Monitor ICC Profiles

Greetings Adobe People!
I've been working with Photoshop since version 6.0, I know people quite often use that as bragging rights and I guess, that's what I'm doing, please forgive mefor doing so. Just trying to state in some term that I think I'm somewhat wise in a few of the ways of :Photoshop. I've read a few books here and there about what I should do for monitor ICC Profiles, I have a Gretag Macbeth, Eye-One Display 2 and I use it to calibrate my laptop and desktop monitor every couple of weeks. I stumbled upon an old picture I had made for some friends in CS2 I believe, a few years back, when I didn't have my Gretag and I was *GASP* calibrating my monitor using Adobe Gamma! When I load the psd file the colors are vibrant and stunning, when I load the associated jpg the colors are dull and extremely muted. Now I'm using Adobe RGB 1998, we could go on all day about sRGB and Adobe RGB and the slew of others that are out there, but at the end of the day it's really just personal preference, much like football fans or people who bicker over why X sports car is better than Y road car, what I'm asking is just keep it to your self if you don't mind doing so. If I select the most recent of my monitor profiles the colors return to there natural glory in both the jpg and the psd file, but I've heard for printing you need to have your RGB set to either sRGB or Adobe RGB 1998 and then print from your printer profile... When I do go to print I've got it down to a pretty good science of getting things done, so it doesn't take me too long to do it and I really don't pay too much attention anymore as to what I'm doing. I could go through the steps here, but I'm sure those that are familiar with it, know what I'm talking about. So all of this typing is leading to this, is it ok to just use my monitor profile for my main profile or should I stick with Adobe RGB 1998 and if I stick with Adobe RGB 1998, how can I get the muted colors to show up like they do in the psd file for the jpg file. Sorry for typing so much, and please take all the time you need to get back to me, I'm in no rush at all... Take care!
- Me

Keep using your EyeOne to calibrate, but don't use that monitor profile as a working space. That's not what it was designed for. Stick with the sRGB or Adobe RGB as your working space. As to your legacy file, this is where the Assign Profile can come into good use. Try using Assign Profile to find the working space that makes your old file looks its best. Then you can either leave it in that space or convert to your preferred working space. As to printing, it won't make a hell of a lot of difference whether you use Adobe RGB, sRGB or something else. It's more important that you've properly calibrated and that you are using a good (preferably custom) printer profile while printing.

Similar Messages

2nd Monitor ICC profile in Acrobat 9

Hi,
I have problem with iMac24" dual monitor setup and Acrobat 9 Pro. I can't get the second monitor ICC profile applied to the pdf document when dragged to the the second monitor. Had the same problem with PhotoShop CS4. I spent several day to figure out why the second monitor looks totally over saturated with PS CS4 (looked fine with PS CS3) and yes indeed the solution was to turn OFF OpenGL in PS preferences. Still have the same problem with Acrobat 9 Pro. When the document is dragged to other monitor the ICC profile of that monitor is not applied. Any idea how to get that working as I can't find the OpenGL setting in Acrobat 9 . I have iMac24" and HP LP2475w as a secondary monitor which is wide gamut monitor which is far too over saturated without proper ICC. Any ideas?

Jao...
Does the secondary monitor always assume it will open in the monitor which WinXP defines in settings as '2'?
The reason I ask, is that if I have the secondary monitor open as "full screen" it opens on the 2nd monitor.
However, I have a slightly different set up. I have my primary LR space stretched some into the 2nd monitor, so that the right hand panels are on the second screen. This gives me a larger space to view the images on the main screen. When I open the secondary LR space, it is not full screen, but sized to just fit in the rest of the available space on the second monitor....and I usually use this space for the 'grid' of thumbnails.
My concern is that if the secondary LR space is even slightly larger than the available space on the secondary monitor, it will pop up in the middle of the primary monitor. After much trial and error, I found the sizing solution and it works....
However, since it seems to open either in #1 or #2 screen, I still have this nagging question....and there is no way I know to query LR to know what ICC profile is being used.
Thanks...JOHN

