 4 differently colored images - with the Photoshop images appearing even more exaggeratedly different than anything.
Obviously I understand that the two monitors will never look identical, but Photoshop seems to be imposing some extra color management on my files that makes it impossible to use with my previously very helpful dual-monitor setup.
Specs:
- Dual monitor setup: both are calibrated using an i1Display 2 from x-rite and have their own different profiles (this is new as of this week)
- Mac OS 10.6.6 (w/all current updates)
- Photoshop CS3 10.0.1 (w/all current updates) :: Edit>Color Settings : set to North America General Purpose 2
Help?

Just read this entire thread and wanted to leave a few comments and qualifications, first a couple of FACTS for all to consider.
1) I am not "new" to color management - in fact I am quite experienced in color management at a commercial level since the days of film back when getting "accurate color" was actually difficult. At this point it should be easy if the involved software is working correctly and impossible if it is not.
2) I have the top of the line color management solution provided by one of the top players in the color management market and am using it properly as verified by their technicians.
3) I am running 10.6 on my main computers. Mac Pro, 2 27inch iMac sandy bridge quad cores, and am using mac cinema displays (new ones) on all of them.
Now the rant - I have been trying to run down this or a similar and related issue for over a year. If you happen to be experiencing the same issue as I am, which I will summarize as trying to get 2 displays to display anywhere near the same color (even identical monitors) do not bother upgrading to CS5 as I am using CS5 as well as a bunch of other tools (Aperture, LR, etc, etc) - this is BROKEN and all I can get from any of the vendors involved is finger pointing from one to the other. Each of them wants to blame the other vendor for not doing something correctly but NONE of them can actually give me any details as to what exactly is the problem.
At this point in time I am holding the color management vendor I use to create the profiles responsible - the reason that I am doing that has nothing to do with what exactly the technical problem is. It s purely because they claim that the product is compatible with OS 10.6 and they claim that their software does EXACTLY what I want = mach two monitors. Now we all know that different monitors have slightly different gamuts but at the end of the day if two identical colors fall within the gamut of both monitors they should display the same. They don't. I have worked with my color management vendor for 6 months on this, they agree that it is not working properly, they blame apple but they cannot tell me exactly what the issue is.
If a company advertises and sells a product they claim to be compatible with a particular brand and version of hardware and software and they claim that it will manage color consistency across multiple monitors (even on differing machines) then I believe they are ultimately accountable for ensuring it actually works and resolving the issue - whatever it is, if it fails to function properly.
RB

Bug - Color Management Photoshop 11 and OS X 10.6 Dual Monitors

I need to know if it's just me, or others are seeing this.
Color management doesn't seem to work properly on dual monitors (MBP + Dell 2408) with Photoshop 11/CS4 and 10.6.
Each of my monitors is independently calibrated and all other apps work fine. For reference Lightroom 2.4/Preview 5.0/FireFox 3.5.2 all render properly across both monitors. Under 10.5 Preview 4.X did not render properly across two monitors, I was so happy in 10.6 it finally did, but PS is WAY more important so I'm kinda bummed.
Anyway, this seems to only happen on the 2nd monitor. If I move the menu bar (Prefs/Displays/Arrangement) to the external monitor making it primary monitor then it works for that monitor, but no longer for the laptop display. Photoshop render images on the 2nd monitor way washed out, but normally on the primary.
Photoshop 11.0.1 worked fine for me on dual monitors under 10.5.

So if you've read the links above regarding the "default monitor" issue, people have suggested that a potential workaround is to go to System Preferences>Displays>Arrangement>drag the menu bar from the first diplay to the second
Essentially you make your secondary monitor the default display.
For me what this does to PS is that it now displays the matching colors to Lr in the secondary display (which is now the default display with the menu bar at the top), BUT! when I drag the PS window back into my MacBook display it appears OVERLY saturated...
Strangely Lr appears the same in both windows, AND MORE IMPORTANTLY with the same colors, saturation, brightness, just as it did before I made my Dell 2405FPW the default display. Basically, Lr hasn't shifted in color from display to display or even from display to display after making the secondary monitor my new default display. It has retained the same integrity of colors through all these changes.
Which begs the question, if Lr can't handle dual displays and always uses the color profile of the display it begins in (starts running in), then why does it never shift in color and still look exactly the same after I've made my Dell 2405FPW my primary display?
And actually, if you look really really carefully, Lr DOES produce a color shift between displays as you drag it from one screen to the next. It's extremely fast and happens pretty much as you get 0.5 to 1 inch of the window into the secondary display. It's subtle on my monitor too, which leads me to believe that it performs this color correction properly, quickly, and seamlessly.
What if, my Photoshop 10.0 (old version of CS3) is not registering and understanding the secondary display's color profile correctly? What if it really is PS's fault because everything else looks right? Maybe the issue I'm having is different from what others are experiencing, after all we're in 10.6 now and most of these issues were reported in 10.4 and 10.5? I should probably upgrade my PS CS3 and see what happens?
jb, what version of PS do you have?

DUAL MONITOR BUG: One Picture – One Monitor – Different Colors!