Aperture and dual monitor ICC profile problem

I am using an Epson Stylus Pro 3800 and run Aperture 2.1 from a MBP with a Cinema Display 23". I calibrated both displays (the 23" and the MBP display) with my ancient but working ColorVision Spyder, using OptiCal 3.7. I calibrated for a gamma of 2.2. and native white point. I check the results with various test images.
Here is the problem: the calibration produces a perfectly calibrated display, but when I open Aperture some color change is taking place, as if Aperture pulls in a wrong profile for the display (which then also leads to wrong colors in the prints): sometimes the photo which I have printed out before in perfect quality displays with either a nasty yellow cast or with totally oversaturated colors. I have used ColorSync utility to make the 23" the default display and I have also tried to simply close the MBP to work only with the 23", and sometimes either of these this did the trick. Most of the times, however, I get these color casts or oversaturation of the photos which I had worked on for a while and printed earlier with perfection.
I ran Disk Utility to Repair Disk Permissions (many Epson-related permissions were wrong, for example "Library/Printers/EPSON/InkjetPrinter/Libraries/UtilityCore.framework/Versions/ A/Resources/Icon8007.png", should be -rw-rw-r-- , they are -rwxrwxr-x ) and reinstalled the latest Epson driver for 10.5 repeatedly.
Even more surprising, at times the color of the full screen image can be off at the same time the thumbnail looks perfect! How is this possible? It seems as if thumbnail and full image use different display profiles. In addition, if I export the Master and display it in Lightroom or CS2 it looks perfectly fine and prints as expected. (I use the appropriate "canned" ICC profiles for the printer-paper combination).
The most surprising happens, however, when I drag the image from the 23" to the MBP: when the image is about half-way between the two displays (that is, one part is displayed on the 23", the other on the MBP scree) it suddenly changes from off-color or oversaturated to the correct color on the 23". If I then move the image up to the 23" again, the wrong display colors appear again.
I am at a loss: I have spent a lot of money on the gorgeous screen, the great printer, and Aperture (which is a great program), but I cannot get Aperture to print reliably, or rather, I cannot get Aperture to use the right display profile to display the image correctly in a reliable way.
I have read kbeat's color management blog and many entries on this blog here, but I have not found a solution. I appreciate your help.

Kai,Simon,
This is the problem i have been having.Colour profiling is correct,prints are rubbish.I run a fuji frontier
as well as epson printers.Anything from aperture is not what you see on screen.I am running aperture2.1.
Today we are removing 2.1 and doing a reinstall of 1.1 but not upgrading to 2 to test run prints.I have been looking for answers to this for sometime.
Simon,the problems we are have are very similar to you clients,photoshop fine,aperture not.I also have 20"external apple monitor attached which is used as the colour correcting monitor ( as the imac screen is not that good for criticl work ) I will post my findings here.
Simon, if you wish to investigate further,e-mail me,i am in leeds
daisy ( not a happy printer )

Multiple monitor ICC profile bug

After considerable head scratching and testing I discovered that PS CS4 11.0.1 (Mac OSX 10.5.7) uses the colour profile of the primary monitor for the second monitor too. You may not notice this if your 2 monitors have similar profiles but you are still not getting the right results!
If you want to work on a second monitor then a workaround is to set the profile of that monitor as the profile for the first monitor too in the OS. That works, but I hope Adobe fixes this ASAP!

I spent several day to figure out why to second monitor looks totally over saturated with PS CS4 (looked fine with PS CS3) and yes indeed the solution was to turn OFF OpenGL in PS preferences. Still have the same problem with Acrobat 9 Pro. When the document is dragged to other monitor the ICC profile of that monitor is not applied. Any idea how to get that working as I can't find the OpenGL setting in Acrobat . I have iMac24" and HP LP2475w as a secondary monitor which is wide gamut monitor which is far too over saturated without proper ICC. Any ideas?

2nd monitor ICC profile?

When using the dual monitor support in LR2, if it is opened in the 2nd monitor, is it aware of the different icc profile for this monitor or does it use the profile of the primary monitor?
Can you manually change the profile used?
Can you interrogate LR (main screen and/or dual screen) to see what profile is being used?
I am using WinXP, but the video card I use looks like two cards and windows has a different default profile for each. Many cards do not do that, which is where being able to manually enter an icc profile would be useful.
John

Jao...
Does the secondary monitor always assume it will open in the monitor which WinXP defines in settings as '2'?
The reason I ask, is that if I have the secondary monitor open as "full screen" it opens on the 2nd monitor.
However, I have a slightly different set up. I have my primary LR space stretched some into the 2nd monitor, so that the right hand panels are on the second screen. This gives me a larger space to view the images on the main screen. When I open the secondary LR space, it is not full screen, but sized to just fit in the rest of the available space on the second monitor....and I usually use this space for the 'grid' of thumbnails.
My concern is that if the secondary LR space is even slightly larger than the available space on the secondary monitor, it will pop up in the middle of the primary monitor. After much trial and error, I found the sizing solution and it works....
However, since it seems to open either in #1 or #2 screen, I still have this nagging question....and there is no way I know to query LR to know what ICC profile is being used.
Thanks...JOHN

Dual Monitor ICC Profiles

Has anyone had luck setting up ICC profiles for dual monitors? I have created ICC profiles for both my Cinema display and MacBook Pro display but cannot get them to work at the same time. Once I set up an extended desktop my Cinema display grabs onto the correct profile but the laptop won't. Any suggestions?
Thanks....

Keep using your EyeOne to calibrate, but don't use that monitor profile as a working space. That's not what it was designed for. Stick with the sRGB or Adobe RGB as your working space. As to your legacy file, this is where the Assign Profile can come into good use. Try using Assign Profile to find the working space that makes your old file looks its best. Then you can either leave it in that space or convert to your preferred working space. As to printing, it won't make a hell of a lot of difference whether you use Adobe RGB, sRGB or something else. It's more important that you've properly calibrated and that you are using a good (preferably custom) printer profile while printing.

Monitor ICC profile supported with Adobe Reader?

Hi, I know Reader supports reading of input ICC color profiles like in embedded pictures (sRGB, Adobe RGB, etc.), but it seems it doesn't support outputting to the monitor's ICC profile. Is there a way to do this? I have used Reader 8 and 9. I need to properly preview the files, and sometimes print them.
Thanks.

Adobe Acrobat's latest version can run on 10.5.8, given the constraints listed on http://www.adobe.com/products/reader/tech-specs.html.
You can upgrade to Mac OS X 10.7.4 if all your software and hardware meets the requirements.
Acrobat 8.1 is the version designed by http://www.adobe.com/ as both PowerPC Mac and Intel Mac
compatible around the same time as 10.5 was released.
See this tip for Mac OS X 10.6, and this one for 10.7 upgrade options.

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

Searching for a monitor icc profile for a Satellite M60-139

i'm a grafic-designer useing a Satellite M60-139 - and therefor i need a color-profile for my Satellite M60-139-display - has anybody an idea where from i can get one?

Hi,
From what I understand, you do not need to download or install any color profiles. It is exactly what the name implies, a profile. One you create and save on your computer. It can also be used to set different color profiles for different monitors. If you right click desktop, and then select the tab on the far right, then click advanced. Under advanced go to color management, and then click add, at which point it will give you a list of predefined color profiles. You can select the one closest to what you need and modify it to your specifications, and then save it. I hope this helps, if not, I can google around and see if there are any predifined on the internet to download, but I found none so far. Let me know how it goes.
Googling around, I found this website with some ICC's you can download. I hope you find the one you need.
http://www.serendipity-software.com.au/support/download/icc/monitor/generic+equipment/
Message was edited by: [email protected]

Monitor profiling & ICC profile management in VMware virtual machines?

Greetings,
I'm successfully running Photoshop CC in Windows 7 on bare metal PCs. To support that, I profile/calibrate my monitors with Datacolor Spyder4Elite and print with Qimage. Photoshop, Spyder4, and Qimage all create and/or install ICC profiles. Does any/all of that function correctly within virtual machines hosted by VMware Workstation (v9.0.2, specifically)? Datacolor's Spyder4Elite, for example, relies upon periodic reloading of the LUT (Look-Up Table) of the graphics adapter. The other apps I mention ask Windows to use ICC profiles. Can I successfully move all of these workflow elements into virtual machines?
Thanks in advance for your assistance.

No, actually the System Default stayed the same, but the ACER profile showed up in the Devices panel. However, [ ] Use My Settings was NOT checked, implying they found some way to install the profile that's outside the normal configuration settings somewhere between the Advanced and Devices level configuration.
The fix is to check the [ ] Use My Settings box, add the profile one wants to use in the Devices panel, and [Set as Default Profile]. This overrides the setting above.
-Noel

HELP! Newly calibrated monitor loses ICC profile setting while computer is on, in middle of editing!