There have been several threads discussing that Photoshop CS4 and OS 10.6. show wrong colors in dual monitor setups.
The first one to prove this with a screen capture was jb510-LJ0JJQ in August 2009: http://forums.adobe.com/message/2207312#2207312
Eight months and three OS updates later the problem is still there and makes professional work with more than one monitor a nuisance.
Here's another actual example: A picture and its 100% identical copy showing different colors on one screen!
Here's how to repeat it – try this at home ;-)
1) In the finder make a copy of a rgb picture.
2) Open one of the two identical pics in photoshop.
3) Drag it to the other monitor.
When releasing the mouse button you may see the bug already: the colors will "switch".
4) To verify this go to system presets - monitors - and change the primary monitor (by dragging the menu bar to the other)
5) Now open the identical copy you made in step 1) and see the difference!
Here's a synopsis of suggested workarounds:
1) disable open GL (which seem to makes no difference on my setup)
2) click "desaturate monitor colors" but set desaturation to 0 (which prevents visual switching in step 3) (only if openGL is ON) but also leads to a wrong display in step 4+5
3) make the hardware calibrated monitor your default monitor and strictly avoid changes or dragging pics to the other monitor (which seems to be the only reliable method)
4) some guys even force both monitors to use the profile of their hardware-calibrated monitor (using color sync) to make sure they see what they should see on at least that one monitor. What a stone-age workaround for the the world's leading imaging program!
Considering that reliable colors in professional (=multi monitor) settings should be the most basic function of photoshop this mayor malfunction should be solved with CS5! Otherwise we might have to live with it for some more years...
Have Adobe and Apple realized this bug and on their agenda? Will it be gone with OS 10.6.3? Can anyone explain the reasons for this bad bug? Is there a "officially" recommended workaround?
Thanks, regards,
Eric

There have been several threads dealing with this malfunction. But most faded out in silence or acceptance of the workarounds.
http://forums.adobe.com/message/2207312#2207312
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/521483
http://forums.adobe.com/message/2272192#2272192
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/311761?start=0&tstart=0
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/618927?tstart=60
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/603992?tstart=90
http://www.wetcanvas.com/forums/showthread.php?t=552977
http://www.hilfdirselbst.ch/gforum/gforum.cgi?post=368889?search_string=zwei%20monitor#368 889
But man, this is no minor bug! Consistent colors are the by far most important basic function of photoshop. If you cannot rely on the colors in photoshop you can as well use "Preview" and "Word" for print production ;-)
Carson, how did Apple react to your complaint? What do you mean with "they don't get it". Do they not see it? Or can't they get it right?
Shall we open a thread at apple forums to point out that it's not the problem of a single user?

VISTA color management and monitor calibration

Elements 7.0
VISTA Home Premium SP1
Nvidia 8600
Samsung SyncMaster 213T
Canon XSi
Multiple printers
Since getting new system with Vista, I haven't been able to get a print that looks like my screen. I tried Costco today and everything was much darker than I expected, but the reds were much richer. I read a lot about calibrating my monitor, but it is possible that there is more do it than that? Learning to adjust skin tone etc. in Photoshop, only to have the prints look bad is pretty frustrating.
Is the other option to invest in a quality printer, or go to a real lab instead of Costco?
Please use small words, since I'm not a professional.
Regards,
Michael

Michael, color management is certainly a difficult issue to perfect. My monitor is color calibrated but it doesn't guarantee that the prints will match. With the same image, I get different results from different printers and labs. I get the best results from labs in the local camera/photo shops, and the pricing for enlargements is still on par with like Snapfish or Kodak.
Check this setting in PSE: Edit>Color Settings...>Always Optimize for Printing. I would suggest color calibrating your monitor, then try different labs until you find the best results.

Accurate proof with inaccurate monitor? [color management question]

At the risk of sounding really dumb, here goes:
I have never had a true color managed workflow despite dabbling in it and even delving into custom profiling.
I don't want to shut the windows in my upstairs office and be dependent on unnatural light sources. I'm content to design knowing that what's on my monitor is not accurate.
But I do want to be able to print my own inkjet proofs and know that what I see on paper is at least 90% accurate to what I'll get off press. And I want to try my best to provide clients with PDF proofs that come as close as possible to press. (This last bit's probably a pipe dream given that the clients don't have calibrated monitors, but perhaps Acrobat 9's new Overprint Preview default settings will help somewhat?)
Is this realistic? Everything I know about color management starts with monitor calibration and I'm reluctant to take that step for fear of working in a cave-like environment.
Would love to hear thoughts from the community.

I'm still using my Sony Artisan, and dreading the day it fails to calibrate, but I'm definitely in the minority now. Adobe Gamma is useless for LCDs, and no longer ships, but the modern hardwares solutions are all supposed to be compatible. I suspect you'll get good results with a good monitor.
As far as being worthwhile, absolutely. My office uses North light and daylight balanced fluorescent lighting, so there isn't a harsh color change through the day. Things are probably most accurate at the time of day when the calibration was last done, but they are definitely better any time than they would be without it.
Peter

Dual-monitor color management?

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