I'm so frustrated!!! Just a few days ago I calibrated my monitor with my new Huey Pro. Today in the middle of the computer being on for hours, at some point, without my knowing it, the ICC profile shifted from the new, calibrated setting BACK to the old default profile!! I didn't realize it and went about editing ... messed up so many files!
I'm using Windows Vista x64 and I've read about this happening to other Vista users, but does anyone know how I can FIX this?? I'm totally overwhelmed at this point. Thanks for you help.

Ans to Q1 - Macintosh HD 1/Library/Printers/EPSON/InkjetPrinter/ICCProfiles/ contains installed with driver and Macintosh HD 1/Library/Colorsync/Profiles were installed by the download.
Ans to Q2 - Epson put them inside the "package" to keep them safe. You can access the package contents via the Ctrl+click or right+click context menu item labelled "Show package contents" (see attached screenshot), but I would
strongly urge you not to remove them from the package. You really don't need to care where they are because they're in the safest place. It's when folk try to get smart that the system bites them.

Help Photoshop/Monitor Calibration and ICC Profiles.

I don't know if this is the right place to ask this, I am completely new here, if I am not, can you help show me where I can get answers to this?
If you can help me, then please. (:
So I'm helping my dad with a photography studio over the summer to make money for a car and I will be doing the editing and such.
I have CS4 on a laptop, that is connected to a NEC monitor with Multisync P221W with the Spectraview II calibration software.
We have done a few pictures before but it has always taken us a few prints from the costco photo center to get the colors and lighting right because
it always seems to be different than how I see it on the monitor. I have been told install the ICC profiles from http://www.drycreekphoto.com/icc/Profiles/California_profiles.htm#CA . I live in the victorville area, and there are 4 ICC profiles, 2 for each printer. How do I install all 4? And how do I switch from one to the other? Also how do I set up my NEC monitor for photo editing, the Spectraview program calibrates it and says that it's set up for Photo editing but are there standard values for the colors, gamma, etc? And also how do I set up Photoshop CS4 for editing, I have been told to go to color settings but I don't know what to do once I get there.
Thanks for your time.

Apparently photoshop is applying additional color correction on top of
what the monitor calibration software has already done. Is this
necessary? If this step is necessary, then why doesn't the monitor
calibration software do that, so that photoshop doesn't have to,
Photoshop doesn't apply any color correction to the images per se, it just operates in a selected color space, and takes into account your monitor profile.
The monitor calibration tells your video card - or the monitor itself for some high end monitors, how it should be set to meet chosen targets, and generates a profile for the monitor.
1. Caibrate your monitor and generate a profile
2. Tell your OS that that it your monitor profile
3. Set Photoshop to work in the space of your choice - sRGB, Adobe RGB, or ProPhoto 99% of the time
That takes you to a state where everything is in order more or less. If at this point your images look out of whack, it's almost certainly because they are, perhaps because they were previously corrected on a non-calibrated setup.
Photoshop and other color managed application should display them all more or less exactly the same, provided the files themselves have a color profile .

PS CS5 Image Display Differs From Used ICC Profile In Win 7

Hi,
on my Windows 7 Ultimate x64 machine, I just calibrated my Dell SP2309W monitor using an i1DisplayPro and basICColor 5, creating a ICC v2 profile (I am aware of the problems under Windows with ICC v4 profiles).
It created the ICC profile and applied it to be used by Windows. I double checked under COLOR MANAGEMENT that the new ICC profile is being used. Although I can see that the new ICC is being used (desktop appearance changes), there are a few issues I am experiencing:
(1.) Windows Photo Viewer
The thumbnails in Windpows Explorer look fine (they DO use the new ICC profile), when I double click a jpeg and open the image it DOES NOT use the new ICC profile. When I click the PLAY SLIDESHOW button (starting the slideshow) in the opened image in Windows Photo Viewer, the images DO use the new ICC profile.
(2.) Internet Browsers
All current internet browser (Firefox, IE, Safari and Chrome) DO use the new ICC profile and display the image correctly.
(3.) Photoshop CS 5
When I open the same image - that Windows Photo Viewer does not correctly displays (according to the new ICC profile) - in Photoshop CS5, I get the same image display that Windows Photo Viewer gives me (when not thumbnail or not in slideshow mode) - it appears to be the sRGB display.
My color settings in PS CS5 are: North America General Purpose 2 > sRGB IEC 61966-2.1.
When I go to View > Proof Setup > Monitor RGB I get the image display using the new ICC profile.
Why does the image look different in PS than my calibrated monitor should output ?
I was under the impression (please correct me if I am wrong), that the sole purpose for calibrating my monitor was to get a uniform display across (ICC aware) applications. Even when one applies different color spaces to a document in PS, I thought the output on my calibrated screen done by the graphic card should always be according to my calibration and the settings in the ICC profile being used.
What Am I doing wrong or what am I misunderstanding ?
Any help or input is appreciated !
Thanks.
- M

Hello,
A note on monitor calibration: calibrating your monitor will not guarentee that every application will display color correctly, it's more of a step along the pipeline, and for the preview part of a color workflow it's the last step. Here's how color translation follows for an ICC workflow when previewing to a monitor:
Image Color Numbers > Document Tag or Workspace Profile > Monitor Profile
For non-color managed applications, if the original document is or isn't tagged with a color profile it will be translated directly to the monitor profile anyway. This is the equivalent in Photoshop of selecting "Monitor" in soft proofing. Selecting monitor in softproofing will bypass the tagged or workspace profile to translate colors directly through the monitor profile.
For most automatic color managed applications (like Firefox), the image will be translated through the tagged profile and then sent through the monitor profile. If the image is untagged or the profile is unrecognized, the colors get sent directly to the monitor profile.
For Photoshop, a tagged document will have its profile respected and then sent to the monitor. An untagged document will be assigned the workspace profile, which acts like a temporary document profile, and then gets sent to the monitor. This is often why users will notice Photoshop behaves differently from other applications. It's usually a case of the workspace coming into play. By default the workspace profile is set to sRGB. You can change this in Edit > Color Settings.
The purpose of the workspace is originally for printing workflows, as a way of keeping consistant color translations when dealing with both tagged and untagged documents. For web output workflows it can be useful for viewing everything through sRGB, which is typical of the average monitor output (not so with newer wide-gamut monitors, another source of confusion...) combined with the fact that originally most web browsers were not color managed. Hence viewing everything through sRGB is pretty close to what most monitors see and what untagged/unmanaged docs will look like.
Monitor calibration is useful only because it brings your monitor output to a "known state". In traditional workflows the monitor was always a middle-man, a preview device which was useful for getting an idea of what the printed output would look like before you print it. Since print colorspaces are often smaller than display spaces, it's feasible and useful to narrow down the monitor/display space and calibrate it to a known state, so that even if it doesn't totally match the print, you'll get used to its differences/limitations and they'll be consistent so long as the calibration is maintained.
For web output, your final output is often another user's computer monitor, which can have any form of behavior (most standard monitors are pretty close to sRGB, or use sRGB as an operating system workspace (default monitor profile). Wide gamuts behave differently, but I'm not sure if there's a particular ICC space that they closely match, or if different wide-gamuts are even that close to each other in their display color spaces.
Hope this helps!

Preview & ICC Profiles

Hello all,
I've been digging around here and elsewhere for a huge chunk of my day, and I'm having trouble concretely answering a question: Does Preview respect embedded color profile information? If so, why can I not get Preview to display a Photoshop PDF with the same colors? I know color profiling is a huge can of worms, and I know a decent amount about it. I have consistent success with various printing presses returning proofs that are very close to what I expect. I seem, simply, to be misunderstanding the manner in which Preview displays my colors.
My monitors are calibrated, and my colors are consistent outside of this issue. Using the built-in OSX PDF creation generates a PDF that shows the exact colors in Preview as I'm seeing in Photoshop. I'm certain I'm missing something obvious. Thanks in advance for any help. I'm tired of worrying myself over my file output every time I run a quick-check in Preview.
Thanks again.

So how does color managment work in FCP X when I can´t calibrate my monitor or use icc profiles from a calibration software?

ICC profile conflicts when printing from Aperture?

I have worked with Aperture now for two years, and I still have problems printing anything that is close enough to what I see on my calibrated screen. And believe me, I have done some reading on color management and ICC profiles. I suspect that Aperture pulls in ICC color profiles in a way that doesn't allow reproducing what I see on the screen. I wonder if these problems are related to the Registered ColorSync devices: opening ColorSync Utility under Devices reveals a bunch of default printers with a diversity of profiles, even if I have no access to these printers (in part these are network printers of my previous employment). I cannot figure out how I can delete these entries: I tried to find remaining printer profiles of these printers in my files, but could not find anything. How can I delete these entries, and can these entries cause color profile conflicts?
More specificially: I work with Aperture 2.1.3 and view my photos on a calibrated 23" Cinema display, run from a MBP with 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 10.5.6, and 2GB of memory. My monitor is calibrated with a Spyder for D65 and gamma of 2.2. I print with an Epson 3800 on Epson paper.
Here is my problem: despite calibrated monitor I don't get the prints to look even remotely close to what I get on my screen. Of course, I use the correct ICC profiles for my papers, and of course I have Aperture (and not the printer) run color management. It seems, however, that my prints resemble my monitor more if I use strange profiles such as "Wide Gamut RGB" or "ProPhoto RGB" as my monitor's profile instead of the calibrated D65, gamma 2.2.
In detail, here are my regular print settings in Aperture:
Print Mode: AccuPhoto HD
Color Mode: Off (No Color Management)
Output Resolution: SuperPhoto - 1440 dpi
Advanced Color Settings: Epson Driver Color Management is Off.
In the Aperture Print menu I use under Printer Selection:
ColorSync Profile: for example, Pro38 PGPP, when I use Epson Premium Photo Paper Glossy
Black Point Compensation checked.
Gamma: 1:00
Under Layout Options I use Print Resolution: Use Best DPI
With these settings the prints look significantly colder than what I see on the screen. Of course, a certain amount of the warmth of the screen colors comes from the calibration to D65 and gamma of 2.2, but shouldn't this give me the best correspondence between the calibrated screen and the print (using of course the color management of the application with ICC profiles, not the printer driver color management)?
I tried the same in CS4 and Lightroom, but no difference. Again, the problem is not that the prints are terrible: they are just not very close to what I see on the calibrated screen.
Where do I make a mistake? All suggestions are very welcome! This is driving me crazy. Many thanks for your help!
Best,
Kai

While the technical aspects of color management are complex, they are largely irrelevant for users.
The following steps have worked well for me:
Step One: Calibrate your monitor. I use the Datacolor Spyder. This produces a monitor profile. Use System Preferences to set your monitor to use this profile. Don't use this profile for anything else and give it a clear name so that you don't confuse it with a printer profile.
Step Two: Download and install the latest drivers for your printer. Buy a small box of photo paper (gloss, semi-gloss) from the manufacturer of your printer. Make sure that you have the correct ICC profiles for this paper and printer. You are trying to establish a baseline.
Step Three: Pick an image with a reasonable range of colors and exposures. (Don't start with a "difficult" image.) Turn soft proofing off and adjust the image as desired.
Step Four: Send this image to the printer. Load up the manufacturer's paper.
Step Five: In the "print" dialog, go to the "Printer Settings" sub menu and select the correct "Quality and Media" and the appropriate setting for "photo" quality. Make sure that all of the color options are neutral. Save.
Step Six: Back on the "Print" dialog select the correct ICC profile for your paper/printer. (Careful, DON'T use the calibrated monitor profile!) Adjust other settings as required. Save and name the preset.
Step Seven: Print and Pray. (And pray I haven't missed a step - sorry I'm not at my Mac. From your initial post, it sounds like you know how to do all of this.)
The results should be reasonably close. (That is why you should use the printer manufacturer's own paper and profiles as a starting point.)
If you are happy, great - get a beer. If not, try the following, making only one change at a time:
== Turn Soft Proofing on using the profile of the paper/printer. (Don't select the profile for your monitor, or any other.) Do the screen and print match now? If so, then you know to do your adjusting with soft proofing on. Remember, soft proofing is not exact - it is merely an attempt to make your screen look like the combination of paper and printer.
== If Soft Proofing makes your monitor look LESS like the print, then don't don't use Soft Proofing.
== If the results are close, you can make fine adjustments using the "Printer Settings" sub menu and saving presents. For example; I use a lot of CostCo paper in my Canon Pixma Pro9000. CostCo says that their paper mimics Canon's Photo Paper Pro, so I use the settings and profile for that paper, but I tweek the cyans and reds a bit in printer settings.
I have found that Red River profiles are a very good match for their papers.
Hope this helps. Good luck!

Monitor ICC Profiles

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